DETAILED ACTION
Claims 1-3, 6-8, 11, 12, 25, 29-31, 33, 46-48, and 50 are pending.
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 .
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 19 Sept 2025 has been entered.
Priority
Applicant’s claim for the benefit of a prior-filed application under 35 U.S.C. 119(e) or under 35 U.S.C. 120, 121, 365(c), or 386(c) is acknowledged. In particular, this Application is the bypass application of an international application that claims foreign priority to a document filed 20 Mar 2020. Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 16 Jun 2025 was filed after the mailing date of the Final on 21 May 2025. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97 because an RCE was filed. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Response to Arguments
The Reply appears to allege the combination of reference is improper because “Cheng does not concern assistance information messages.” Reply, 15. The Reply further finds “Cheng does not teach the skilled person to transmit [assistance information messages] over the PSSCH and indicating this in a way as taught by the claimed invention.” Id. at 16. In response, Balasubramanian is now cited for teaching assistance information being communicated between UEs over the sidelink. In Balasubramanian, the assistance information may be included in an SCI, which is transmitted in a PSSCH.
Claim Objections
Claim 29 and 50 are objected to for the following reasons:
Claim 29 recites, in part, “the UE is to automatically send resource allocation related to the further UE.” The Examiner believes “AIM” was inadvertently left out of this limitation.
Claim 50 recites, in part, “sending, by the UE, to the further UE one or resource allocation related assistance information messages.” The Examiner believes the Reply inadvertently crossed out “more” when amending this limitation.
Appropriate correction is required.
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.
All claims are 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.
Claims 1, 46, 48, and 50 recite, in part, the limitation "the indication in the control message.” There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim, which leads to ambiguity as to whether the “one or more parameters” or a “data transmission” need to be “in the control message” to meet the requirements of “the indication.”
Claims 1, 46, 48, and 50 recite, in part “an indicator (beta_offset_indicator).” The Examiner recommends deleting “(beta_offset_indicator)” to clarify that the claimed invention only requires “an indicator” and not a beta offset indicator.
All dependent claims are indefinite due to their dependence upon an indefinite independent claim.
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.
Claims 1-3, 6-8, 11, 33, 46-48, and 50 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable by Lee (US 20210400639) in view of Balasubramanian (US 11582721).
Regarding claims 1 and 48, Lee teaches a user device, UE, and a method for operating a user device for a wireless communication system, where the UE comprises one or more antennas and a transceiver, and the wireless communication system comprising a plurality of user devices, UEs,
wherein the UE is operated to communicate with one or more further UEs using a sidelink, SL, interface (Lee, figure 16 – assisting device communicates with transmitting UE; Lee, ¶113 – a UE may be the assisting device for SL resource selection by another UE; Lee, ¶¶127-128 – the other devices that may send assistance information [i.e. assisting device] may be a master UE or a specific UE defined by the base station),
wherein the UE is to send to the further UE one or more resource allocation related assistance information messages, resource allocation AIMs (Lee, figure 16 - assisting device sends assistance information to transmitting device, where the transmitting device uses the assistance information when selecting transmission resources for communication with the receiving device; Lee, ¶¶6, 127, 146 - assistance information related to resource allocations from other devices).
Lee does not explicitly teach “wherein the UE sends or transmits the one or more resource allocation related AIMs as a part of a data transmission, which is indicated by one or more parameters in a control message, and wherein the indication in the control message comprises one of the following: an indicator (beta offset indicator) in a first stage SCI, the indicator indicating a presence of or a presence and a size of one or more resource allocation related AIMs in a Physical Sidelink Shared Channel (PSSCH), a parameter to be set by the UE in a first stage SCI or second stage SCI for indicating a presence of the one or more resource allocation related AIMs in a Physical Sidelink Shared Channel (PSSCH).”
Instead, Lee merely teaches generic sidelink control and data communication between the transmitting UE and receiving UE. Lee, figure 13 and ¶¶111-112 (UE 1 transmits an SCI via PSCCH and then SCI-based data via PSSCH to receiving UE 2). However, Balasubramanian teaches a transmitting UE sending assistance information to a receiving UE in a SCI in a PSSCH, as required by the claimed invention. Balasubramanian, 19:51-55 and figure 2 (SCI 240 and assistance information 245 in PSSCH 250-a). The assistance information included in the SCI is transmitted to the receiving UE. Id. at 20:2-6. The transmitting UE may send the SCI along with a data transmission over the PSSCH. Id. at 18:60-62. The MCS provided by the assistance information enables the transmitting UE to transmit within a resource of the sidelink resource pool. Id. at 23:20-28. At the time of the invention (pre-AIA ) or at the effective filing date of the invention (AIA ), it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to forward the assistance information, taught by Balasubramanian, from the transmitting UE to the receiving UE, as taught by Lee, in order to enable concurrent uplink and sidelink transmissions by the transmitting UE. Id. at 23:28-37; see also id. at 18:49-56 for background on MCS creating a base layer and enhancement layer, where each layer can be used for a concurrent transmission (i.e. thus each receiver needs to be informed of the MCS to decode the layer designated for it).
