DETAILED ACTION
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 .
Claim status in the amendment received on 6/12/2025:
Claims 1, 4, 6 and 18 have been amended.
Claims 20-21 have been canceled.
Claims 1-6 and 16-19 are pending.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments have been considered but are moot because the arguments do not apply to any of the references being used in the current rejection.
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.
Claim(s) 1, 4, 6 and 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Parulkar et al. (Patent No.: US 11138035 B1) in view of Jain et al. (Pub. No.: US 20130144978 A1).
As to claim 1, Parulkar teaches a method of providing a service in a multi- access edge computing (MEC) network, the method comprising:
determining, by an edge application server (EAS) in the MEC network, that an application context relocation for service continuity is required for user equipment (UE) location (col. 10, lines 27-33, “…the first edge device 420 may determine, due to the movement of the mobile device 410 to the area of the second edge device 430, to hand over the mobile device 410 from the first edge device 420 to the second edge device 430…”);
determining, by the EAS, another EAS for the service continuity based on the UE location (col. 10, lines 27-33, “…the first edge device 420 may determine, due to the movement of the mobile device 410 to the area of the second edge device 430, to hand over the mobile device 410 from the first edge device 420 to the second edge device 430…”);
duplicating, by the EAS, an application context to support the service continuity between the EAS and the another EAS (col. 16, lines 30-33, “…An application session may be maintained during handover of the mobile device by replicating and/or migrating a session state from the first edge device to the second edge device…”); and
transmitting, by the EAS to the another EAS, the application context (col. 16, lines 30-33, “…An application session may be maintained during handover of the mobile device by replicating and/or migrating a session state from the first edge device to the second edge device…”, “replicating and/or migrating” teaches transmitting).
Parulkar does not explicitly teach determining another EAS based on expected UE location.
However, in the same field of endeavor (computer networks) Jain teaches determining that an application context relocation for service continuity is required for an expected user equipment (UE) location (paragraphs [0041]-[0042], “…For example, when a travel plan entry of the user's calendar indicates that the user is traveling to location #1, the data relocation system 100 may determine a data center located in the vicinity of location #1…”);
determining another EAS for the service continuity based on the expected UE location (paragraph [0042], “…the data relocation system 100 may determine a data center located in the vicinity of location #1…”, and fig. 4).
Based on Parulkar in view of Jain, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to incorporate determining another EAS based on expected UE location (taught by Jain) with the edge based computing network for serving subscribers (taught by Parulkar) in order enhance user experience as motivated by Jain (paragraph [0041]).
As to claim 4, Parulkar teaches wherein the application context at the EAS is made available to the another EAS, and wherein the application context is made available by an ambassador pattern operable to replicate data between the EAS and the another EAS (col. 16, lines 30-33, “…An application session may be maintained during handover of the mobile device by replicating and/or migrating a session state from the first edge device to the second edge device…”, and fig. 3, 322).
As to claim 6, Parulkar further teaches an edge application server (EAS) in a multi- access edge computing (MEC) network comprising: a transceiver; and a processor (fig. 14). Therefore, the limitations of claim 6 are substantially similar to claim 1. Please refer to claim 1 above.
As to claim 18, the limitations of claim 18 are substantially similar to claim 4. Please refer to claim 4 above.
Claim(s) 2-3 and 16-17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Parulkar et al. (Patent No.: US 11138035 B1) in view of Jain et al. (Pub. No.: US 20130144978 A1) and further in view of Wagner (Pub. No.: US 20160092252 A1).
As to claim 2, Parulkar teaches providing, by the EAS, an application that offers a service to one or more subscribers (col. 16, lines 30-33, “…An application session may be maintained during handover of the mobile device by replicating and/or migrating a session state from the first edge device to the second edge device…”, and fig. 3, 322).
Parulkar in view of Jain does not explicitly teach conditions for holding a subscriber in a register state.
However, in the same field of endeavor (computer networks) Wagner teaches wherein a particular subscriber is held in a registered state until one or more of the following conditions apply:
a configurable time period has elapsed;
the particular subscriber is no longer registered with the service; or
the particular subscriber becomes an active subscriber, and wherein the configurable time period is determined on basis of behavior patterns of the one or more subscribers (paragraph [0045], “…For example, after a threshold time has passed (e.g., 5 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 24 hours, 30 days, etc.) without any activity (e.g., running of the code), the container and/or the virtual machine instance is shutdown (e.g., deleted, terminated, etc.”).
Based on Parulkar in view of Jain and further in view of Wagner, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to incorporate conditions for holding a subscriber in a register state (taught by Wagner) with determining another EAS based on expected UE location (taught by Jain) with the edge based computing network for serving subscribers (taught by Parulkar) in order enhance user experience as motivated by Jain (paragraph [0041]), and in order to manage the network resources more efficiently and conserve network resources.
As to claim 3, Wanger further teaches wherein in case that the EAS has no active or registered subscribers, the EAS is deleted (paragraph [0045], “…For example, after a threshold time has passed (e.g., 5 minutes, 30 minutes, 1 hour, 24 hours, 30 days, etc.) without any activity (e.g., running of the code), the container and/or the virtual machine instance is shutdown (e.g., deleted, terminated, etc.”). The limitations of claim 3 are rejected in view of the analysis of claim 2 above, and the rationale to combine, as discussed in claim 2, applies here as well.
As to claims 16-17, the limitations of the claims are substantially similar or broader in scope to claims 2-3, respectively. Please refer to each respective claim above.
Claim(s) 5 and 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Parulkar et al. (Patent No.: US 11138035 B1) in view of Jain et al. (Pub. No.: US 20130144978 A1) and further in view of Lassoued et al. (Pub. No.: US 20200249039 A1).
As to claim 5, Parulkar in view of Jain does not explicitly teach determining EAS based on prediction of subscriber’s behavior.
However, in the same field of endeavor (computer networks) Lassoued teaches another EAS is discovered on basis of a prediction of a subscriber's behavior (paragraph [0073], “MEC” teaches EAS).
Based on Parulkar in view of Jain and further in view of Lassoued, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to incorporate determining EAS based on prediction of subscriber’s behavior (taught by Lassoued) with determining another EAS based on expected UE location (taught by Jain) with the edge based computing network for serving subscribers (taught by Parulkar) in order to improve content retrieval speed as motivated by Jain (paragraph [0041]), and in order enhance user experience as motivated by Lassoued (paragraph [0073]).
As to claim 19, the limitations of the claim are substantially similar to claim 5. Please refer to claim 5 above.
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ABDULKADER M ALRIYASHI whose telephone number is (313)446-6551. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 8AM - 5PM Alt, Friday, EST.
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/Abdulkader M Alriyashi/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2447 9/17/2025