Detailed Action
The office action is in response to the communications filed on 11/25/2025.
Notice of 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 .
Claims Status
Claims 1-22 are allowed.
Claims 24 and 28 have been cancelled.
Claims 23, 25-27, and 29-30 are pending.
Prior Art Made of Record
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Shrivastava (US Publication No. 2024/0187823), the prior art discloses that prioritization is defined for MBS and unicast with regard to SR/Random Access Channel (RACH)/BSR/HARQ ACK/PUCCH/PUSCH operations. One approach to derive the priority can be to relate to or compare the multicast and unicast priority, as determined by the UE 10 and reported by the UE 10 in the MBS interest indication message; see ¶ 279.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-22 are allowed.
Response to Arguments
Applicant remarks, filed on 11/25/2025, with respect to claim 23 have been fully considered and are persuasive. However, a new ground of rejection is set forth below.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under AIA 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 23 and 27 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang et al. (Publication No. US 2022/0272726, hereinafter referred to as Wang) in view of Li et al. (US Publication No. 2021/0306824, hereinafter referred to as Li).
Regarding Claims 23 and 27, Wang discloses receiving, from a network node, a radio resource control (RRC) message configuring the first UE to transmit, to a second UE, a unicast message associated with a first priority, or to transmit, to a group of UEs that includes the second UE, a multicast message associated with a second priority different than the first priority (A transmitting device receive one or more configuration parameters via RRC signaling; see ¶ 0135. The configuration parameter indicating that the transmitting device may only transmit a unicast and/or groupcast TB having a priority higher than the priority indicated by the configuration parameter; see ¶ 0137 & figure 2.);
transmitting the unicast message to the second UE in accordance with the first priority being higher than a priority or transmitting the multicast message to the group of UEs in accordance with the second priority being higher than a priority (The transmitting device transmit a unicast and/or groupcast, when the unicast and/or groupcast TB have a priority higher than the priority indicated by the configuration parameter; see figure 2 numeral 230.); and
receiving, from the second UE, a hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) feedback message in accordance with the one of the unicast message or the multicast message that was transmitted (The transmitting device receive the HARQ feedback from the receiving device; see figure 2 numeral 240.).
Wang discloses a sidelink transmission system using a prioritization scheme for transmitting unicast or multicast messages, but fails to explicitly discloses that the prioritization scheme comprises comparing the first priority of the unicast message with the second priority of the multicast message. However, in analogous art, Li discloses assigning multicast packets to a low priority as compared to unicast packets; see ¶ 34. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wang prioritization system with the prioritization scheme of Li in order to improve the unicast performance of the device; see ¶ 34.
Claims 25-26 and 29-30 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang et al. (Publication No. US 2022/0272726, hereinafter referred to as Wang) in view of Li et al. (US Publication No. 2021/0306824, hereinafter referred to as Li) and further in view of Kim et al. (Publication No. US 2024/0224301, hereinafter referred as Kim).
Regarding Claims 25 and 29, Wang fails to discloses that the first priority is higher than the second priority; the first UE transmits the unicast message based on the first priority being higher than the second priority; and the HARQ feedback message includes HARQ feedback for the unicast message. However, in analogous art, Kim discloses that the UE may determine that if the first sidelink data is received through unicast and the second sidelink data is transmitted through groupcast, the transmission for the first sidelink data transmitted in the unicast type is prioritized. Of course, the opposite case is also possible; see ¶ 0143. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wang prioritization system with the prioritization mechanism in order to performing sidelink communication using next-generation radio access technology; see ¶ 0011.
Regarding Claims 26 and 30, Wang fails to discloses that the second priority is higher than the first priority; the first UE transmits the multicast message based on the second priority being higher than the first priority; and the HARQ feedback message includes HARQ feedback for the multicast message. However, in analogous art, Kim discloses that the UE may determine that if the first sidelink data is received through unicast and the second sidelink data is transmitted through groupcast, the transmission for the first sidelink data transmitted in the unicast type is prioritized. Of course, the opposite case is also possible; see ¶ 0143. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Wang prioritization system with the prioritization mechanism in order to performing sidelink communication using next-generation radio access technology; see ¶ 0011.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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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/H.R/Examiner, Art Unit 2472
/KEVIN T BATES/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2472