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 .
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.
Claims 1-21 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.
Regarding claims 1 and 15, the claimed limitation, “commissioning the variable frequency drives”, render the claims 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. Does its means to authorize the variable frequency drives to be in use, in service, or to initiate the process of communication between the commissioning device and the variable frequency drives? Dependent claims 2-14 and 16-21, respectively, are rejected for the same reasoning. Appropriate correction required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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.
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)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1-6, 8, 10-16, and 18-21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Snider et al. (hereinafter “Snider”, US Pat No. 2020/0248923).
As per claim 1, Snider disclosed a method for commissioning variable frequency drives (see fig. 5, one of a plurality of variable frequency drive 112) of electrical drive systems (see fig. 5), wherein at least one of the variable frequency drives has wireless data transmission equipment (see fig. 5, wherein each communication interface 128 of variable frequency drive 112 can perform wireline or wireless communication) via which the at least one of the variable frequency drives is supplied with data during commissioning, the method comprising a commissioning device (see fig. 5, multi-variable frequency drive control unit 130 and computing device 170) connecting with the wireless data transmission equipment of the at least one of the variable frequency drives during commissioning to transmit data to the at least one of the variable frequency drives; setting up the wireless data transmission equipment of the at least one of the variable frequency drives before commissioning the at least one of the variable frequency drives so that the at least one of the variable frequency drives can be communicated with under an individual identifier (see abstract and at least 0055-0060, each variable frequency drive may have an address that identifies a respective variable frequency drive) specific to the at least one of the variable frequency drives; and during commissioning of the at least one of the variable frequency drives, the commissioning device identifying the at least one of the variable frequency drives using the identifier (see 0055, The address may alternatively or additionally be based in part on a communication protocol used to communicatively coupled to the respective variable frequency drive, such as the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), the Internet Protocol (IP), the Ethernet protocol, the media access control (MAC) protocol, and so on. In some embodiments, the processor of the multi-VFD controller and each processor of a respective VFD controller may execute a software application, which may be stored in the memory device of the multi-VFD controller and a respective memory device of each VFD controller, that enables the multi-VFD controller to communicate with the respective variable frequency drive (via the communication interface and a respective communication interface) by entering or selecting the address of the respective variable frequency drive. For example, the software application may be a Modbus software application that enables communication using the Modbus serial communications protocol. The address of a target variable frequency drive may be entered via the user interface and/or the keypad of the multi-VFD control unit, and/or searched for via the communication interface of the multi-VFD control unit and selected via the user interface and/or the keypad of the multi-VFD control unit ).
As per claim 2, Snider disclosed the identifier is an SSID of a wireless network in accordance with the IEEE standards family 802.11 (WLAN) (see 0050, 0052, 0055, and 0059).
As per claim 3, Snider disclosed the data transmission equipment provides an access point of an infrastructure network (see fig. 5, multi-variable frequency drive control unit 130 can be the access point for computing device 170).
As per claim 4, Snider disclosed when setting up the data transmission equipment of the at least one of the variable frequency drives, the identifier is selected depending on a serial number of the at least one of the variable frequency drives (see 0055, the identity of variable frequency drive can be a serial number and it is clearly that when setting up the data transmission equipment of the at least one of the variable frequency drives, the serial number of the at least one of the variable frequency drives is selected).
As per claim 5, Snider disclosed, after the identifying the at least one of the variable frequency drives, the commissioning device transmitting data intended for the at least one of the variable frequency drives via the data transmission equipment to the at least one of the variable frequency drives (see at least abstract and 0056, the control unit may be implemented as a part of a mobile computing device, such that the controller may wirelessly and communicatively couple to each variable frequency drive controller. In this manner, managing or changing settings and/or control parameters of multiple variable frequency drives may be performed via a single control unit).
As per claim 6, Snider disclosed data that is transmitted contains programs and/or parameters for execution of control and/or regulation tasks by the at least one of the variable frequency drives (see rejection in claim 5).
As per claim 8, Snider disclosed the commissioning device uses the identifier to select the data intended for the at least one of the variable frequency drives from a data pool that contains data intended for multiple ones of the variable frequency drives (see rejection in claim 5 ; Also, the multi-variable frequency drive controller adjusts a control parameter of each variable frequency drive, see at least 0006 and 0056).
As per claim 10, Snider disclosed data that is transmitted from the commissioning device to the at least one of the variable frequency drives is previously transmitted to the commissioning device using remote data transmission equipment (see 0056, As such, the settings or control parameters of each variable frequency drive may include a setpoint of a respective variable frequency drive . In particular, the setpoint of a variable frequency drive may refer to a trigger or threshold value that is compared to a measured value, wherein a resulting action may be performed based on the comparison. In some embodiments, one or more variable frequency drives may include a proportional-integral-derivative controller that enables a control loop feedback mechanism. In particular, the proportional-integral-derivative controller may continuously calculate an error value as the difference between the setpoint and a measured value and apply a correction based on proportional, integral, and derivative terms).
