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
The Amendment to the claims filed on 10/27/2025 complies with the requirements of 37 CFR 1.121(c) and has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's Arguments/Remarks filed 10/27/2025 (hereinafter Resp.) have been fully considered as follows.
Applicant argues that Yiu et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2021/0076275 (hereinafter Yiu) “fails to disclose ‘identifying, by the user equipment, using at least the one or more parameters, the user equipment for measurement modification based at least on the estimate of the level of signal variation, wherein identifying the user equipment for measurement modification comprises determining by the user equipment that the user equipment is stationary and identifying the user equipment for measurement modification because the user equipment is stationary,’ as recited in claim 1.” – See Resp., ¶5:15.
First, Yiu discloses identifying, by the user equipment, using at least the one or more parameters, the user equipment for measurement modification based at least on the estimate of the level of signal variation – See, e.g., [¶¶0178-80] (“When evaluating Srxlev and Squal of non-serving cells for reselection purposes, the UE shall use parameters provided by the serving cell” and “[i]f the serving cell fulfils Srxlev>SintraSearchP and Squal>SintraSearchQ,” i.e., signal variation, “the UE may choose not to perform intra-frequency measurements”); see also [¶0223] (“UE may activate relaxed measurement criteria if at least any of the following conditions are met”).
Second, Yiu discloses that “‘UE Power Saving in NR’ Work Item (WI) in 3GPP Release 16 (NR) (Rel-16) denoted by RP-191607, from June 2019” – See [¶0215] defines “triggering criteria for the UE to move between relaxed and normal RRM measurements, that considers at least . . . if UE is stationary” – See [¶0218], wherein “triggering criteria for the UE” is reasonably understood by one of ordinary skills in the art as “identifying [by the user equipment, e.g., triggered] the user equipment for measurement modification because the user equipment is stationary,” as claimed in Amended Claim 1. Yiu further discloses determining by the user equipment that the user equipment is stationary – See [¶¶0222-26] (e.g., when “Serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period” and “UE is not a cell edge, meaning that serving cell/beam RSRP/RSRQ/SINR is above a threshold”); see also [¶0256](“the SIB including UE configuration information including an indication of one or more conditions to trigger a relaxation of radio resource management (RRM) measurements by the UE in cell selection or reselection, the one or more conditions including at least one of a mobility state of the UE and a location of the UE in a cell of the gNB,” i.e., the stationarity is determined by the UE and triggers RRM relaxation)(emphasis added); 3GPP TS 38.331 V16.2.0 (2020-09), “Technical Specification Group Radio Access Network; NR; Radio Resource Control (RRC) protocol specification (Release 16)” (hereinafter 3GPP TS 38.331) (disclosing, at page 319-322, SIB2 configured to the UE to determine stationarity using lowMobilityEvaluation, cellEdgeEvaluation, and combineRelaxedMeasCondition parameters, with reference to 3GPP TS 38.304); 3GPP TS 38.304 V16.2.0 (2020-09), “Technical Specification Group Radio Access Network; NR; User Equipment (UE) procedures in Idle mode and RRC Inactive state (Release 16)”. To be sure, the claim language does not require a distinguishable UE-specific and/or cell-specific aspect of stationarity, beside estimate of the level of signal variation.
Therefore, the argument against Yiu is not persuasive. In addition, the argument is also moot in view of the new reference necessitated by the Amendment.
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, 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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1-5, 14-15, 20-21, 24-28, 37-38, 45 and 48, as amended, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yiu et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2021/0076275 (hereinafter Yiu), and further in view of Johansson et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2018/0332532 (hereinafter Johansson).
