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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 09/23/2025 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Response to Amendment/ Remark
Examiner acknowledges receipt of Applicant’s amendment filled 12/15/2025.
Claims 1-6, 9-16 and 19-20 are currently pending.
Response to Arguments/ Remarks
Examiner has fully considered Applicant's amendment, see pages 6-9, filed on 12/15/2025 including Applicant’s argument about independent claims 1, and 11, that the prior art fails to prove the obviousness of these limitations. Examiner respectfully maintains the obviousness of the prior art used, Suzuki (US 20220317681).
The Applicant argues:
“In short, even when combined with the other three references, Suzuki teaches measuring delay to a central controller, not to other base stations. Claim 1 explicitly requires that the second master base station is identified based on an "average communication time with other base stations." Emphasis added. This limitation explicitly defines a metric based on peer-to-peer connectivity-measuring the communication time between the candidate master base station and the plurality of other base stations it is intended to serve.”
The Examiner’s Response to the above argument:
Primary reference Sandberg (US 20200077355) already teaches, communication between master base station and the plurality of other base stations as mentioned in the reference: “Figure 6 (block 612, 614), "If the master controller 104 has failed (or if a new timing master otherwise needs to be determined), each slave controller 104 determines if it should serve as the timing master for the cluster 124. In this exemplary embodiment, the slave controller 104 having the best connection quality metric should serve as the timing master for the cluster 124 and associated radio points 106 (assuming that the slave controller 104 has itself not otherwise failed)…” [¶0074].
Here Suzuki teaches the other limitation of the claim 1, “an average communication time”; ("The selection criterion for the master transport apparatus may be, for example, a delay of communication performed between the transport apparatuses 201 and 202 and the control apparatus 100. Specifically, the control apparatus 100 may measure time variation in the delay time, and may select the transport apparatus having the smallest variation in the delay time or the transport apparatus having the smallest average delay time as the master transport apparatus." [¶0098]); See also, “the selection section is configured to select the first transport apparatus and the second transport apparatus, based on a delay time of communication performed between the plurality of transport apparatuses and the control apparatus.” [¶0251] Here, the Suzuki reference teaches how to select a device among the plurality of devices based on smallest average delay time criteria.
The Applicant argues:
“In contrast, the Applicant's claim 1 requires the parameter to be the communication time "with other base stations." Even if one were to map Suzuki's "transport apparatuses" to the Applicant's claimed "base stations," Suzuki would only teach selecting a base station based on its communication time with a central controller (control apparatus 100), not based on its communication time with other base stations.”
The Examiner’s Response to the above argument:
As indicated above, Sandberg already teaches about the multiple base station: “…wherein the plurality of radio points is communicatively coupled to the controllers using a fronthaul network, wherein the controllers and the plurality of radio points are configured to implement a plurality of base stations in order to provide wireless service to user equipment…” [¶0089].
The Applicant argues about the non-analogous art:
First, Suzuki is not within the same field of endeavor. Second, Suzuki is not reasonably pertinent to the problem facing the inventor.
The Examiner’s Response to the above argument:
As indicated above, Sandberg is of the same filed of endeavor as the application. Suzuki teaches the other limitation, that is, how to select a device among plurality of devices based on timing criteria which is very much pertinent to the limitation of the claim 1 and 11. Suzuki relates, "The selection criterion for the master transport apparatus may be, for example, a delay of communication performed between the transport apparatuses 201 and 202 and the control apparatus 100. Specifically, the control apparatus 100 may measure time variation in the delay time, and may select the transport apparatus having the smallest variation in the delay time or the transport apparatus having the smallest average delay time as the master transport apparatus." [¶0098], see also, "For example, the control apparatus 100 (selection section 147) may select the master transport apparatus and the slave transport apparatus out of the transport apparatuses 201 and 202, based on capability information of the transport apparatus 200, such as operating time and a remaining battery, for example." [0119]. Here Suzuki, clearly mentioned how to select one device from a plurality of devices in a communication network and also teaches how to solve this problem by using an average communication time to select a device from a plurality of devices.
