US Patent 7428416 Handover in a cellular communication system

A cellular communication system includes first and second base stations and a user equipment. A Radio Network Controller controls a handover of the user equipment between the base stations by either forwarding data of the communication to both the first and second base stations or to only one of the first and second base stations dependent on a Quality of Service (QoS) characteristic of the communication of the user equipment. The QoS characteristic can specifically be an indication of a delay constraint for the communication service such as an indication of whether the service is a real-time service or a non-real time service.