Regarding claim 2, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian also teaches wherein the resource allocation related assistance information indicates resources to be used by the further UE, wherein the indicated resources are in the form of one or more of the following: one or more receive resource pools to be used by the further UE, one or more transmit resource pools to be used by the further UE, one or more exceptional resource pools to be used by the further UE, one or more resources within a resource pool to be used for transmission by the further UE to another further UE, for periodic transmissions, or for aperiodic transmissions, one or more bandwidth parts, BWPs, to be used by the further UE, interference information, , a resource pool congestion status, a sensing report. Lee, ¶¶137-138, 141, 144, 149-151 (assistance information may be channel measurement information, time/frequency information, or information related to the resources allocated by the base station, such as interference conditions and resource pools to be considered by the transmitting UE when transmitting to the receiving UE [“transmission by the further UE to another further UE”]).
Regarding claim 3, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian also teaches wherein the UE is to determine from a set of sidelink resources or from a sidelink resource pool of the wireless communication system a set of resources that are available or unavailable for usage by one or more of the further UEs, and the UE is to send to the further UE one or more resource allocation related AlMs comprising the determined set of resources, so as to allow the further UE to decide the transmission resources to be used. Lee, ¶129 (transmitting UE selects resources for its transmission to receiving UE by using the received assistance information); Lee, ¶139 (assisting UE performs the sensing operation of figure 14); Lee, ¶116 (in the method of figure 14, the UE identifies resources reserved by another UE during a sensing window and selects resources having low interference from among the remaining resources).
Regarding claim 6, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian also teaches wherein the resource allocation related AIM comprises resources to be used by the further UE for a transmission to one or more other further UEs, the other further UE being different from the UE. Lee, figure 16 (assistance information received from assisting device is used to select resources for a transmission to a receiving UE); Lee, ¶¶6, 127, 146 (assistance information related to resource allocations from other devices).
Regarding claim 7, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian also teaches
wherein the UE is configured and/or pre-configured with one or more resource pools to be used for sidelink communications (Lee, ¶¶100, 144 – resource pools are configured by the base station), and
wherein the UE is to send the resource allocation related AIM in one or more of the following ways: send only a resource allocation related AIM comprising resources of one of the resource pools, send a resource allocation related AIM comprising resources of two or more or all of the plurality of resource pools, wherein each AIM comprises resources pertaining to a single or a plurality of resource pools. Lee, ¶144 (assisting device may designated a specific region in the transmission resource pool for the transmitting UE to use); Lee, ¶150 (assisting device can provide the resource pools used for a specific service to the transmitting UE).
Regarding claim 8, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian also teaches wherein the plurality of resource pools comprises any combination of one or more of the following resource pools: a first resource pool providing resources for a feedback channel over the sidelink, like the PSFCH, and a second resource pool providing no resources for a feedback channel over the sidelink, resources pools of different QoS levels, resources pools of different priority levels, resources pools of different communication types, one or more transmit pools, one or more receive pools, one or more of exceptional pools. Lee, ¶¶104-108 (resource pools can be divided based upon multiple factors); e.g. Lee, ¶151 (resource pool based on priority or groupcast).
Regarding claim 11, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian also teaches wherein the resource allocation related AIM indicates a resource set to be used by the further UE in any one of the following manners: by a list of all resource blocks, RBs, that are available in one or more time slots, by a list of all resource blocks, RBs, that are unavailable in one or more time slots, by a list of resource blocks, RBs, for which collisions are expected. Lee, ¶141-143, 148 and figure 18 (assistance information may include time/frequency resources for use in sidelink communication, including slots); see also id. at figure 7 and ¶¶77-78 for relation between slots and resource blocks).
Regarding claim 33, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian also teaches wherein the UE and one or more of the further UEs form a UE group (Lee, ¶133 – groupcast communication between all three devices shown in figure 16), and the UE is to assist one or more of the other group members by providing the one or more resource allocation related AIMs such that one or more of the other group members need not carry out sensing. Lee, ¶139 (assisting UE performs the sensing operation of figure 14 and provides the results to transmitting UE); Lee, figure 16 (no indication that the transmitting UE performs sensing in this embodiment).
