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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 09/04/2025 has been entered.
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.
Claim 25 is 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.
With regards to Claim 25, the claim recites a “fifth,” “sixth,” “seventh” and “eighth” function but there is no recitation of functions 1-4.
Claim 25 seems to require the dependency of Claim 23 but it is not recited in the claim language. The examiner suggests tying the dependency of Claim 25 to Claim 23.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 23-41 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed towards an abstract idea without significantly more.
Claims 23, 30, and 36 are directed towards steps of “defining a search space…” by the use of mathematical formulas.
Each of these limitations would be practical to perform in the mind with the aid of pencil and paper, thus directed towards a mental process (see MPEP §2106.04(a)(2)(III)). Each of these limitations work together to work on a set of data, go through some optimization processes, and return a result to define the search space As result, the limitations listed recite an abstract idea.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. The claims 1 further recites steps of “receiving” and “transmitting” which aid in the generic data gathering steps. The additional elements have been considered alone, and in combination with the claimed invention as a whole, but does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. As result, the invention is directed towards an abstract idea.
The claims does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more that the judicial exception. The data gathering steps are well understood routine and conventional MPEP 2106.05(g).
Note: The claimed invention is estimating usage of the wireless and the improvement is going through having to go through fewer iterations of analysis to get the best result.
The method receives signal vectors, uses this convex domain function to determine the search space, and implements the claimed algorithm to reach the conclusion of the estimation of transmitting symbols. This is merely the platform and process for implements the calculations and the results of the output are not sufficiently tied to the technology to conclude that it is anything than a patent on the calculations. Applicant is encouraged to implement a process of using the result of the estimation to help improve the system such as resource selection or interference avoidance (if such support exists in the specification).
Conclusion
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/SUJOY K KUNDU/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2471 October 28, 2025