Respectfully, the applicant’s arguments are not persuasive and the examiner maintains the rejection status.
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.
Claims 1-2, and 11-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sandberg (US 20200077355), hereinafter Sandberg, in view of Nakamura et al. (US 20060039347, hereinafter Nakamura) and in view of Krishnaswamy et al. (US 20210243839 A1, hereinafter Krishnaswamy) and further in view of Suzuki et al. (US 20220317681 A1, hereinafter, Suzuki).
Regarding Claim 1, Sandberg teaches, a method for generation of a grandmaster timing signal within a cellular network, the method comprising: transmitting, by a first master base station, grandmaster timing signals to a plurality of base stations (Fig 5, (block 128, CELL 108), “When each of the controllers 104 has access to GPS signals, each controller 104 can use the GPS receiver 324 to independently synchronize its local clock 320 to the GPS clock and the resulting differential errors between the local clocks 320 in the various controllers 104 in the cluster 124 will be small. Put another way, in this GPS example, the GPS clock serves as the master clock source (also referred to here as the “grandmaster”) [¶0055]. See also, “In many installations, the controllers 104 do not have access to GPS signals (for example, the controllers 104 are deployed indoors without GPS signal reception) and, instead, must synchronize to a master clock source 128 that is accessed via a wide area network (WAN) used to implement the back-haul 116 (for example, the Internet). This synchronization can be done using the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) 1588 Precision Time Protocol (PTP). However, the backhaul 116 over which the controllers 104 synchronize to the master clock source 128 typically experiences high packet delay variation (PDV). This can result in large differential errors among the local clocks 320 of the various controllers 104 in the cluster 124 when the local clocks 320 of the various controllers 104 are independently synchronized to the same master clock source 128. The resulting large differential errors among the local clocks 320 of the various controllers 104 in the cluster 124 can cause downlink IQ data front-hauled from the controllers 104 to the various radio points 106 to be received out of alignment.” [¶0056]. In fig. 5, Master controller (104) is the left most one among many slave controllers (104) inside the cluster (124),
determining that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals (Fig. 6 (block 608), “Method 600 further comprises determining by each controller 104, when a new timing master needs to be determined (block 608). For example, this determination needs to be made when the timing master for the cluster 124 fails or is otherwise no longer able to serve as the timing master. In this exemplary embodiment, each controller 104 can make this determination based on whether or not it has received, within a predetermined timeout period, a predetermined message (for example, a recent IEEE 1588 synchronization message or heartbeat message) from the master controller 104.” [¶0072]);
identifying, by the cellular network, a second master base station based on one or more parameters (Figure 6 (block 612, 614), "If the master controller 104 has failed (or if a new timing master otherwise needs to be determined), each slave controller 104 determines if it should serve as the timing master for the cluster 124. In this exemplary embodiment, the slave controller 104 having the best connection quality metric should serve as the timing master for the cluster 124 and associated radio points 106 (assuming that the slave controller 104 has itself not otherwise failed). That is, each slave controller 104 compares its current connection quality metric with the current connection quality metrics for the other slave controllers 104 in the cluster 124 (as reported in the messages received from those other controllers 104). If a slave controller 104 has the best current connection quality metric among the other slave controllers 104 in the cluster 124 (block 612), that slave controller 104 should transition to serving as the time master for the cluster 124 and associated radio points 106 (block 614) and perform the acts described above in connection with blocks 404-408 of FIG. 4." [¶0074]),
Sandberg does not explicitly teach, transmitting, by the cellular network, an assignment message to the second master base station; and in response to the assignment message, transmitting, by the second master base station, the grandmaster timing signals to the first master base station and the plurality of base stations.
Nakamura, in analogous art, teaches transmitting, by the cellular network, an assignment message to the second master base station; and in response to the assignment message, transmitting, by the second master base station, the grandmaster timing signals to the first master base station and the plurality of base stations (each node having received the [optimum master station notification] 71 changes the setting of the selection clock priority levels in the self-node on the basis of the optimum master station identifier set in the clock signal. FIG. 22 shows how the selection clock priority levels are automatically changed in the node E [¶0164-¶0169]. This explains how optimum master station is selected by changes in the setting of a selection clock priority level which gets transmitted from the present sub-master station).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg’s design by including Nakamura’s suggestion in correctly identifying the master base station. The system needs to know which one will be the master base station. [Nakamura - ¶0021].
