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 Amendment
Applicant’s amendment filed on February 25, 2026 has been entered. Claims 1, 3, 5, 9, 11-12, 16 and 19-21 have been amended. Claim 2 is canceled. Claims 13-15 were previously canceled. No claims have been added. Claims 1, 3-12 and 16-23 are still pending in this application, with claims 1, 11-12. 16-17 and 20-23 being independent.
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)(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.
Claims 11, 20 and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Hong (U.S. PGPub 2021/0127293), hereinafter referred to as Hong.
Regarding claim 11, Hong discloses a congestion processing method applied to a second node (IAB node; See Fig. 13), the method comprising:
determining congestion information, wherein the congestion information includes downlink congestion information and uplink congestion information (The IAB node performs a step of monitoring an uplink buffer status or a downlink buffer status in the IAB node. The buffer status information for indicating of the congestion status; See [0151] and [0213]); and
sending the congestion information to a first node through an F1 application protocol F1AP interface (The IAB node may transmit the downlink buffer status information to the donor base station by including the downlink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The IAB node may transmit the uplink buffer status information to a donor base station by including the uplink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The buffer status information for indicating of the congestion status may be delivered from an access IAB node accommodating a UE to a donor base station; See [0156]-[0157] and [0213]).
Regarding claim 20, Hong discloses a device, comprising:
at least one processor (controller; See Fig. 16, #1610);
a memory (memory; See [0346]) configured to store at least one program, wherein the at least one program, when executed by the at least one processor, causes the at least one processor to implement the congestion processing method according to claim 11 (The IAB node performs a step of monitoring an uplink buffer status or a downlink buffer status in the IAB node. The IAB node may transmit the downlink buffer status information to the donor base station by including the downlink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The IAB node may transmit the uplink buffer status information to a donor base station by including the uplink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The buffer status information for indicating of the congestion status may be delivered from an access IAB node accommodating a UE to a donor base station; See [0151], [0156]-[0157] and [0213]).
Regarding claim 22, Hong discloses a non-transitory storage medium having stored computer executable instructions (memory unit; See [0346]), wherein when executed by a processor, the computer executable instructions implement the congestion processing method according to claim 11 (The IAB node performs a step of monitoring an uplink buffer status or a downlink buffer status in the IAB node. The IAB node may transmit the downlink buffer status information to the donor base station by including the downlink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The IAB node may transmit the uplink buffer status information to a donor base station by including the uplink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The buffer status information for indicating of the congestion status may be delivered from an access IAB node accommodating a UE to a donor base station; See [0151], [0156]-[0157] and [0213]).
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.
Claims 1, 3, 5-7, 9-10 and 16-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wu et al. (U.S. PGPub 2022/0408308), hereinafter referred to as ‘308 in view of Hong.
Regarding claim 1, ’308 teaches a congestion processing method applied to a first node (IAB donor; See Fig. 3, #302), the method comprising:
receiving congestion information, wherein the congestion information is used for congestion processing of the first node (a donor node may receive an enhanced DDDS message indicating that congestion happens at an IAB node; See [0089]); and
performing the congestion processing based on the congestion information (the donor node may take an action to reduce the congestion at the IAB node; See [0090]);
wherein the congestion information includes downlink congestion information (The enhanced DDDS message may include information regarding the ingress RLC channel, the egress RLC channel, or both; See [0060]) and downlink congestion data radio bearer (DRB) information (the accessing IAB node can have information indicating that the given DRB has a congestion issue. Accordingly, the DU of the accessing IAB node can include such information in the DDDS message and transmit the DDDS message to the CU of the donor node; See [0047]).
‘308 fails to teach wherein the congestion information includes uplink congestion information.
Hong teaches wherein the congestion information includes downlink congestion information and uplink congestion information (The IAB node may transmit the downlink buffer status information to the donor base station by including the downlink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The IAB node may transmit the uplink buffer status information to a donor base station by including the uplink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The buffer status information for indicating of the congestion status may be delivered from an access IAB node accommodating a UE to a donor base station; See [0156]-[0157] and [0213])
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the method of ‘308 to include wherein the congestion information includes uplink congestion information taught by Hong in order to optimize congestion handling by mitigating congestion and packet dropping using efficient flow control.
Regarding claim 3, ‘308 further teaches the method according to claim 1, wherein the downlink congestion information includes at least one of:
a wireless backhaul radio link control (RLC) channel identifier of a congested link (The enhanced DDDS message may include information regarding the ingress RLC channel, the egress RLC channel, or both; See [0060]);
a routing identifier of the congested link;
an integrated access and backhaul (IAB) child node identifier of the congested link; or
a downlink data transmission efficiency of the congested link.