Regarding claims 46 and 50, Lee teaches a wireless communication system and a non-transitory digital storage medium having stored thereon a computer program, the wireless communication system comprising a plurality of user devices, UEs,
wherein the UE is operated to communicate with one or more further UEs using a sidelink, SL, interface (Lee, figure 16 – assisting device communicates with transmitting UE; Lee, ¶113 – a UE may be the assisting device for SL resource selection by another UE; Lee, ¶¶127-128 – the other devices that may send assistance information [i.e. assisting device] may be a master UE or a specific UE defined by the base station),
wherein the UE is to send to the further UE one or more resource allocation related assistance information messages, AIMs, to provide the further UE with one or more of the following: resource allocation related assistance information, link related assistance information, distance related assistance information, geographical area related assistance information, group related assistance information, relay related assistance information (Lee, figure 16 - assisting device sends assistance information to transmitting device, where the transmitting device uses the assistance information when selecting transmission resources for communication with the receiving device; Lee, ¶136 - assistance information may be channel measurement information or time/frequency information of a specific resource to use).
Lee does not explicitly teach “wherein the UE sends or transmits the one or more resource allocation related AIMs as a part of a data transmission, which is indicated by one or more parameters in a control message, and wherein the indication in the control message comprises one of the following:
an indicator (beta offset indicator) in a first stage SCI, the indicator indicating a presence of or a presence and a size of one or more resource allocation related AIMs in a Physical Sidelink Shared Channel (PSSCH),
a parameter to be set by the UE in a first stage SCI or second stage SCI for indicating a presence of the one or more resource allocation related AIMs in a Physical Sidelink Shared Channel (PSSCH).”
Instead, Lee merely teaches generic sidelink control and data communication between the transmitting UE and receiving UE. Lee, figure 13 and ¶¶111-112 (UE 1 transmits an SCI via PSCCH and then SCI-based data via PSSCH to receiving UE 2). However, Balasubramanian teaches a transmitting UE sending assistance information to a receiving UE. Balasubramanian, 19:51-55 and figure 2. The assistance information may be included in the SCI transmitted to the receiving UE. Id. at 20:2-6. The transmitting UE may send the SCI along with a data transmission over the PSSCH. Id. at 18:60-62. The MCS provided by the assistance information enables the transmitting UE to transmit within a resource of the sidelink resource pool. Id. at 23:20-28. At the time of the invention (pre-AIA ) or at the effective filing date of the invention (AIA ), it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to forward the assistance information, taught by Lee, from the transmitting UE to the receiving UE, as taught by Balasubramanian, in order to enable concurrent uplink and sidelink transmissions by the transmitting UE. Id. at 23:28-37; see also id. at 18:49-56 for background on MCS creating a base layer and enhancement layer, where each layer can be used for a concurrent transmission (i.e. thus each receiver needs to be informed of the MCS to decode the layer designated for it).
Regarding claim 47, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian also teaches one or more base stations, wherein the base station comprises one or more of a macro cell base station, or a small cell base station, or a central unit of a base station, or a distributed unit of a base station, or a road side unit, or a UE, or a group leader, or a relay or a remote radio head, or an AMF, or an SMF, or a core network entity, or mobile edge computing entity, or a network slice as in the NR or 5G core context, or any transmission/reception point, TRP, enabling an item or a device to communicate using the wireless communication network, the item or device being provided with network connectivity to communicate using the wireless communication network. Lee, figure 11 (network includes a base station).
Claims 12, 25, and 29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee (US 20210400639) in view of Balasubramanian (of record) and further in view of Li (US 2021/0219268).
Regarding claim 12, the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian teaches the user device, UE, of claim 11, but does not explicitly teach “wherein the resource allocation related AIM indicates the resource across time in any one of the following manners: by a bitmap across time, the bitmap indicating resources, where the resource set is defined, spanning either a portion or the entire length of the one BWP, by a starting resource, and a duration of the resource set, by explicit resources numbers, by puncturing out resources mentioned explicitly or that are part of another set of resources or RP, by a starting resource, and periodic offsets for subsequent occurrences, by a pattern of symbols, time slots or subframes or frames, or the resource allocation related AIM indicates the resource across frequency in any one of the following manners: by a bitmap, the bitmap the bitmap indicating resources, across the one BWP, by a starting resource, and a number of resources for a resource set, by multiple starting resources, and ending resources, if the resource set is non-contiguous over frequency, by explicit resource indices, like resource block indices, by puncturing out resources mentioned explicitly or that are part of another set of resources or RP, by a starting resource, and periodic offsets for subsequent occurrences, by a pattern of resource blocks or subchannels, and/or the AIM indicates the resources across time and frequency in any one of the following manners: by a matrix, the matrix indicating the resources across time, across frequency, by a pattern, the pattern indicating the resources across time and across frequency.”