Combination of Sandberg and Nakamura do not explicitly teach, wherein: the first master base station comprises a radio unit and a distributed unit; and the first master base station communicates with a plurality of pieces of user equipment (UE) equipments via the radio unit;
Krishnaswamy, in analogous art disclose, wherein: the first master base station comprises a radio unit and a distributed unit ("FIG. 1B illustrates a C-RAN 100B implementing an example of a 5G Next Generation NodeB (gNB). The architecture of a Next Generation NodeB (gNB) is partitioned into a 5G Central Unit (CU) 103, one or more 5G Distributed Unit (DU) 105 and one or more 5G Remote Units (RU) 106..." [¶0053]); and the first master base station communicates with a plurality of pieces of user equipment (UE) equipments via the radio unit ("...FIG. 1A, the system 100A is implemented using the cloud radio access network (C-RAN) (point-to-multipoint distributed base station) architecture that employs at least one baseband unit 104 and one or more remote units 106, also referred to as “radio units,” “RUs,” “radio points”, or “RPs,” which serve at least one cell..." [¶0027], see also, "...Each radio unit (RU) 106 may include or be coupled to at least one antenna used to radiate downlink RF signals to user equipment (UEs) 110 and receive uplink RF signals transmitted by UEs 110..."[¶0029];
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg and Nakamura’s design by including Krishnaswamy’s suggestion that a base station having a DU, RU and multiple UEs, so that the master base station acts as a hub, facilitating communication between many users and the wider network. The radio unit handles the immediate radio communication, while the distributed unit handles more complex tasks.
Sandberg does not explicitly teach, wherein the one or more parameters includes an average communication time with other base stations of a plurality of base stations;
Suzuki teaches, wherein the one or more parameters includes an average communication time with other base stations of a plurality of base stations ("The selection criterion for the master transport apparatus may be, for example, a delay of communication performed between the transport apparatuses 201 and 202 and the control apparatus 100. Specifically, the control apparatus 100 may measure time variation in the delay time, and may select the transport apparatus having the smallest variation in the delay time or the transport apparatus having the smallest average delay time as the master transport apparatus." [¶0098]);
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura and Krishnaswamy’s idea by including Suzuki’s idea of selecting a master base station based on average communication time to ensure optimal performance. A short average communication time translates to a more reliable and faster control link within the cluster.
Regarding Claim 2, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki disclose the limitations of Claim 1.
Sandberg further teaches, wherein determining that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is performed by the first master base station. (Figure 6 (block 602), [¶0070] a quality metric for its connection with the external master clock source 128 over the backhaul 116).
Regarding Claim 11, Sandberg teaches a cellular network system for generation of grandmaster timing signals, the cellular network system comprising: a plurality of base stations of a cellular network (Figure 5 (block 128, CELL108), [¶0055-¶0056], see also "The exemplary embodiment of the system 100 shown in FIG. 1 is described here as being implemented as a Long Term Evolution (LTE) radio access network providing wireless service using an LTE air interface."[ ¶0022]);
a first master base station, comprising a radio unit, ([¶0034] recites, each network interface 204 comprises an ETHERNET network interface that is configured to communicatively couple that radio point 106 to the switched ETHERNET network 120), the first master base station configured to transmit grandmaster timing signals to the plurality of base stations (Figure 5, Grandmaster Clock (Unit 128) transmitting signal down to the multiple base Stations at Unit 108, [¶0055-¶0056]);
a cellular network component configured to: determine that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals (Figure 6 (block 608), [¶0072]);
identify a base station of the plurality of base stations to be a second master base station based on one or more parameters (Figure 6 (block 612, 614), [¶0074]);
Sandberg does not teach, transmit an assignment message to the second master base station; and the second master base station configured to transmit the grandmaster timing signals to the first master base station and the plurality of base stations based on the assignment message.