Regarding claim 5, ‘308 fails to teach the method according to claim 1, wherein the uplink congestion information includes at least one of: a wireless backhaul radio link control (RLC) channel identifier of a congested link; a link identifier of the congested link; an integrated access and backhaul (IAB) child node identifier of the congested link; a buffer status report (BSR) reported by a child node of the congested link; or an uplink data transmission efficiency of the congested link.
Hong teaches a wireless backhaul RLC channel identifier of a congested link (the uplink buffer status information or downlink buffer status information may include backhaul RLC channel identifier information for identifying a backhaul RLC channel associated with a corresponding IAB node; See [0161]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the method of ‘308 to include wherein the uplink congestion information includes at least one of: a wireless backhaul RLC channel identifier of a congested link taught by Hong in order to optimize congestion handling by mitigating congestion and packet dropping using efficient flow control.
Regarding claim 6, ‘308 further teaches the method according to claim 5, wherein the wireless backhaul RLC channel identifier includes at least one of an ingress wireless backhaul RLC channel identifier and an egress wireless backhaul RLC channel identifier (The enhanced DDDS message may include information regarding the ingress RLC channel, the egress RLC channel, or both; See [0060]).
Regarding claim 7, ‘308 further teaches the method according to claim 5, wherein the IAB child node identifier includes at least one of a wireless backhaul adaptation protocol (BAP) address and an Internet protocol (IP) address (the identifier for identifying a child node of an IAB node may be a BAP entity address for the child node; See [0074]).
Regarding claim 9, ’308 further teaches the method according to claim 1, wherein the downlink congestion DRB information includes at least one of:
an identifier of a congested DRB (an identifier for identifying the given DRB; See [0046]);
an identifier of a user equipment (UE) to which the congested DRB belongs;
an identifier of a tunnel endpoint of a general packet radio service (GPRS) tunnel protocol of the congested DRB;
an amount of data required for the congested DRB; or
a rate of the data required for the congested DRB.
Regarding claim 10, ‘308 further teaches the method according to claim 1, wherein receiving the congestion information includes:
receiving downlink congestion information or uplink congestion information sent by a second node through an F1 application protocol (F1AP) interface (different IAB nodes may take different schemes to report congestion to the donor node (e.g., via F1 signaling); See [0058]) ; or receiving downlink congestion DRB information sent by a third node through an E1 application protocol (E1AP) interface.
Regarding claim 16, ‘308 teaches a device (IAB donor; See Fig. 3, #302), comprising:
at least one processor (processor; See Fig. 6, #608); and
a memory (medium; See Fig. 6, #606) configured to store at least one program, wherein the at least one program, when executed by the at least one processor, causes the at least one processor to implement the congestion processing method according to claim 1 (The accessing IAB node can have information indicating that the given DRB has a congestion issue. Accordingly, the DU of the accessing IAB node can include such information in the DDDS message and transmit the DDDS message to the CU of the donor node. The enhanced DDDS message may include information regarding the ingress RLC channel, the egress RLC channel, or both. A donor node may receive a message indicating that congestion happens at an IAB node. The donor node may take an action to reduce the congestion at the IAB node; See [0047], [0060], [0089]-[0090]).
‘308 fails to teach wherein the congestion information includes uplink congestion information.
Hong teaches wherein the congestion information includes downlink congestion information and uplink congestion information (The IAB node may transmit the downlink buffer status information to the donor base station by including the downlink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The IAB node may transmit the uplink buffer status information to a donor base station by including the uplink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The buffer status information for indicating of the congestion status may be delivered from an access IAB node accommodating a UE to a donor base station; See [0156]-[0157] and [0213])
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the apparatus of ‘308 to include wherein the congestion information includes uplink congestion information taught by Hong in order to optimize congestion handling by mitigating congestion and packet dropping using efficient flow control.
Regarding claim 17, ‘308 teaches a non-transitory storage medium having stored computer executable instructions (a non-transitory computer-readable medium; See Fig. 6, #606), wherein when executed by a processor, the computer executable instructions implement the congestion processing method according to claim 1 (The accessing IAB node can have information indicating that the given DRB has a congestion issue. Accordingly, the DU of the accessing IAB node can include such information in the DDDS message and transmit the DDDS message to the CU of the donor node. The enhanced DDDS message may include information regarding the ingress RLC channel, the egress RLC channel, or both. A donor node may receive a message indicating that congestion happens at an IAB node. The donor node may take an action to reduce the congestion at the IAB node; See [0047], [0060], [0089]-[0090]).
‘308 fails to teach wherein the congestion information includes uplink congestion information.
Hong teaches wherein the congestion information includes downlink congestion information and uplink congestion information (The IAB node may transmit the downlink buffer status information to the donor base station by including the downlink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The IAB node may transmit the uplink buffer status information to a donor base station by including the uplink buffer status information in a F1 user plane protocol header or a F1AP message. The buffer status information for indicating of the congestion status may be delivered from an access IAB node accommodating a UE to a donor base station; See [0156]-[0157] and [0213])
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the non-transitory storage medium of ‘308 to include wherein the congestion information includes uplink congestion information taught by Hong in order to optimize congestion handling by mitigating congestion and packet dropping using efficient flow control.
