DETAILED ACTION
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 submitted a response on 20 May 2026. Therein, claims 1, 10 and 19 are amended. No new claims have been cancelled or added. These amendments have been entered and reviewed below.
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 Amendments/Arguments
Applicant's arguments with respect to the rejection under 35 U.S.C. 112 have been fully considered but they are persuasive. The rejection has been withdrawn.
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 103 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1-6, 10-17 and 19-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kentley, et al. (U.S. Patent Publication No. 2017/0123421), in view of Penilla, et al. (U.S. Patent Publication No. 2017/0197617) in view of Mizuguchi, et al. (U.S. Patent Publication No. 2014/0098664).
For claim 1, Kentley discloses a method comprising: determining, by a computing device that a vehicle is approaching an intersection (see paras. 0061, 0084); determining, by the computing device, a plurality of potential maneuvers at an intersection (see para. 0061); determining, by the computing device, a navigation score for each of the plurality of potential maneuvers at the intersection (see para. 0061); selecting, based on the navigation score for each of the plurality of potential maneuvers, a maneuver (see para. 0061). Kentley does not explicitly disclose the remaining limitations.
A teaching from Penilla discloses sending, via one or more wireless communications and to a mobile device of a driver of the vehicle, the maneuver (see para. 0270, accelerating is a maneuver; para. 0081); determining, by the computing device, a status of a traffic light at the intersection (see para. 0284); enabling one or more applications on the mobile device upon determining that the status of the traffic light is red (see para. 0281, red light implicit as “waiting to turn green”, and “manipulating a mobile device” implies device is enabled; see para. 0300, “certain applications… will be enabled when the vehicle is at a stop, and intersection…”); and disabling the one or more applications on the mobile device when the traffic light turns green (see para. 0300. “when the state changes of the connected objects, such as the light turning green, … computing systems of the vehicle, display screens, or user devices within the vehicle may be disabled, deactivated, place to sleep, paused, stopped, turned off, etc.”).
Penilla does not explicitly disclose that the mobile device would be disabled “a predetermined time before” the traffic light turning green. However, Penilla discloses that “the alert can also take on the form of…a traffic light state (e.g. the light is green, the light is red…)” (see para. 0300) where “sending an alert” occurs when or “upon determining” the state information changed (see para. 0015) and a device may be disabled “just before receiving the alert” (see para. 0083). Because it is interpreted that the time gap of sending and reception of the alert is negligible, the time of “receiving” is equivalent to the time of “sending”. Therefore, as time is removed from the alerting, it is interpreted that the alert occurs when the light turns green (“upon determining” equivalent to “when”) and the device is disabled before (“a time before”) the alert (“traffic light turning green”). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the effective date of filing that Penilla teaches disabling the one or more applications on the mobile device a time before the traffic light turning green based on the motivation to improve enhancing communication between connected vehicles and connected objects, and methods for exchanging information with cloud-based processing systems (see para. 0004).
It would have been obvious at the effective date of filing to modify Kentley to include the teachings of Penilla based on a reasonable expectation of success and the motivation to improve a subject vehicle that may receive information from other connected objects based on the geo-location of the subject vehicle, and certain of the connected objects within a zone of influence to the subject vehicle may be surfaced to the subject vehicle and/or mobile devices within the vehicle or associated with the vehicle (see para. 0007).
Continuing with the claim, a teaching from Mizuguchi discloses wherein the first predetermined time is based on timing data received from the traffic light (see paras. 0072, 0073). It would have been obvious at the effective date of filing to modify Kentley to include the teachings of Mizuguchi based on a reasonable expectation of success and the motivation to improve application program that conveys a start preparation to the driver while the vehicle 12 stops at an intersection, before the traffic light color changes to a color (e.g., green) at which the vehicle 12 can start (see para. 0072).
Regarding claim 2, Kentley further teaches determining, by the computing device, a level of autonomy of the vehicle (see para. 0059), and in response to determining that the vehicle is approaching the intersection and that the vehicle has one or more autonomous features enabled, sending, to the vehicle, an instruction to deactivate one or more of the one or more autonomous features (see para. 0083, autonomy deactivated).
With reference to claim 3, Penilla does not explicitly disclose “determining the status of the traffic light is red for a second predetermined time”. However, Penilla teaches monitoring that the vehicle has stopped for a specific amount of time. One of ordinary skill in the art would find the amount of time a vehicle is stopped (while in mobile modes) is equivalent to the amount of time a traffic light is red. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art that determining the amount of time a vehicle is stopped is based on the amount of time a traffic light is red such that determining the amount of time for one is also determining the amount of time for the other.
Continuing with the claim, Penilla further teaches enabling the one or more applications on the mobile device (see para. 0081).
With regards to claim 4, Penilla further discloses determining a location of the computing device based on a sensor of the computing device or a sensor associated with the intersection (see para. 0013, 0084, 0307).
Referring to claim 5, Penilla further discloses sending instructions to turn off the mobile device, turn off a screen of the mobile device, or stop the one or more applications on the mobile device (see para. 0300).
Regarding claim 6, Penilla further teaches sending an instruction to the computing device to display a message requesting a pause to usage of the mobile device as the mobile device approaches the intersection (see paras. 0298-0299, 0311, 0313, 0314).
Claims 10 and 19 largely mirror the subject matter defined in claim 1. Therefore, claims 10 and 19 are rejected based on the reasoning and citations outlined above for claim 1.
Referring to claim 11, Penilla further teaches wherein the computing device is a mobile device or a vehicle control computer (see para. 0163).
Claims 12 and 20 largely mirror the subject matter defined in claim 3. Therefore, claims 12 and 20 are rejected based on the reasoning and citations outlined above for claim 3.
Claims 13 and 21 largely mirror the subject matter defined in claim 4. Therefore, claims 13 and 21 are rejected based on the reasoning and citations outlined above for claim 4.
Claims 14 and 22 largely mirror the subject matter defined in claim 5. Therefore, claims 14 and 22 are rejected based on the reasoning and citations outlined above for claim 5.
Claims 15 and 23 largely mirror the subject matter defined in claim 6. Therefore, claims 15 and 23 are rejected based on the reasoning and citations outlined above for claim 6.
For claim 16, Penilla further discloses wherein the non-transitory computer readable medium stores instructions that, when read by the computing device, cause the computing device to: display information indicative of how a driver associated with the vehicle compares to other drivers (see para. 0196-0197; see also, paras. 0311, 0313, 0314).
With regards to claim 17, Penilla further discloses wherein the information includes relative speed, reactive time, or risk score (see para. 0201, confidence equivalent to risk).
For claim 24, the limitations largely mirror the subject matter defined in claim 16. Therefore, claim 24 is rejected based on the reasoning and citations outlined above for claim 16.
Conclusion
Examiner previously stated at the end of the previous rejection that Applicant is considered to have implicit knowledge of the entire disclosure once a reference has been cited. The cited figures, columns and lines should not be considered the only relevant teachings. The entire reference must be taken as a whole. This includes any teachings within the reference that were not explicitly cited in the previous Office action. Any new citation of additional teachings of the previously cited art is not a new ground of rejection. Taking the references as a whole, the art supports the new rejection of the currently amended claims.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ADAM D TISSOT whose telephone number is (571)270-3439. The examiner can normally be reached 8:00-4:30.
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/ADAM D TISSOT/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3663
