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 .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, filed May 24, 2026, with respect to claims 1-10 and 19-21 have been fully considered and are persuasive. The 35 U.S.C. 103 rejections of claims 1-11 and 19-21 have been withdrawn.
Applicant’s arguments filed May 24, 2026 with respect to claims 12-18 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. Regarding claim 12, Applicant argues that Pylappan (US 2022/0373637) describes the UE device transmitting its GPS location, which is not the same as motion of the UE device, and that Pylappan makes no mention of the UE device transmitting information about its own motion to the network in the first contextual information.
Examiner respectfully disagrees. Pylappan’s UE device transmitting its GPS location corresponds to UE motion information because according to Pylappan’s paragraphs 2 and examiner-cited paragraph 34, the UE shares its location data at an increased interval (sampling rate) allowing for determining of direction of travel of the UE (See paragraphs 52-54, 56-58, 61-63). Thus, the GPS location serves as contextual information including a motion of the UE device. Accordingly, claims 12-18 remain rejected as outlined in the non-final rejection dated February 23, 2026.
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.
Claim(s) 12, 16 and 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tabet et al. (US 2015/0304883) in view of Pylappan (US 2022/0373637).
Regarding claim 12, Tabet et al. disclose a method of operating a user equipment (UE) (Figure 4, UE 106) to communicate with a cellular network, the method comprising:
with the one or more processors (Figure 4, processor(s) 402), generating first contextual information about usage of the UE device (Figure 7 and paragraph 104, In 702, a UE 106 may transmit an indication of one or more types of expected upcoming data traffic (e.g., uplink traffic, and/or downlink traffic) to a (e.g., serving) base station 102 or MME/(S/P)GW. The UE 106 may monitor application data already generated, buffered, and ready for transmission to determine the expected upcoming data traffic, according to some embodiments. Additionally or alternatively, the UE 106 may monitor application data generation and/or application data flow patterns to predict if one or more types of data traffic will be generated and ready for transmission within a certain time period), wherein the first contextual information includes
a cellular connectivity history of the UE device (Paragraph 104, a UE 106 may transmit an indication of one or more types of expected upcoming data traffic (e.g., uplink traffic, and/or downlink traffic) to a (e.g., serving) base station 102 or MME/(S/P)GW…UE 106 may monitor application data generation and/or application data flow patterns [cellular connectivity history] to predict if one or more types of data traffic will be generated and ready for transmission within a certain time period),
a location of the UE device,
a motion of the TE device, or
information about a battery level of the UE device (Paragraphs 143, 153 and figure 9, power preference indicator (PPI)); and
transmitting, using one or more antennas (Figure 4, antenna 435), a signal to the cellular network (Figure 7 and paragraph 115 step 710, exchange RRC connection establishment parameters with the BS 102 to establish the scheduled RRC connection), that implements, for the UE device and the cellular network, a network connectivity decision that is based on the first contextual information (Figure 7 steps 706-710, RRC connection established between based station and UE based on indication in step 702).
Tabet et al. do not disclose the following limitations that are disclosed by Pylappan: motion information of the UE device (Pylappan, Paragraphs 13 and 21, mobile device 105 is triggered to share its location data; Paragraph 17, Mobile device 105 determines its location using a geographical positioning receiver 140 (e.g., global positioning system (GPS)), assisted GPS (A-GPS), cellular tower data (e.g., nearest tower, triangulation, etc.), wireless network data (e.g., a listing of known Wi-Fi network connections within geographical areas), or a combination thereof. For example, mobile device 105 may determine that it is within or outside of a threshold distance from a dead zone, location of directional ambiguity, or pickup/drop off location based upon latitude and longitude values determined by geographical positioning receiver 140 and/or latitude and longitude values associated with a wireless network signal received by mobile device 105). According to paragraph 34, mobile device 105 uses its location data to determine whether to increase communication rate with the network or wait to communicate with the network; Paragraphs 2 and 34, the UE shares its location data at an increased interval (sampling rate) allowing for determining of direction of travel of the UE (See paragraphs 52-54, 56-58, 61-63).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gheorghiu et al. with the cited disclosure from Pylappan in order to mitigate signal loss an directional ambiguity with dynamic location data sampling (Pylappan, Title).
Regarding claim 16, Tabet et al. disclose transmitting, using the one or more antennas, an additional signal to the cellular network that includes the first contextual information (Figure 9 steps 902 and 904, UE 106 transmission of load-based-delay feature during RRC connection establishment [Paragraph 142]).
Regarding claim 17, Tabet et al. and Pylappan disclose wherein the network connectivity decision comprises: a decision to immediately transmit or to delay wireless data transfer with the cellular network (Paragraph 14, a wireless devices and a base station may (e.g., optionally) agree to implement a feature whereby transmission of some uplink and/or downlink traffic may be selectively delayed depending on loading considerations at the base station; Pylappan, According to paragraph 34, mobile device 105 uses its location data to determine whether to increase communication rate with the network or wait to communicate with the network), selection of a wireless base station of the cellular network for reception of the signal, selection of a frequency to use for transmission of the signal, or a reduction in data quality of the signal.
Claim(s) 13-15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tabet et al. in view of Pylappan as applied to claim 12 above, and further in view of Gheorghiu et al. (US 2014/0307623).
