DETAILED ACTION
This Office action is in response to the amendment filed October 21, 2025.
Claims 1-43 are pending and have been examined.
Claims 1-4, 8-10, 13-16, 21-23, 26-30, 34, 36, and 37 have been amended.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Response to Amendment
Claim Objections
Claims 3, 8-14, 29-35, and 43 are objected to because of the following informalities.
Claims 8-14 and 29-35 and 43 are system claims and recite processors to execute instructions. These claims do not positively recite the instructions but only the processors. It is suggested to recite the system comprising a memory storing instructions as well as the processor to execute the instructions to perform the intended steps to avoid any potential 112 issues.
Claims 3 and recite “their properties.” It is recommended to recite “properties of the available physical devices” or similar language.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 1, line 6, recites “an API call” when a call to an API was previously introduced in the claim. It is unclear if this refers to the same API call. It is assumed for the rejections below the claim recites “the API call” instead. Claims 2-7 are rejected as being dependent on a rejected base claim.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1, 2, 6-9, 11, 12, 15, 16, 18, 21-25, 29, 30, 31, 33, 35-37, 39, 41, and 43 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Joshi (Building an Accelerated 5G CloudRAN at the Edge) [cited by Applicant] in view of Aziz (US 2019/0082040).
Regarding claim 1, Joshi discloses:
perform a plurality of fifth generation (5G) new radio operations based at least in part on an API call to perform the plurality of 5G new radio operations (see at least Aerial SDK functional blocks in figure 2; Aerial SDK, “the cuVNF SDK (CUDA-based VNFs) provides networking libraries and features to optimize packet placement and data transmission and reception, to and from the GPU memory; E2E System, “The Aerial SDK is the world’s first GPU-based, software-defined virtualized RAN. Inline acceleration reduces latency by streamlining packet movement within the ZGPU. Aerial 5G cuBB (CUDA Baseband) performs physical layer signal processing and provides transport packets to the third-party L2+ stack”); and
[…] a result of performing the plurality of 5G new radio operations using a […] network interface; and provide the results from […] the network interface (see at least Aerial SDK functional blocks in figure 2; E2E System, “Aerial 5G cuBB (CUDA Baseband) performs physical layer signal processing and provides transport packets to the third-party L2+ stack. The L2+ stack performs the MAC, RLC, and PDCP functionality that interface to the core network”)
However Joshi does not explicitly disclose, but Aziz discloses:
in response to a call to an application programming interface (API), at least: (see at least paragraphs 44 and 61, the hardware accelerators have a defined API by which the control processor may send instructions to the hardware accelerators to perform the operations; paragraphs 27 and 60, systems configured to meet high data throughput and low latency requirements of the 3GPP 5G standards)
store a result of performing the […] operations using a memory of a network interface; and provide the results from the memory of the network interface (see at least paragraph 27, one or more dedicated memories separate from the control processor memory that serve as buffers of the incoming and outgoing packets and headers and service as a component of TX and RX data paths for the packets and headers, the hardware accelerators perform operations in the TX and RX path and with the dedicated buffer memory)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Joshi by adapting the teachings of Aziz to include the use of an API to send operation calls and a network interface memory to store data. The combination allows for commands to be sent through a defined API to hardware accelerators to allow high data throughput and low latency requirements of the 5G standards (Aziz ¶27, 60, and 61).
Regarding claim 2, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated, and Joshi as modified further discloses:
receive the API call and data to perform the plurality of 5G new radio operations on one or more hardware accelerators; perform the plurality of 5G new radio operations on the one or more hardware accelerators in connection with the data; store the result of performing the plurality of 5G new radio operations using a memory of the network interface; and provide the result of performing the plurality of 5G new radio operations on the one or more hardware accelerators from the memory of the network interface (see at least Joshi figure 3, hardware accelerators; Aziz paragraphs 27, 44, 60, and 61)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Joshi by adapting the teachings of Aziz to include the use of an API to send operation calls and a network interface memory to store data. The combination allows for commands to be sent through a defined API to hardware accelerators to allow high data throughput and low latency requirements of the 5G standards (Aziz ¶27, 60, and 61).