However, Li teaches the resource pool information, provided to a transmitting UE from a sensing assistant, including a bitmap of symbol pools and other iterations. Li, ¶248; see also id. at ¶¶160-164 for other iterations of indicating resource pools. At the time of the invention (pre-AIA ) or at the effective filing date of the invention (AIA ), it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to Li’s method of indicating resources when transmitting the assistance information, taught by the combination of Lee and Balasubramanian, in order to adjust the granularity of resource allocations as needed by the sidelink communication. Id. at ¶155.
Regarding claim 25, Lee teaches the user device, UE, of claim 1, but does not explicitly teach “wherein the UE is to transmit the one or more resource allocation related AIMs in one or more of the following methods: at periodic intervals, or responsive to a request by the further UE, or responsive to one or more implicit events.” However, Li teaches a sensing assistant that periodically broadcasts local resource pool information or provide said information at a vehicle UE’s request. Li, ¶¶242, 251. At the time of the invention (pre-AIA ) or at the effective filing date of the invention (AIA ), it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to periodically broadcast or per a UE’s request, as taught by Li, the assistance information, taught by Lee, in order to provide assistance information at convenient times for the transmitting UE.
Regarding claim 29, the combination of Lee, Balasubramanian, and Li also teaches wherein, when transmitting the one or more resource allocation related AIMs responsive to one or more implicit events, the UE is to automatically send resource allocation related AIM to the further UE, when a certain event occurs. Lee, figure 16 (assistance information to further UE); Li, ¶242 (sensing assistant provides resource pool information either at broadcast intervals or upon another UE’s request); see also id. at ¶¶248, 251 for further details.
Claims 30 and 31 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Lee (US 20210400639) in view of Balasubramanian (of record) and Li (US 2021/0219268) and further in view of Ashraf (US 20210204250).
Regarding claim 30, the combination of Lee, Balasubramanian, and Li also teaches the user device, UE, of claim 29, but does not explicitly teach “wherein the certain event comprises one or more of the following: when the UE detects that there is a possibility of consecutive packet collisions for a transmission which is to be carried out by the further UE, or an occupancy of the sidelink resource pool reaches a threshold, or a link quality between the further UE and another further UE is below a pre-defined threshold, or a beamforming link has broken down between further UEs, or when the further UE is beyond a pre-defined communication range, or when another further UE enters or exits an existing group of further UEs, or a selection or reselection of a relay UE, or when a UE is switched on or before being switched off or leaving a cell, or when a UE is detecting a change in resource pool configuration, or when a UE is entering a certain geographical area, or when a UE is within a certain distance of another UE or detects that another UE (UE-B) is within a certain distance of a further UE.”
However, Ashraf teaches a first UE transmitting assistance information to a second UE when the second UE enters the coverage area of the first UE. Ashraf, ¶38. At the time of the invention (pre-AIA ) or at the effective filing date of the invention (AIA ), it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art to trigger the assisting device, taught by the combination of Lee, Balasubramanian, and Li, to transmit assistance information to the transmitting UE of a sidelink communication, as taught by Ashraf, in order to update the assistance information that configures the sidelink communication. Id. at ¶62.
Regarding claim 31, the combination of Lee, Balasubramanian, Li, and Ashraf also teaches wherein, to detect a possibility of consecutive packet collisions, the UE is to listen to control messages being transmitted by other UEs on the sidelink, the control message comprising not only current resources of a transmission, but also resources of one or more future transmissions, and determine, using a control message from the further UE, resources of intended transmissions that are scheduled to occur in the same set of resources, and using the resources of the current, future and intended transmissions, to determine the resource allocation related AIM in order to avoid the further UE from transmitting in these resources. Lee, ¶139 (assisting UE performs the sensing operation of figure 14); Lee, ¶116 (in the method of figure 14, the UE identifies resources reserved by another UE during a sensing window and selects resources having low interference from among the remaining resources); Lee, ¶114 (assisting UE would decode SCIs from other UEs to learn what SL resources are being used by the UE transmitting the SCI).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BENJAMIN S LAMONT whose telephone number is (571)270-7514 and fax number is 571-270-8514 and email address is benjamin.lamont@uspto.gov (see MPEP 502.03 for authorizing unsecure communication). The examiner can normally be reached M-F 7am to 3pm EST.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Huy Vu can be reached on 571-272-3155. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/Benjamin Lamont/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2461