Nakamura, in analogous art, teaches transmit an assignment message to the second master base station; and the second master base station configured to transmit the grandmaster timing signals to the first master base station and the plurality of base stations based on the assignment message (each node having received the [optimum master station notification] 71 changes the setting of the selection clock priority levels in the self-node on the basis of the optimum master station identifier set in the clock signal. FIG. 22 shows how the selection clock priority levels are automatically changed in the node E [¶0164-¶0169]. This explains how optimum master station is selected by changes in the setting of a selection clock priority level which gets transmitted from the present sub-master station).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg’s design by including Nakamura’s suggestion in correctly identifying the master base station. The system precisely needs to know which one will be the master base station. [Nakamura – ¶0021].
Combination of Sandberg and Nakamura do not explicitly teach, “a distributed unit”.
Krishnaswamy, in analogous art disclose, a distributed unit ("FIG. 1B illustrates a C-RAN 100B implementing an example of a 5G Next Generation NodeB (gNB). The architecture of a Next Generation NodeB (gNB) is partitioned into a 5G Central Unit (CU) 103, one or more 5G Distributed Unit (DU) 105 and one or more 5G Remote Units (RU) 106."[¶0053]).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg and Nakamura’s design by including Krishnaswamy’s idea of including a distributed unit (DU). The Distributed Unit (DU) handles the lower layers of the protocol stack, which includes the Upper Physical, MAC, and RLC layers.
Sandberg does not explicitly teach, wherein the one or more parameters includes an average communication time with other base stations of a plurality of base stations;
Suzuki teaches, wherein the one or more parameters includes an average communication time with other base stations of a plurality of base stations ("The selection criterion for the master transport apparatus may be, for example, a delay of communication performed between the transport apparatuses 201 and 202 and the control apparatus 100. Specifically, the control apparatus 100 may measure time variation in the delay time, and may select the transport apparatus having the smallest variation in the delay time or the transport apparatus having the smallest average delay time as the master transport apparatus." [¶0098]);
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura and Krishnaswamy’s idea by including Suzuki’s idea of selecting a master base station based on average communication time to ensure optimal performance. A short average communication time translates to a more reliable and faster control link within the cluster.
Regarding Claim 12, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki discloses the limitations of Claim 11.
Sandberg further teaches, wherein the cellular network component is the first master base station. (Figure 6 (block 602), [¶0070] a quality metric for its connection with the external master clock source 128 over the backhaul 116).
Claims 3 and 13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki in view of Tournier et al. (US20110135047) hereinafter Tournier.
Regarding Claim 3, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki disclose the limitations of Claim 2.
Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy and Suzuki do not explicitly teach, wherein determining, by the first master base station, that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is based on a router of the first master base station no longer receiving global navigation satellite system (GNSS) timing signals from a GNSS satellite.
Tournier, in analogous art, teaches wherein determining, by the first master base station, that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is based on a router of the first master base station no longer receiving global navigation satellite system (GNSS) timing signals from a GNSS satellite (Loss of the GPS signal and/or antenna due to exposure to an unfavourable environment [¶0020]).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design by including Tornier’s suggestion to achieve precision timing (in order to avoid unnecessarily precise offset predictions during short disruptions [¶0021]).
Regarding Claim 13, Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki disclose the limitations of Claim 12.
Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki do not teach, wherein determining, by the first master base station, that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is based on a router of the first master base station no longer receiving global navigation satellite system (GNSS) timing signals from a GNSS satellite.
Tournier, in analogous art, teaches wherein determining, by the first master base station, that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is based on a router of the first master base station no longer receiving global navigation satellite system (GNSS) timing signals from a GNSS satellite (Loss of the GPS signal and/or antenna due to exposure to an unfavourable environment [¶0020]).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design by including Tornier’s suggestion to precision timing (in order to avoid unnecessarily precise offset predictions during short disruptions [¶0021]).
