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 .
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 1/08/2026 has been entered.
The prior art rejections are maintained or modified as follows:
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 of this title, 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 1-5, 7 and 9-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Adler et al. (“Adler”)(US 2022/0148117 A1) in view of Thome et al. (“Thome”)(US 2004/0162844), Vrba et al. (“Vrba”)(US 2010/0138017) and legal precedent.
Adler (fig. 1-6) teaches an automated transportation system comprising:
(re: certain elements of claim 1) a facility layer including at least one first transportation facility (fig. 2 and para. 37-38, 44, 146-163 teaching a distributed warehouse system comprising showing warehouse and related control systems 204, i.e., facility layer, connected to a warehouse management hub 202, i.e., system layer); and
a system layer, in which an integrated control system controlling the at least one first transportation facility, a material control system (MCS) controlling a transport command with respect to the integrated control system, a Real-Time Dispatcher (RTD) and a database storing information corresponding to an operation of the material control system and the real-time dispatcher are established (para. 3-5, 11, 12, 14, 23-27, 32-35, 39, 45-47 teaching that management hub/system layer includes multiple control systems which may include some or all of the functionality of the facility layer, e.g., dispatching real-time tasks to respective individual warehouses, such as retrieval and transport of material/products, wherein system layer tracks the status of each specific transportation facility/warehouse and sends tasks to specific warehouses accordingly; para. 37-38, 44 teaching that hub/system layer comprises a database that contains bulk of information relating to materials/products);
wherein the facility layer corresponds to a production site where transportation goods are transported by the at least one first transportation facility (para. 10, 105 teaching transportation of various products/goods to various destinations as part of supply chain operations), and
the system layer corresponds to a server room, spatially separated from the production site, in which a server controlling the at least one first transportation facility is established (fig. 2; para. 10, 31-36, 42-46 teaching that management hub may be implemented in cloud computing environment—including servers, memory and storage—or as a central management server in a physical location, i.e., warehouse/building);
(re: claim 2) wherein the facility layer further comprises at least one second transportation facility, and the integrated control system controls the at least one second transportation facility together with the at least one first transportation facility (para. 14, 42, 49-50, 157 teaching that multiple warehouses may be interconnected via warehouse management hub);
(re: claim 3) wherein each of the at least one first transportation facility and the at least one second transportation facility is one of an automated guided vehicle (AGV), an overhead hoist transport (OHT), a stacker crane, and a conveyor (para. 4-6);
(re: claim 4) wherein the integrated control system comprises at least one first control system respectively corresponding to the at least one first transportation facility, and at least one second control system respectively corresponding to the at least one second transportation facility (para. 14, 157);
(re: claim 5) wherein the at least one first transportation facility is an Overhead Hoist Transport (OHT), and the integrated control system comprises one OHT Control System (OCS) controlling the at least one first transportation facility (para. 6 teaching stacker cranes and vertical lift modules);
(re: claim 7) wherein the facility layer further comprises at least one second transportation facility, and a transportation facility control system controlling the at least one second transportation facility (para. 14, 49, 50, 157);
(re: claim 9) wherein systems included in the system layer are implemented as virtual machines (VMs) created in at least one host (para. 32-36 teaching use of virtual computing resources, such as multiple virtual machines, for hosting system functions);
(re: certain elements of claim 10) wherein the integrated control system, the material control system, and the real-time dispatcher managed have at least one of a redundancy structure or a replication system design (para. 27, 33 teaching that computing resources include multiple redundant sites, e.g., a primary and a backup).