As per claim 11, wherein data transmitted to the commissioning device contains information about particular ones of the variable frequency drives for which the data is intended (see rejection in claim 5).
As per claim 12, Snider disclosed the commissioning device is a network-compatible terminal (see at least 0050, the communication interface may enable the VFD controller to communicate with any suitable communication network to communicatively couple to another electronic device. As such, the communication interface may enable the VFD controller to communicate with wireless networks, such as a mobile, WiFi, LAN, WAN, or Internet network, through which the VFD controller may communicatively couple to a communication interface of another electronic device. The communication interface may also or alternatively enable the VFD controller to communicatively couple to a communication interface of another electronic device through wire-based communication technology, such as Ethernet, RS-232, RS-485, UART, USART, or USB technology).
As per claim 13, Snider disclosed software is transmitted to the network-compatible terminal via remote data transmission equipment (see at least 0055, Modbus software and see rejection of claim 12).
As per claim 14, Snider disclosed after transmission of the data to the at least one of the variable frequency drives, the commissioning device searches for radio signals of other ones of the variable frequency drives that are each identifiable by the commissioning device using an identifier of the data transmission equipment corresponding to each of the other ones of the variable frequency drives (see 0055 & 0063, the commissioning device using an identifier of the data transmission equipment corresponding to each of the other ones of the variable frequency drives so it is clear that the commissioning device can search for the variable frequency drives at any time).
As per claim 15, as rejected in claim 1, Snider disclosed further disclosed that
the commissioning of an electric drive system having a variable frequency drive and an electric motor (see fig. 5, 126) that is supplied with electrical energy (see fig. 5, 124)using the variable frequency drive.
As per claim 16, Snider disclosed the serial number is the identifier and/or the serial number can be identified using the identifier (see 0055, each variable frequency drive may have an address that identifies a respective variable frequency drive. The address of the respective variable frequency drive may be a unique address relative to other variable frequency drives , and may be based in part on a manufacturer, model number, and/or serial number of the respective variable frequency drive).
As per claim 18, Snider disclosed the data is transmitted using the internet (see 0050, 0052, 0055, and 0059).
As per claim 19, Snider disclosed the data transmitted to the commissioning device contains information indicative of at least one of identifiers for the particular ones of the variable frequency drives for which the data is intended or serial numbers for the particular ones of the variable frequency drives for which the data is intended (see rejection above in claims 4 and 8; By utilizing each variable frequency drive address (for ex.. Serial No.), the multi-variable frequency drive controller communicated with each variable frequency drive, see at least 0006, and vice versa).
As per claim 20, Snider disclosed the network-compatible terminal is one of: a PC, tablet or a smartphone (see 0057).
As per claim 21, Snider disclosed the software is transmitted via the internet (see 0050, 0052, 0055, and 0059).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.
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.
Claim(s) 7 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Snider and in view of Zhang et al. (hereinafter “Zhang”, US Pat No. 8,908,562).
As per claim 7, Snider does not explicitly disclosed data that is transmitted contains settings for a network that puts the at least one of the variable frequency drives in a position to register as a client in the network via the wireless data transmission equipment. However, such teaching is commonly known in the art, Zhang disclosed that the DM server (commissioning device) transmitted data contain settings (see fig. 9, steps 941 & 942) and wherein upon received the message, the device BT1 (variable frequency drives) can established connection (register) (see fig. 9, col. 20/ln. 56-col. 21/ln. 1-13). Therefore, it would have been obvious to of ordinary skill in the art at the time of invention for Snider to adopt such teaching, as taught by Zhang, in order to provide effective remote management network thereby reducing the complexity of implementing the management.
Claim(s) 9 and 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Snider in view of Nair et al. (hereinafter “Nair”, US Pat No. 9,489,832).
As per claims 9 and 17, Snider disclose various types of identifiers (see 0055) but is silent about tag type identifier. However in the same field of endeavor, Nair discloses such a tag type (for ex. barcode or QR code), see col. 32/ln. 14-19). Therefore, it would have been obvious to of ordinary skill in the art at the time of invention for Snider to adopt such tag type identifier, as taught by Nair, in order to provide effective remote management network to quicky and easily identified the variable frequency drives.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Pablo Tran whose telephone number is (571)272-7898. The examiner normal hours are 9:30 -5:00 (Monday-Friday). If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner's supervisor, Jinsong Hu, can be reached at (571)272-3965. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571)273-8300.
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March 20, 2026
/PABLO N TRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2643