Regarding claim 13, Tabet et al. in view of Pylappan disclose the claimed invention above but do not specifically disclose the following limitations that are disclosed by Gheorghiu et al.: receiving, using the one or more antennas (Gheorghiu et al., Figure 7, antennas 760), second contextual information about usage of a set of additional UE devices (Gheorghiu et al., Paragraph 83, …the device 500 is configured to receive a cell load indication [second contextual information] from the Pcell…the device 500 is configured to receive a cell load indication [second contextual information] from the Scell…; Figure 10 step 1005; The cell load indication inherently includes usage information of additional UEs in the cell because a cell is comprised of a plurality of UEs, as shown in figure 1, that contribute to the load of the respective cell), wherein making the network connectivity decision comprises making the network connectivity decision based on the second contextual information (Paragraph 83, …and to establish the independent connection with the Scell based at least in part on the cell load indication received from the Pcell…and to select the Scell based at least in part on the cell load indication received from the Scell…; Figure 10 steps 1010 and 1015).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Tabet et al. and Pylappan with the cited disclosure from Gheorghiu et al. in order to establish connection quickly with low signaling to rapidly enable communication at high data rates (Gheorghiu et al., Paragraph 42).
Regarding claim 14, Tabet et al. in view of Pylappan in view of Gheorghiu et al. disclose wherein making the network connectivity decision comprises: selecting an updated frequency band for transmission of the signal based on the first contextual information (Tabet et al., Figure 7, connection establishment based on indication of contextual information from UE) and the second contextual information (Gheorghiu et al., Figure 10 step 1005, receive selection parameters; Paragraph 125, receiving selection parameters from the first cell includes receiving a set of candidate cells from which to select the second cell [select updated frequency band]… In some embodiments, the selection parameters received from the first cell include at least one of a reference signal receive power, a reference signal receive quality, a wireless local area network (WLAN) load [second contextual information], a basic service set (BSS) load [second contextual information], or a wide area network (WAN) metric; Paragraph 78, candidate cell is identified by a carrier frequency).
Regarding claim 15, Pylappan and Gheorghiu et al. disclose wherein the first contextual information includes the location of the UE device (Pylappan, Paragraphs 17 and 34, mobile device 105 obtains location information via GPS), the second contextual information includes information about the set of additional UE devices dropping a connection to the cellular network at a particular location (Pylappan, Paragraph 21, data of a history of previous trips made by mobile devices [set of additional UE devices] stored in trip history database 165… arrival prediction engine 155 transmits one or more messages to mobile device 105 to trigger mobile device 105 to share location data more or less frequently; Paragraph 22, Dead zone tracker 160 determines geographic areas with a history of wireless communication loss; Paragraphs 23-24 and 30-34, system uses mobile device 105 location, trip history databased 165 and dead zone tracker 160 to determine mobile device 105 is within or approaching a dead zone), and selecting the updated frequency band comprises selecting the updated frequency band when the UE device is at or approaching the particular location (Pylappan, Paragraphs 23-24 and 30-34, system uses mobile device 105 location, trip history databased 165 and dead zone tracker 160 to determine mobile device 105 is within or approaching a dead zone; Gheorghiu et al., Paragraph 125, cell selection based on parameters including a reference signal receive power, a reference signal receive quality, a wireless local area network (WLAN) load, a basic service set (BSS) load, or a wide area network (WAN) metric).
Claim(s) 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tabet et al. in view of Pylappan in view of Gheorghiu et al. as applied to claim 13 above, and further in view of Brooks et al. (US 11,212,857)
Regarding claim 18, Tabet et al. in view of Pylappan in view of Gheorghiu et al. disclose the claimed invention above but do not specifically disclose the following limitations that are disclosed by Brooks et al.: training, using the one or more processors, a learning model based on the first contextual information, wherein making the network connectivity decision comprises making the network connectivity decision based on an output of the learning model (Brooks et al., Claim 1, aggregated network information associated with a plurality of user equipments (UEs) in communication with at least one of the 4G base station or a Fifth Generation (5G) base station, wherein the aggregated network information comprises at least signal strength information and location information associated with the plurality of UEs; determining that a UE is communicating with the 4G base station using a first bearer; determining network information associated with the UE; inputting, based at least in part on an addition inquiry associated with the UE, the network information and the aggregated network information to a machine learning algorithm trained to evaluate addition inquiries; receiving, from the machine learning algorithm, a response to the addition inquiry, the machine learning algorithm trained to determine the response at least partially based on a likelihood that, if a 5G connection is established, the UE will be dropped by the 5G base station within a threshold amount of time; and performing one of: determining that the response denies the addition inquiry and refraining from establishing a 5G connection with the UE; or determining that the response approves the addition inquiry and sending a message to the 5G base station to establish a 5G connection with the UE using a second bearer, wherein the UE is connected to both the 4G base station via the first bearer and the 5G base station via the second bearer at a same time).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the system of Tabet et al., Pylappan and Gheorghiu et al. with the cited disclosure from Brooks et al. in order to optimize communications between UEs and base stations (Brooks et al., Abstract).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-10 and 19-21 are allowed.
The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance: regarding claims 1 and 19, the prior art does not disclose or adequately suggest updating, using the one or more processors, communication between the one or more antennas and the cellular network when the UE device is at or approaching the location, wherein updating the communication comprises changing a frequency band of the communication (Claim 1), and transmitting, using the one or more antennas, a second signal to the cellular network that implements the wireless connectivity action, wherein the second signal comprises a request to update a frequency band used by the UE device to communicate with the network.
Any comments considered necessary by applicant must be submitted no later than the payment of the issue fee and, to avoid processing delays, should preferably accompany the issue fee. Such submissions should be clearly labeled “Comments on Statement of Reasons for Allowance.”
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to OTIS L THOMPSON, JR whose telephone number is (571)270-1953. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 6:30am - 7:00pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Chirag G. Shah can be reached at (571)272-3144. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/OTIS L THOMPSON, JR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2477
July 16, 2026
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