Claims 4, 6, 10, 14, 16 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki and further in view of Farra et al. (US Patent No: 20170302392), hereinafter Farra.
Regarding Claim 4, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki disclose the limitations of Claim 1.
The combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki fail to explicitly disclose, wherein determining that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is performed by a regional data center (RDC).
Farra, in analogous art, teaches wherein determining that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is performed by a regional data center (RDC). (Figure 9 (915 a / 915b)- Server can act as a regional data center (RDC), [¶0113] how to use server as a grandmaster timing signal similar to RDC as suggested by the invention).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design by including Farra’s suggestion to increase flexibility of communication network (RDC) as a cellular network component for Accurate Synchronization as a Service (“ASaaS”) functionality [¶0110]).
Regarding Claim 6, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki disclose the limitations of Claim 1.
The combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki fail to explicitly disclose wherein the first master base station and the second master base station each comprise a distributed unit (DU) located on-site.
Farra, in analogous art, teaches wherein the first master base station and the second master base station each comprise a distributed unit (DU) located on-site (Figure 5 (Block 520), [¶0071]; that is, Farra discloses that both base stations comprise a distribution unit (DU) on-site).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design by including Farra’s suggestion of collocated (on-site) distribution unit to further reduce the communication latency (Figure 5 (Block 520), [¶0072]).
Regarding Claim 10, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki disclose the limitations of Claim 1.
The combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki fail to explicitly disclose, wherein the cellular network is a 5G New Radio (NR) cellular network.
Farra, in analogous art, teaches wherein the cellular network is a 5G New Radio (NR) cellular network. (Figure 1 (Block 150), [¶0046], the network(s) 150 might include, without limitation, at least one of a 5G network(s), a centralized radio access network(s) (“C-RAN(s)”), a cellular network, a WiFi network, other wireless communications networks).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design with Farra’s idea and include cellular network using 5G New Radio (NR) in order to enhance their networks towards 5G/LTE-A or the like, for example, increasingly precise timing is required for their backhaul networks and provide extremely accurate or precise timing or time synchronization [¶0004].
Regarding Claim 14, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki discloses the limitations of Claim 11.
The combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki fail to explicitly disclose, wherein the cellular network component is a regional data center (RDC).
Farra, in analogous art, teaches wherein determining that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is performed by a regional data center (RDC) (Figure 9 (915 a / 915b)- Server can act as a regional data center (RDC), [¶0113]).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design concept by including Farra’s teaching of using regional data center (RDC) as a cellular network component for Accurate Synchronization as a Service (“ASaaS”) functionality [¶0110]).
Regarding Claim 16, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki discloses the limitations of Claim 11.
The combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki fail to explicitly disclose wherein the first master base station and the second master base station each comprise a distributed unit (DU) located on-site.
Farra, in analogous art, teaches wherein the first master base station and the second master base station each comprise a distributed unit (DU) located on-site (Figure 5 (Block 520), [¶0071]; that is, Farra discloses that both base stations comprise a distribution unit (DU) on-site).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design by including Farra’s suggestion of collocated (on-site) distribution unit to further reduce the communication latency (Figure 5 (Block 520), [¶0072]).
Regarding Claim 20, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki discloses the limitations of Claim 11.
The combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki fail to explicitly disclose, wherein the cellular network is a 5G New Radio (NR) cellular network.
Farra, in analogous art, teaches wherein the cellular network is a 5G New Radio (NR) cellular network. (Figure 1 (Block 150), [¶0046], The network(s) 150 might include, without limitation, at least one of a 5G network(s), a centralized radio access network(s) (“C-RAN(s)”), a cellular network, a WiFi network, other wireless communications networks).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki’s design with Farra’s idea and include cellular network using 5G New Radio (NR) in order to enhance their networks towards 5G/LTE-A or the like, for example, increasingly precise timing is required for their backhaul networks and provide extremely accurate or precise timing or time synchronization [¶0004].
Claims 5 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki and Farra as applied to claims 4 and 14, respectively, above, and further in view in view of Steiner et al. (US20140185632) hereinafter Steiner.
