Techniques are provided herein to enable collaborative spatial multiplexing in a wireless communication system. At M plurality of antennas of a first wireless communication device, N plurality of spatially multiplexed transmissions are received from corresponding ones of N plurality of second wireless communication devices. The first wireless communication device produces M receive signals from the transmissions received at the M plurality of antennas. The first wireless communication device applies beamforming weight vectors to the M receive signals and in so doing produces N signals or signal streams, where N is less than or equal to M. The first wireless communication device then recovers the modulated data for each of the transmissions from the N signals.