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 .
This communication is in response to claims filed on 02/09/26.
Claims 1-6 are presented for examination.
Claims 1 & 3 are currently amended.
Claims 7-20 are cancelled.
Response to Arguments
6. Applicant’s amendment filed on 02/09/26, regarding a claim objection (claims 1, 7 & 17) has been considered and is persuasive. Thus, the claim objection has been withdrawn.
7. Applicant's amendments filed on 02/09/26, regarding a 112, 2nd paragraph (claims 7-11 & 13-19 are canceled) has been considered and is persuasive. Thus, the 112, 2nd paragraph has been withdrawn.
8. Applicant’s arguments and amendment filed on 02/09/26, regarding a 102 & 103 rejection (Claims 1-6) have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
9. Applicant’s argument/amendment filed on 02/09/26 (on page 7) is rejected as follow:
Claim 1: Ericsson discloses a terminal equipment (See Section 5.X; the UE performing a consistent LBT failure recovery), comprising:
a transmitter and/or a receiver (See Section 2.4; a User Equipment (UE) is equipped with a transceiver); and
a processor (See Section 2.4; a User Equipment (UE) is equipped with a Controller/CPU/Processor) configure to, for an activated serving cell configured with lbt-FailureRecoveryConfig, when a first condition is satisfied (See 5.X; the UE performing a consistent LBT failure recovery is located in the active serving in which an LBT-MAC is set. FailureRecoveryConfig when a consistent LBT failure recovery is configured on active BWP of the serving cell),
reset a counter for consistent LBT failure detection (See 5.X; a LBT counter is set to 0),
the first condition comprising at least one of the following conditions:
an event causing a scheduling request for LBT failure Medium Access Control Control Element (MAC CE) to be triggered occurs (See Section 5.X.2 on page 7; triggering a Scheduling Request for LBT failure MAC CE).
Therefore, claim 1 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102 by Ericsson.
Claims 2-6 are also rejected since they are depend upon rejected independent claim set forth above.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
10. The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
11. Claims 1-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Ericsson et al. (hereinafter referred as Ericsson) NPL Document, “Handling consistent UL LBT failures” 24th February – 6th March 2020 (as disclosed in the IDS).
Regarding claim 1: Ericsson discloses a terminal equipment (See Section 5.X; the UE performing a consistent LBT failure recovery), comprising:
a transmitter and/or a receiver (See Section 2.4; a User Equipment (UE) is equipped with a transceiver); and
a processor (See Section 2.4; a User Equipment (UE) is equipped with a Controller/CPU/Processor) configure to, for an activated serving cell configured with lbt-FailureRecoveryConfig, when a first condition is satisfied (See 5.X; the UE performing a consistent LBT failure recovery is located in the active serving in which an LBT-MAC is set. FailureRecoveryConfig when a consistent LBT failure recovery is configured on active BWP of the serving cell),
reset a counter for consistent LBT failure detection (See Section 5.X; a LBT counter is set to 0),
the first condition comprising at least one of the following conditions:
an event causing a scheduling request for LBT failure Medium Access Control Control Element (MAC CE) to be triggered occurs (See Section 5.X.2 on page 7; triggering a Scheduling Request for LBT failure MAC CE).
Regarding claim 2: Ericsson discloses a terminal equipment, wherein the event causing instructing a multiplexing and assembly procedure to generate an LBT failure MAC CE comprises at least one of the following events that: upon reception of Radio Resource Control (RRC) configuration or RRC reconfiguration for BWP switching (See Section 2.4 & 4; RRC reconfiguration for the SCell).
Regarding claim 3: Ericsson discloses a terminal equipment, wherein the first condition comprises an event causing instructing a multiplexing and assembly procedure to generate an LBT failure MAC CE, and the event causing instructing a multiplexing and assembly procedure to generate an LBT failure MAC CE comprises at least one of the following events that: consistent LBT failure has been triggered and not cancelled in a special cell (SpCell), and uplink shared channel (UL-SCH) resources are available for a new transmission in the special cell and these UL-SCH resources can accommodate theLBT failure MAC CE plus its sub-header as a result of logical channel prioritization (LCP) (See Section 5.X.1 & 5.X.2; consistence LBT failure has been triggered, and not canceled, in the SPCell. UL-SCH resources are available for a new transmission in the SPCell and these UL-SCH resources can accommodate the LBT failure MAC CE plus its subleader as a result of logical channel prioritization).
Regarding claim 4: Ericsson discloses a terminal equipment, wherein the event causing a scheduling request for LBT failure MAC CE to be triggered (See Section 3; Scheduling request is triggered to request resource for UL LBT failure MAC CE) comprises: consistent LBT failure has been triggered and not cancelled in at least one secondary cell, and uplink shared channel (UL-SCH) resources are not available for a new transmission in a serving cell for which consistent LBT failure has not been triggered and these UL-SCH resources can accommodate the LBT failure MAC CE plus its sub-header as a result of logical channel prioritization (LCP) (See Section 5.X.1; consistence LBT failure has been triggered, and not canceled, in the SPCell. UL-SCH resources are available for a new transmission in the SPCell and these UL-SCH resources can accommodate the LBT failure MAC CE plus its subleader as a result of logical channel prioritization).
Regarding claim 5: Ericsson discloses a terminal equipment, wherein reset a counter for consistent LBT failure detection comprises: set the counter to 0 (See Section 5.X; a LBT counter is set to 0).
Regarding claim 6: Ericsson discloses a terminal equipment, wherein, one of the lower layers of the terminal equipment is a physical layer (See Section 1; a physical layer).
Conclusion
12. 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.
13. The prior art of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure.
A. Lohr et al. 2025/0024500 A1 (Title: Techniques for listen before talk failure recovery for sidelink) (See Abstract, Para. 0012 & 0037-0038).
B. Jeong et al. 2024/0049286 A1 (Title: SL resource selection and reselection for SL transmission) (See abstract, Para. 0006 & 00813-0016).
C. Kung et al. 2023/0199638 A1 (Title: Method and apparatus for uplink time alignment in a wireless communication system) (See FIG. 1, Para. 0046, 0050 & 0160).
14. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MEWALE A AMBAYE whose telephone number is (571)270-1076. The examiner can normally be reached on M.F 6a.m.-2p.m..
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Ian Moore can be reached on (571)272-3085. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MEWALE A AMBAYE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2469