Regarding Claim 5, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki, and Farra disclose the limitations of Claim 4.
Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki and Farra fail to explicitly disclose, wherein determining, by the RDC, that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is based on an amount of time that has elapsed since receipt of a grandmaster timing signal of the grandmaster timing signals.
Steiner, in analogous art, teaches wherein determining, by the RDC, that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is based on an amount of time that has elapsed since receipt of a grandmaster timing signal of the grandmaster timing signals (recites, the re-election process does not happen instantaneously, but takes a certain duration in real-time and how re-electing a grandmaster that fails intermittently by not having the announce message and sync messages on time[¶0009-¶0010]).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki and Farra’s design by including Steiner’s suggestion to improve timing precision (the precision (i.e., the maximum difference of any two non-faulty local clocks) needs to take these, potentially long, periods of non-synchronization into account [¶0009])
Regarding Claim 15, Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki and Farra discloses the limitations of Claim 14.
Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki and Farra fail to explicitly disclose, wherein the RDC being configured to determine that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is based on an amount of time that has elapsed since receipt of a grandmaster timing signal of the grandmaster timing signals.
Steiner, in analogous art, teaches wherein the RDC being configured to determine that the first master base station is no longer eligible to generate the grandmaster timing signals is based on an amount of time that has elapsed since receipt of a grandmaster timing signal of the grandmaster timing signals (recites, the re-election process does not happen instantaneously, but takes a certain duration in real-time and how re-electing a grandmaster that fails intermittently by not having the announce message and sync messages on time [¶0009-¶0010]).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, Suzuki and Farra’s design by including Steiner’s suggestion to improve timing precision (the precision (i.e., the maximum difference of any two non-faulty local clocks) needs to take these, potentially long, periods of non-synchronization into account [¶0009])
Claims 9 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki as applied to claim 1 and 11 respectively above, and further in view of Wang (US 20170127368), hereinafter Wang.
Regarding Claim 9, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki disclose the limitations of Claim 1.
The combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki fail to explicitly disclose, wherein the one or more parameters comprises signal strength of received GNSS timing signals.
Wang, in analogous art, teaches wherein the one or more parameters comprises signal strength of received GNSS timing signals ([¶0044], select the grandmaster eNB 120.sub.GM and the slave eNB 120.sub.S based on one or more factors, such as, but not limited to…and GPS signal availability at the eNBs 120 (It is implicitly understood that signal availability is based on the detection of GNSS/GPS signal strength).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design with the teachings of Wang to include GNSS signal strength as a parameter for clock synchronization between computer systems over packet-switched, variable-latency data networks, is enabled over the backhaul (e.g., S1 Interface 126) between the EPC 104 and the grandmaster eNB 120.sub.GM to maintain frequency stability (Figure 1C, 1D [¶0035]).
Regarding Claim 19, combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki discloses the limitations of Claim 11.
The combination of Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki fail to explicitly disclose, wherein the one or more parameters comprises signal strength of received GNSS timing signals.
Wang, in analogous art, teaches wherein the one or more parameters comprises signal strength of received GNSS timing signals ([¶0044], select the grandmaster eNB 120.sub.GM and the slave eNB 120.sub.S based on one or more factors, such as, but not limited to…and GPS signal availability at the eNBs 120 (It is implicitly understood that signal availability is based on the detection of GNSS/ GPS signal strength).
It therefore would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify Sandberg, Nakamura, Krishnaswamy, and Suzuki’s design with the teachings of Wang to include GNSS signal strength as a parameter for clock synchronization between computer systems over packet-switched, variable-latency data networks, is enabled over the backhaul (e.g., S1 Interface 126) between the EPC 104 and the grandmaster eNB 120.sub.GM to maintain frequency stability (Figure 1C, 1D [¶0035]).
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 MUHAMMAD AINUL HUDA whose telephone number is (703)756-1594. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:30 - 6:30 ET.
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/MUHAMMAD AINUL HUDA/Examiner, Art Unit 4126
/HASSAN A PHILLIPS/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2467