Regarding claim 18, ‘308 further teaches the method according to claim 3, wherein the wireless backhaul RLC channel identifier includes at least one of an ingress wireless backhaul RLC channel identifier and an egress wireless backhaul RLC channel identifier (The enhanced DDDS message may include information regarding the ingress RLC channel, the egress RLC channel, or both; See [0060]).
Regarding claim 19, ‘308 further teaches the method according to claim 3, wherein the IAB child node identifier includes at least one of a wireless backhaul adaptation protocol (BAP) address (the identifier for identifying a child node of an IAB node may be a BAP entity address for the child node; See [0074]) and an Internet protocol (IP) address.
Claims 4 and 8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over ‘308 in view of Hong as applied to claims 3 and 5 above, and further in view of Zhuo et al. (U.S. PGPub 2021/0377787), hereinafter referred to as Zhuo.
Regarding claim 4, ‘308 in view of Hong fails to teach the method according to claim 3, wherein the downlink data transmission efficiency includes at least one of: a ratio of an actual downlink cache to a supportable downlink cache (if the first information fed back by the first node to the second node includes the downlink buffer occupancy ratio of the first bearer, the second node may include the total downlink buffer size of the first bearer, to calculate the remaining downlink buffer size of the first bearer; See [0211]); or a ratio of a data rate of an egress wireless backhaul RLC channel to a data rate of an ingress wireless backhaul RLC channel.
Zhuo teaches wherein the downlink data transmission efficiency includes at least one of: a ratio of an actual downlink cache to a supportable downlink cache (if the first information fed back by the first node to the second node includes the downlink buffer occupancy ratio of the first bearer, the second node may include the total downlink buffer size of the first bearer, to calculate the remaining downlink buffer size of the first bearer; See [0211]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the method of ‘308 in view of Narasimha to include wherein the downlink data transmission efficiency includes a ratio of an actual downlink cache to a supportable downlink cache taught by Zhuo in order to optimize efficiency.
Regarding claim 8, ‘308 in view of Hong fails to teach the method according to claim 5, wherein the uplink data transmission efficiency includes: a ratio of an actual uplink cache to a supportable uplink cache.
Zhou teaches the concept of wherein the data transmission efficiency including: a ratio of an actual cache to a supportable cache (if the first information fed back by the first node to the second node includes the downlink buffer occupancy ratio of the first bearer, the second node may include the total downlink buffer size of the first bearer, to calculate the remaining downlink buffer size of the first bearer, wherein it would have been obvious that the concept would apply in the uplink as well; See [0211]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the method of ‘308 in view of Narasimha to include wherein the uplink data transmission efficiency includes: a ratio of an actual uplink cache to a supportable uplink cache taught by Zhou in order to optimize efficiency.
Claims 12, 21 and 23 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over ‘308 in view of Akl et al. (U.S. PGPub 2021/0120478), hereinafter referred to as Akl.
Regarding claim 12, ‘308 teaches a congestion processing method applied to a third node (accessing IAB node; See [0058]), the method comprising:
determining congestion information (The accessing IAB node can have information indicating that the given DRB has a congestion issue; See [0047]), wherein the congestion information includes downlink congestion data radio bearer (DRB) information (Accordingly, the DU of the accessing IAB node can include such information in the DDDS message and transmit the DDDS message to the CU of the donor node. If an IAB node (e.g., the accessing IAB node) has information regarding the DRB associated with the congestion occurring at the IAB node, it may transmit a DDDS message including information regarding the DRB to the donor node (e.g., via F1 signaling); See [0047] and [0058]); and
sending the congestion information to a first node (If an IAB node (e.g., the accessing IAB node) has information regarding the DRB associated with the congestion occurring at the IAB node, it may transmit a DDDS message including information regarding the DRB to the donor node (e.g., via F1 signaling); See [0058]).
While ‘308 teaches the congestion report transmitted by a legacy DDDS message may indicate a DRB which has a congestion issue to the CU (See [0049]), it fails to explicitly teach of using the E1AP interface.
Akl teaches transmitting a message through the E1AP interface (an IAB node DU may transmit a set of path identifiers associated with a bearer to the IAB donor CU-CP via an F1-AP interface. The IAB donor CU-CP may transmit all or a subset of the set of path identifiers (along with the connection identifier, in some aspects) to the IAB donor CU-UP via an E1 interface; See [0103]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the method of ‘308 to include transmitting a message through the E1AP interface taught by Akl in order to improve spectral efficiency, lower costs, improve services, make use of new spectrum, and better integrate with other open standards.