Regarding claim 6, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations are performed on one or more graphics processing units (see at least Aerial SDK, GPU)
Regarding claim 7, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations comprise one or more operations of a downlink physical layer pipeline (see at least figure 2)
Regarding claim 11, the rejection of claim 8 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations comprise operations of one or more containerized network functions (see at least I/O Communication)
Regarding claim 12, the rejection of claim 8 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations are performed sequentially (see at least figure 2)
Regarding claim 18, the rejection of claim 15 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations are performed on one or more application-specific integrated circuits (see at least I/O Communication, SmartNICs are ASIC based)
Regarding claim 21, the rejection of claim 15 is incorporated, and Joshi as modified further discloses:
wherein the result of performing the plurality of 5G new radio operations is provided from the memory of a network interface through, at least, a fronthaul interface and one or more remote radio units (see at least Joshi figure 2; Aziz paragraph 27)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Joshi by adapting the teachings of Aziz to include the use of an API to send operation calls and a network interface memory to store data. The combination allows for commands to be sent through a defined API to hardware accelerators to allow high data throughput and low latency requirements of the 5G standards (Aziz ¶27, 60, and 61).
Regarding claim 22, Joshi discloses:
in response to a call to an application programming interface (API), at least:
perform a plurality of fifth generation (5G) new radio operations based at least in part on the API call to perform the plurality of 5G new radio operations and data from a network interface (see at least Aerial SDK functional blocks in figure 2; Aerial SDK, “the cuVNF SDK (CUDA-based VNFs) provides networking libraries and features to optimize packet placement and data transmission and reception, to and from the GPU memory; E2E System, “The Aerial SDK is the world’s first GPU-based, software-defined virtualized RAN. Inline acceleration reduces latency by streamlining packet movement within the ZGPU. Aerial 5G cuBB (CUDA Baseband) performs physical layer signal processing and provides transport packets to the third-party L2+ stack”; figure 3 and section 1, “A 5G, cloud-native, radio access network (CloudRAN) is a software-defined computing architecture that brings real0time, high0bandwidh, law-latency access to 5G communications. CloudRANs are ideal for both centralized and distributed RAN architectures.” The Aerial SDK operates in a cloud environment, so utilizing data from a network interface is inherent.);
[…] a result of performing the plurality of 5G new radio operations using a […] network interface; and provide the result from […] the network interface (see at least Aerial SDK functional blocks in figure 2; E2E System, “Aerial 5G cuBB (CUDA Baseband) performs physical layer signal processing and provides transport packets to the third-party L2+ stack. The L2+ stack performs the MAC, RLC, and PDCP functionality that interface to the core network”)
However Joshi does not explicitly disclose, but Aziz discloses:
in response to a call to an application programming interface (API), at least: (see at least paragraphs 44 and 61, the hardware accelerators have a defined API by which the control processor may send instructions to the hardware accelerators to perform the operations; paragraphs 27 and 60, systems configured to meet high data throughput and low latency requirements of the 3GPP 5G standards)
store a result of performing the […] operations using a memory of a network interface; and provide the results from the memory of the network interface (see at least paragraph 27, one or more dedicated memories separate from the control processor memory that serve as buffers of the incoming and outgoing packets and headers and service as a component of TX and RX data paths for the packets and headers, the hardware accelerators perform operations in the TX and RX path and with the dedicated buffer memory)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Joshi by adapting the teachings of Aziz to include the use of an API to send operation calls and a network interface memory to store data. The combination allows for commands to be sent through a defined API to hardware accelerators to allow high data throughput and low latency requirements of the 5G standards (Aziz ¶27, 60, and 61).
Regarding claim 24, the rejection of claim 22 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations are performed in parallel (see at least E2E System)
Regarding claim 25, the rejection of claim 22 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations comprise one or more operations of an uplink physical layer pipeline (see at least figure 2)
Regarding claim 31, the rejection of claim 29 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations comprise operations of one or more virtual network functions (see at least Aerial SDK)
Regarding claim 33, the rejection of claim 29 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the API supports at least a look-aside acceleration model and an inline acceleration model (see at least E2E system)
Regarding claim 43, the rejection of claim 29 is incorporated, and Joshi further discloses:
wherein the one or more processors comprise a graphics processing unit (GPU) to perform one or more of the plurality of fifth generation (5G) new radio operations based, at least in part, on the API call (see at least Aerial SDK, GPU )
Claims 8 and 15 are of similar scope and are rejected for the same reasons as claim 1.
Claims 9, 16, 23, 30, and 37 are of similar scope and are rejected for the same reasons as claim 1.
Claims 29 and 36 are of similar scope and are rejected for the same reasons as claim 22.
Claim 35 is of similar scope and are rejected for the same reasons as claim 21.
Claim 39 is of similar scope and are rejected for the same reasons as claim 11.
Claim 41 is of similar scope and is rejected for the same reasons as claim 24.
Claims 3-5, 10, 13, 14, 17, 19, 20, 26-28, 32, 34, 38, 40, and 42 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Joshi (Building an Accelerated 5G CloudRAN at the Edge), in view of Aziz (US 2019/0082040), and further in view of Khronos (The OpenCL Specification).