Adler as set forth above teaches all that is claimed except for expressly teaching
(re: certain elements of claims 1, 9) wherein said system layer includes
an application server for managing the Real-Time Dispatcher (RTD); and
a Manufacturing Execution System (MES) executed by the application server, and
a database storing information about an operation of the manufacturing execution system are further established,
wherein the manufacturing execution system supports activities for performing production at a production site;
(re: claim 11) wherein the integrated control system includes a first control system and a second control system managed by different hosts, wherein the first control system and the second control system have an active-active structure;
(re: claim 12) wherein the material control system includes a first material control system and a second material control system managed by different hosts, and the real-time dispatcher includes a first real-time dispatcher and a second real-time dispatcher managed by different hosts;
wherein the first material control system, the second material control system, the first real-time dispatcher and the second real-time dispatcher respectively have an active-standby structure.
Here, it is noted that Adler already teaches that the warehouse control systems can include a variety of computing resources—such as web-based software, servers, memory, applications, virtual machines, etc. (para. 8-9, 15-16, 24, 32-35)—and that it is well-known to configure a control system with multiple redundant sites in both the virtual and physical spaces, and is merely silent on the specific server types and number of hosts for each control function.
Vrba also teaches that it is well-known in the control system arts
(re: certain elements of claims 1, 9)
- to couple a manufacturing module with a material control module within a system layer to allow retrieval and transport of material/products in the manufacturing context (fig. 1 and 2 showing product agent functioning at system level with transportation/equipment modules; para. 3-4, 90-91 teaching that manufacturing-focused controllers can be implemented using centralized or distributed schemes, wherein multiple control elements can be used for controlling production, supply chain management and planning and scheduling and that product agent determines “how products/semi-products and/or raw materials will be transported to and from” various production sites using production plan database; see also para. 18-21, 25-28, 36-38 teaching control system applicable to manufacturing and/or product ordering context using multiple module types, wherein product module is specifically configured to develop and execute production plans from a database transportation and is integrated with transportation module to ensure proper resources/equipment/materials are present to fulfill production plan).
Thome further teaches that it is well-known in the control system arts
(re: certain elements of claims 1, 9 and 11-12)
-to utilize application servers to efficiently implement specific system functions/tasks—such as material control tasks-- and to integrate multiple elements of a specific computing resource into a control system—such as hosts and application servers—to serve as system redundancies and to balance the system load (fig. 2 showing multiple application servers; fig. 3 showing multiple hosts; para. 44, 46, 48 teaching multiple hosts that function to prevent single point failure and that can be placed in various modes, e.g., active-standby).
Indeed, the claimed features relating to the number of hosts; types of servers; and system modes can be regarded as common design parameters/operating variables controlled by the design incentives and/or economic considerations involved in this type of subject matter. This is especially applicable in the control system arts as overall system requirements and economics controls variations in the specific system features. Moreover, legal precedent teaches that variations in these type of common design parameters/operating variables are obvious and are the mere optimization of result-effective variables that would be known to one with ordinary skill in the art. See MPEP 2144.05 I.II (teaching ample motivation to optimize or modify result-effective variables based on “design need(s)” or “market demand”); see also MPEP 2144.04.V.D. and VI (teaching that the mere rearrangement or duplication of known elements is not a patentable advance).
It would thus be obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art to modify the base reference with these prior art teachings—with a reasonable expectation of success—to arrive at the claimed invention. The rationale for this obviousness determination can be found in the prior art itself as cited above, in legal precedent as described above and from an analysis of the prior art teachings that demonstrates that the modification to arrive at the claimed invention would merely involve the substitution/addition of well-known elements (e.g., manufacturing control module, application server or host) with no change in their respective functions. Moreover, the use of prior art elements according to their known functions is a predictable variation that would yield predictable results (e.g., benefit produced by known function), and thus cannot be regarded as a non-obvious modification when the modification is already commonly implemented in the relevant prior art. See also MPEP 2143.I (teaching that simple substitution of one known element for another to obtain predictable results is known to one with ordinary skill in the art); 2144.06, 2144.07 (teaching as obvious the use of art recognized equivalences). Further, the prior art discussed and cited demonstrates the level of sophistication of one with ordinary skill in the art and that these modifications are predictable variations that would be within this skill level. Therefore, it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to modify the invention of Adler for the reasons set forth above.
Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Adler, Vrba Thome and legal precedent (“Adler et al.”) as applied to the claims above, and further in view of Weber et al. (“Weber”)(US 2003/0158615 A1).
Adler et al. as set forth above teach all that is claimed except for expressly teaching
(re: claim 13) wherein the automated transportation system is applied to a battery production process and is controlled to transport a battery being produced or a battery having been produced by the battery production process by using the at least one first transportation facility.
Weber, however, teaches that these types of distributed control system elements are well-known and are readily applicable to manufacturing items, such as batteries, as manufacturing processes often involve a variety of inputs and outputs that are well-suited to dynamic adjustment via process control software/hardware (fig. 49; para. 174-177, 191-195, 230-231, 303, 307 teaching that control system has flexible control components applicable to a variety of manufacturing processes, including batteries, and is effective in managing intelligent conveyor and guided vehicles in high-speed manufacturing environments; see also para. 304-306 teaching redundant process modules including hot back up controllers; para. 260-261, 293-294 teaching benefits of distributed data stores for manufacturing system; para. 174-177, 191-195, 252-253, 262, 272-275, 282-291 teaching that distributed control system includes multiple interacting subsystems—including software applications and hosting servers—to execute specific manufacturing tasks)
It would thus be obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art to modify the combination of references with these prior art teachings—with a reasonable expectation of success—to arrive at the claimed invention as these modifications are already well-known and commonly implemented in the control system arts. The rationale for this obviousness determination can be found in the prior art itself as cited above, in legal precedent as described above. Therefore, it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to modify the invention of Adler et al. for the reasons set forth
above.
Claims 14-16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Adler et al. (“Adler”)(US 2022/0148117 A1) in view of Vrba et al. (“Vrba”)(US 2010/0138017).
Adler (fig. 1-6) teaches an integrated control system, characterized in that,
(re: certain elements of claim 14) the integrated control system is separately established in a space separated from a plurality of transportation facilities, and is comprised of a plurality of control systems corresponding to the plurality of transportation facilities, respectively, the plurality of control systems being respectively managed by a plurality of virtualized hosts (para. 32-35, 42-46 teaching that a plurality of virtual machines may be used to manage and control multiple transportation facilities; see also fig. 2 and para. 6-12 teaching each transportation facility comprising a PLC managed by a separately located management hub control system),
wherein the space is separated from a production site where transportation goods are transported by at least one of the plurality of transportation facilities (para. 10, 105 teaching transportation of various products/goods to various destinations as part of supply chain operations), and
wherein the space corresponds to a server room, spatially separated from the production site, in which a server controlling the at least one of the plurality of transportation facilities are established (fig. 2; para. 10, 31-36, 42-46 teaching that management hub may be implemented in cloud computing environment—including servers, memory and storage—or as a central management server in a physical location, i.e., warehouse/building); and
the integrated control system is established as a single server integrated with a Material Control System (MCS) and a Real-Time Dispatcher (RTD), and controls the plurality of transportation facilities based on a transport command transmitted by the material control system and the real-time dispatcher to transport transportation goods (para. 35 teaching that management hub may be implemented as a central management server; para. 3-5, 11, 12, 14, 23-27, 32-35, 39, 45-47 teaching that management hub includes multiple control systems which may include some or all of the functionality of the warehouse/facility layer, e.g., dispatching real-time tasks to respective individual warehouses, such as retrieval and transport of material/products, wherein management hub tracks the status of each specific transportation facility/warehouse and sends tasks to specific warehouses accordingly);
(re: claim 15) wherein the plurality of transportation facilities are respectively one of an Automated Guided Vehicle (AGV), an Overhead Hoist Transport (OHT), a stacker crane, and a conveyor (para. 4-6, 10);
(re: claim 16) wherein the plurality of transportation facilities include different types of a first transportation facility and a second transportation facility, and are implemented to control operations of the first transportation facility and the second transportation facility by at least one hardware device installed in a space separated from the plurality of transportation facilities (para. 10, 35, 49-50, 105).