Regarding claim 21, ‘308 teaches a device (accessing IAB node; See [0058]), comprising:
at least one processor (processor; See Fig. 6, #608);
a memory (medium; See Fig. 8, #606) configured to store at least one program, wherein the at least one program, when executed by the at least one processor, causes the at least one processor to implement the congestion processing method according to claim 12 (The accessing IAB node can have information indicating that the given DRB has a congestion issue. Accordingly, the DU of the accessing IAB node can include such information in the DDDS message and transmit the DDDS message to the CU of the donor node; See [0047]. If an IAB node (e.g., the accessing IAB node) has information regarding the DRB associated with the congestion occurring at the IAB node, it may transmit a DDDS message including information regarding the DRB to the donor node (e.g., via F1 signaling); See [0047] and [0058]).
While ‘308 teaches the congestion report transmitted by a legacy DDDS message may indicate a DRB which has a congestion issue to the CU (See [0049]), it fails to explicitly teach of using the E1AP interface.
Akl teaches transmitting a message through the E1AP interface (an IAB node DU may transmit a set of path identifiers associated with a bearer to the IAB donor CU-CP via an F1-AP interface. The IAB donor CU-CP may transmit all or a subset of the set of path identifiers (along with the connection identifier, in some aspects) to the IAB donor CU-UP via an E1 interface; See [0103]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the apparatus of ‘308 to include transmitting a message through the E1AP interface taught by Akl in order to improve spectral efficiency, lower costs, improve services, make use of new spectrum, and better integrate with other open standards.
Regarding claim 23, ‘308 teaches a non-transitory storage medium having stored computer executable instructions, wherein when executed by a processor, the computer executable instructions implement the congestion processing method according to claim 12 (The accessing IAB node can have information indicating that the given DRB has a congestion issue. Accordingly, the DU of the accessing IAB node can include such information in the DDDS message and transmit the DDDS message to the CU of the donor node; See [0047]. If an IAB node (e.g., the accessing IAB node) has information regarding the DRB associated with the congestion occurring at the IAB node, it may transmit a DDDS message including information regarding the DRB to the donor node (e.g., via F1 signaling); See [0047] and [0058]).
While ‘308 teaches the congestion report transmitted by a legacy DDDS message may indicate a DRB which has a congestion issue to the CU (See [0049]), it fails to explicitly teach of using the E1AP interface.
Akl teaches transmitting a message through the E1AP interface (an IAB node DU may transmit a set of path identifiers associated with a bearer to the IAB donor CU-CP via an F1-AP interface. The IAB donor CU-CP may transmit all or a subset of the set of path identifiers (along with the connection identifier, in some aspects) to the IAB donor CU-UP via an E1 interface; See [0103]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time before the effective filing date of the invention, to modify the non-transitory storage medium of ‘308 to include transmitting a message through the E1AP interface taught by Akl in order to improve spectral efficiency, lower costs, improve services, make use of new spectrum, and better integrate with other open standards.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1, 3-12 and 16-23 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
On pages 7-10 of the Applicants’ Response, Applicants indicate that the prior art of Wu et al. (U.S. PGPub 2022/0408308), hereinafter referred to as ‘308, Narasimha et al. (U.S. PGPub 2021/0211928), hereinafter referred to as Narasimha and Zhou et al. (U.S. PGPub 2021/0377787), hereinafter referred to as Zhuo fail to teach individually and in combination, “wherein the congestion information includes downlink congestion information, uplink congestion information, and downlink congestion data radio bearer information.
Examiner partially agrees. ‘308 in particular teaches wherein the congestion information includes downlink congestion information (The enhanced DDDS message may include information regarding the ingress RLC channel, the egress RLC channel, or both; See [0060]) and downlink congestion data radio bearer (DRB) information (the accessing IAB node can have information indicating that the given DRB has a congestion issue. Accordingly, the DU of the accessing IAB node can include such information in the DDDS message and transmit the DDDS message to the CU of the donor node; See [0047]). ‘308 fails to teach of the congestion information including the uplink congestion information. Examiner has thus introduced Hong (U.S. PGPub 2021/0127293), hereinafter referred to as Hong which teaches wherein congestion information includes the downlink and uplink congestion information (See [0151], [0156]-[0157] and [0213]). The combination of the references provides a broadest reasonable interpretation for one skilled in the art.
With respect to claims 11, 20 and 22, Examiner is solely relying on Hong with the provided citation indicated above.
With respect to claim 12, the rejection remains the same with ‘308 in view of Akl et al. (U.S. PGPub 2021/0120478), hereinafter referred to as Akl, as the limitations have not been amended to include any language affecting the scope of the claim.
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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.
Conclusion
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/ASHLEY SHIVERS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2477 3/16/2026