Regarding claim 3, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the API comprises an API function that, when called, causes the one or more processors to discover information about available physical devices and their properties (see at least page 41, discover OpenCL devices and their capabilities)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Joshi and Aziz by adapting the teachings of Khronos to include the use of OpenCL which includes an API implementation. The combination allows for commands to be sent through a defined API to hardware accelerators to allow high data throughput and low latency requirements of the 5G standards (Aziz ¶27, 60, and 61).
Regarding claim 4, the rejection of claim 1 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the API comprises an API function that, when called, causes the one or more processors to initialize a context data structure, wherein the context data structure comprises a memory space for one or more data objects indicating information about the plurality of 5G new radio operations (see at least page 41, create contexts for OpenCL devices; page 66, section 4.4 Contexts)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 5, the rejection of claim 4 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the one or more data objects comprise at least: a device data object; a cell data object; and a task data object (see at least page 41, create contexts for OpenCL devices; page 66, section 4.4 Contexts, page 67, contexts are used to manage objects)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 10, the rejection of claim 8 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the API comprises an API function that, when called causes the one or more processors to, destroy a data object within a context data structure (see at least page 69, release objects attached to a context)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 13, the rejection of claim 8 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the API comprises an API function that, when called, causes the one or more processors to enqueue the plurality of 5G new radio operations to be performed (see at least page 5, enqueue API call)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 14, the rejection of claim 8 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
the API comprises an API function that, when called, causes the one or more processors to dequeue the plurality of 5G new radio operations after the plurality of 5G new radio operations have been performed (see at least page 127, removing work items for processing from the queue)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 17, the rejection of claim 15 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein one or more parameters of the API call are utilized to determine how to perform the plurality of 5G new radio operations (see at least page 119, callback function with parameters)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 19, the rejection of claim 17 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the one or more parameters comprise a context pointer parameter and a slot command parameter (see at least page 119, callback function with pointer)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 20, the rejection of claim 15 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein each 5G new radio operation of the plurality of 5G new radio operations is associated with a priority value (see at least page 23, section 3.2.4)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 26, the rejection of claim 22 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the API comprises an API function that, when called, causes the one or more processors to create a data object within a context data structure (see at least page 41, create contexts for OpenCL devices; page 66, section 4.4 Contexts)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 27, the rejection of claim 22 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the API comprises an API function that, when called, causes the one or more processors to get status and attributes of a data object within a context data structure (see at least page 139, section 5.8.1, program objects within a context)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 28, the rejection of claim 22 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the API comprises an API function that, when called, causes the one or more processors to set a state of a data object within a context data structure (see at least page 139, section 5.8.1, program objects within a context)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 32, the rejection of claim 29 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein a first portion of the plurality of 5G new radio operations is performed on a first set of hardware accelerators and a second portion of the plurality of 5G new radio operations is performed on a second set of hardware accelerators (see at least page 19, coordinate command execution between one or more devices)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 34, the rejection of claim 29 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
where the API comprises an API function that, when called, causes the one or more processors to check a status of performing the plurality of 5G new radio operations (see at least page 8, event object status of operation)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 38, the rejection of claim 36 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein performing the plurality of 5G new radio operations is based at least in part on one or more parameters of the API call (see at least page 6, command; page 19, command prereqs)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 40, the rejection of claim 38 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the one or more parameters encode the plurality of 5G new radio operations (see at least page 41, section 3.4.1)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Regarding claim 42, the rejection of claim 36 is incorporated. However Joshi and Aziz do not explicitly disclose, but Khronos discloses:
wherein the plurality of 5G new radio operations are performed in an order indicated by the API call (see at least page 6, command-queue, in-order or out-of-order execution)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine Joshi, Aziz, and Khronos for the reasons listed above.
Response to Arguments
Rejection of claims under §102(a)(1) and §103:
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the claims have been fully considered but are not persuasive.
Applicant asserts that Joshi does not disclose a call to an API which causes processors to perform 5G new radio operations and the cited portions discuss an SDK which is a software development kit. Applicant states Joshi is silent regarding an API and thus cannot disclose an API call as claimed. Examiner maintains previous statements regarding Joshi, but provides explicit teachings of previously cited art as seen in the rejections above.
Also still relevant are Network Functions Virtualization figure 1 and discussion of interactions of various components which would require an API call, section 4.5.2 NFV, and Civerchia discloses 5G standards and using OpenCL to offload to FPGAs where APIs are used to interact with the hardware.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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/KIMBERLY L JORDAN/Examiner, Art Unit 2194
/KEVIN L YOUNG/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2194