Adler as set forth above teaches all that is claimed except for expressly teaching
(re: certain elements of claim 14) wherein within an integrated control system space
a Manufacturing Execution System (MES) executed by the server, and
a database storing information about an operation of the manufacturing execution system are further established,
wherein the manufacturing execution system supports activities for performing production at a production site.
Vrba, however, teaches that it is well-known in the control system arts
(re: certain elements of claims 14)
- to couple a manufacturing module with a material control module to allow retrieval and transport of material/products in the manufacturing context (fig. 1 and 2 showing product module integrated with transportation/equipment modules; para. 3-4, 90-91 teaching that manufacturing-focused controllers can be implemented using centralized or distributed schemes, wherein control elements can be used for controlling production, supply chain management and planning and scheduling and that product agent module determines “how products/semi-products and/or raw materials will be transported to and from” various production sites using production plan database; see also para. 18-21, 25-28, 36-38 teaching control system applicable to manufacturing and/or product ordering context using multiple module types, wherein product module is specifically configured to develop and execute production plans from a database transportation and is integrated with transportation module to ensure proper resources/equipment/materials are present to fulfill production plans).
It would thus be obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art to modify the base reference with these prior art teachings—with a reasonable expectation of success—to arrive at the claimed invention. The rationale for this obviousness determination can be found in the prior art itself as cited above and from an analysis of the prior art teachings that demonstrates that the modification to arrive at the claimed invention would merely involve the substitution/addition of well-known elements (e.g., manufacturing control module) with no change in their respective functions. Moreover, the use of prior art elements according to their known functions is a predictable variation that would yield predictable results (e.g., benefit produced by known function), and thus cannot be regarded as a non-obvious modification when the modification is already commonly implemented in the relevant prior art. See also MPEP 2143.I (teaching that simple substitution of one known element for another to obtain predictable results is known to one with ordinary skill in the art); 2144.06, 2144.07 (teaching as obvious the use of art recognized equivalences). Further, the prior art discussed and cited demonstrates the level of sophistication of one with ordinary skill in the art and that these modifications are predictable variations that would be within this skill level. Therefore, it would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to modify the invention of Adler for the reasons set forth above.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments that the prior art fails to teach the amended claim features are unpersuasive in view of the reformulated prior art rejections set forth above. In particular, Adler as cited above expressly teaches that it is well-known to integrate a manufacturing execution module with a material control module. Consequently, as a reasonable interpretation of the prior art undermines Applicant’s arguments, the claims stand rejected.
Conclusion
Any references not explicitly discussed but made of record during the prosecution of the instant application are considered helpful in understanding and establishing the state of the prior art and are thus relevant to the prosecution of the instant application.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JOSEPH C RODRIGUEZ whose telephone number is 571-272-3692 (M-F, 9 am – 6 pm, PST). The Supervisory Examiner is MICHAEL MCCULLOUGH, 571-272-7805. The Official fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Alternatively, to contact the examiner, send an E-mail communication to Joseph.Rodriguez@uspto.gov. Such E-mail communication should be in accordance with provisions of the MPEP (see e.g., 502.03 & 713.04; see also Patent Internet Usage Policy Article 5). E-mail communication must begin with a statement authorizing the E-mail communication and acknowledging that such communication is not secure and may be made of record. Please note that any communications with regards to the merits of an application will be made of record. A suggested format for such authorization is as follows: "Recognizing that Internet communications are not secure, I hereby authorize the USPTO to communicate with me concerning any subject matter of this application by electronic mail. I understand that a copy of these communications will be made of record in the application file”.
Information regarding the status of an application may also be obtained from the Patent Center: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov/
/JOSEPH C RODRIGUEZ/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3655
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May 19, 2026
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