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 .
DETAILED ACTION
This action is in response to remarks filed 12/31/2025.
Claims 1-5, 7-11, 13-18, and 20 are pending in the application.
Claims 1, 5, 8, 14, and 18 are currently rejected.
Claims 2-4, 7, 9-11, 13, 15-17, and 20 are objected to.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see remarks, filed 12/31/2025, with respect to the 35 U.S.C. 112(b) rejections of claims 6, 12, and 19 have been fully considered and are persuasive. The rejection of claims 6, 12, and 19 under 35 U.S.C. 112 (b) has been withdrawn in view of the cancellation of the claims.
Applicant's arguments with respect to the rejection of claims 1, 5, 8, 14, and 20 filed 12/31/2025 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. The claim limitations have a new claim scope and a mapping has been provided below. Examiner would like to additionally note for the purpose of compact prosecution that claim 8 does not specify that it is a relay UE performing the generating and transmitting steps as is specified in the other independent claims. In the case this isn’t specified, a base station performing this step can be used for this claim limitation.
Applicant’s arguments, see remarks, filed 12/31/2025, with respect to the rejection of claims 2-4, 7, 9-11, 13, 15-17, and 20 have been fully considered and are persuasive. The rejection of claims 2-4, 7, 9-11, 13, 15-17, and 20 has been withdrawn.
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.
Claims 1, 8, and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Chun (Pub. No.: US 2019/0239147 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Chun teaches
A communication method (Chun [0005-0006]: communication method), comprising:
generating, by a relay User Equipment (UE), replacement indication information based on cell reselection (Chun [0266-0268]: relay UE confirms criteria regarding cell reselection (generating information)); and
transmitting, by the relay UE, the replacement indication information to a remote UE (Chun [0266-0268]: relay UE informing (transmitting to) remote UE information regarding cell reselection);
wherein the replacement indication information informs the remote UE that the relay UE performs cell reselection (Chun [0266-0268]: remote UE associated with relay UE, which the relay UE informs when performing reselection).
Regarding claim 8, Chun teaches
A non-transitory storage medium storing one or more programs, the one or more programs comprising computer instructions, which, when executed by a processor (Chun [0321]: storage and processor to control overall operations), cause the processor to:
generate replacement indication information based on cell reselection (Chun [0266-0268]: relay UE confirms criteria regarding cell reselection (generating information)); and
transmit the replacement indication information to a remote User Equipment (UE) (Chun [0266-0268]: relay UE informing (transmitting to) remote UE information regarding cell reselection);
wherein the replacement indication information informs the remote UE that the relay UE performs cell reselection (Chun [0266-0268]: remote UE associated with relay UE, which the relay UE informs when performing reselection).
Regarding claim 14, Chun teaches
A relay User Equipment (UE) (Chun [0266-0268]: relay UE), comprising a memory and a processor (Chun [0321]: memory and processor), wherein the memory stores one or more programs (Chun [0321]: memory storing calculated and processed information), the one or more programs comprising computer instructions, which, when executed by the processor (Chun [0321]: processor controlling overall operations), cause the processor to:
generate replacement indication information based on cell reselection (Chun [0266-0268]: relay UE confirms criteria regarding cell reselection (generating information)); and
transmit the replacement indication information to a remote UE (Chun [0266-0268]: relay UE informing (transmitting to) remote UE information regarding cell reselection);
wherein the replacement indication information informs the remote UE that the relay UE performs cell reselection (Chun [0266-0268]: remote UE associated with relay UE, which the relay UE informs when performing reselection).
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.
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.
Claims 5 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Chun (Pub. No.: US 2019/0239147 A1) in view of Huang (CN 107889080 A).
Regarding claim 5, Chun teaches
The method according to claim 1 (the limitations of parent claim 1 as indicated above), wherein a communication connection between the relay UE and the remote UE is a PC5 connection (Chun [0297]: UE [remote] establishes a PC5 interface with a relay UE), and…
Chun does not appear to explicitly teach that a communication connection between the remote UE and a source base station is a Uu connection.
However, Huang, in the analogous art of handover and mobility-related information, teaches
a communication connection between the remote UE and a source base station is a Uu connection (Huang pg. 5 lines 8-9 and lines 14-15: remote UE and BS connected via a Uu interface).
It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Chun to incorporate the teachings of Huang and have the communication connection between the remote UE and a source base station be a Uu connection. Doing so would allow for the exchange of mobility related information (Huang pg. 5).
Regarding claim 18, Chun teaches
The relay UE according to claim 14 (the limitations of parent claim 14 as indicated above), wherein a communication connection between the relay UE and the remote UE is a PC5 connection (Chun [0297]: UE [remote] establishes a PC5 interface with a relay UE), and…
Chun does not appear to explicitly teach that a communication connection between the remote UE and a source base station is a Uu connection.
However, Huang, in the analogous art of handover and mobility-related information, teaches
a communication connection between the remote UE and a source base station is a Uu connection (Huang pg. 5 lines 8-9 and lines 14-15: remote UE and BS connected via a Uu interface).
It would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Chun to incorporate the teachings of Huang and have the communication connection between the remote UE and a source base station be a Uu connection. Doing so would allow for the exchange of mobility related information (Huang pg. 5).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-4, 7, 9-11, 13, 15-17, and 20 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Claims 2-4, 7, 9-11, 13, 15-17, and 20 recite additional limitations which differentiate from the cited prior art. The handover termination information being transmitted based on the replacement indication information is not taught by the cited prior arts nor is updating a target cell based on the replacement information where the target is selected from a group consisting of the target cell after the cell reselection or target cells corresponding to other relay UEs.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RACHEL E MARKS whose telephone number is (703)756-1309. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Fri 8:30am-6pm.
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, Charles C Jiang can be reached at (571)270-7191. 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.
/R.E.M./Examiner, Art Unit 2412 /CHARLES C JIANG/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2412