Regarding Amended Claim 1, Yiu teaches a method (“provide enhancements on radio resource management (RRM) measurements for NR for multi-beam operation, and under certain conditions (such as stationary, or low mobility)” – See [¶0015]), comprising:
receiving, with a user equipment connected to a base station in a wireless network, one or more parameters to be used to identify the user equipment for measurement modification ((“the flow includes [the UE] decoding a broadcast system information block (SIB) message from a NR Node B (gNB), the SIB including UE configuration information including an indication of one or more conditions to trigger a relaxation of radio resource management (RRM) measurements by the UE” – See [¶0255] and Fig. 9, whereby the relaxed measurement conditions for NR are described in § 5.2.4.9, 3GPP TS 38.304 V16.2.0 (2020-09), “Technical Specification Group Radio Access Network; NR; User Equipment (UE) procedures in Idle mode and RRC Inactive state (Release 16)” (hereinafter 3GPP TS 38.304), at page 28-29, referencing relaxation methods in §§ 4.2.2.9-11, 3GPP TS 38.133 V16.5.0 (2020-09), “Technical Specification Group Radio Access Network; NR; Requirements for support of radio resource management (Release 16)” (hereinafter 3GPP TS 38.133), at page 48-53, and measurement related UE configuration parameters included in SIBs, as described in 3GPP TS 38.331 V16.2.0 (2020-09), “Technical Specification Group Radio Access Network; NR; Radio Resource Control (RRC) protocol specification (Release 16)” (hereinafter 3GPP TS 38.331), e.g., serving cell quality parameters such as q-RxLevMin and q-RxLevMinOffset in SIB1, at page 290-292, and cell re-selection measurement parameters cellEdgeEvaluation, lowMobilityEvaluation, combineRelaxedMeasCondition, highPriorityMeasRelax, s-[Non/]IntraSearchP, s-[Non/]IntraSearchQ, s-SearchDeltaP, s-SearchThresholdP, s-SearchThresholdQ, smtc measurement timing configuration, threshServingLowP/Q, t-SearchDeltaP included in SIB2, at page 318- 321, and for inter-frequency measurements in SIB4, at pages 323-327; see also Rel-15 LTE Specifications in corresponding 3GPP TS 36.xxx documents, e.g., relevant parts of 3GPP TS 36.304 and TS 36.133 described in [¶¶0173-213])
determining, by the user equipment, an estimate of a level of signal variation for signals received at the user equipment (“UE may activate relaxed measurement criteria if at least” the “Serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period” and “serving cell/beam RSRP/RSRQ/SINR is above a threshold” – See [¶¶0223-0226], i.e., using the LTE criteria as a baseline, the UE must determine at least that “’(SrxlevRef - Srxlev)<SsearchDeltaP’,” wherein SrxlevRef is the “reference Srxlev value of the serving cell” – See [¶¶0232-33] and whereby “’serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period,’” could “define the criterion in terms of a ‘beam measurement quantity value.’” – See [¶0234])
identifying, by the user equipment, using at least the one or more parameters, the user equipment for measurement modification based at least on the estimate of the level of signal variation (“[d]efine triggering criteria for the UE to move between relaxed and normal RRM measurements, that considers at least if UE is not at cell edge, or if UE is stationary or with low mobility” – See [¶0218], wherein “the LTE relaxed monitoring criterion as described above may be extended or changed, aiming for example to incorporate multi-beam operation” – See [¶0231] e.g., “[a] new parameter SrxLevminthresh may be considered (e.g. when staying in a cell edge without cell (re) selection) to guarantee that the reference value to serving cell Srxlev meets the following new criteria "Srxlev>SrxLevminthresh” – See [¶0241]), wherein identifying the user equipment for measurement modification comprises
determining by the user equipment that the user equipment is stationary (“Measurement relaxation criteria can consider both low mobility and UE location in the cell (e.g. whether the UE is in cell-edge)” – See [¶0222], i.e., “(SrxlevRef-Srxlev)<SsearchDeltaP” – See [¶0232] and “Srxlev>SrxLevminthresh for TSearchDeltaP” – See [¶0244] wherein “SsearchDeltaP threshold may be configured differently based on a specific aspect or behavior, such as based on a UE's mobility state,”– See [¶0248] e.g., a stationary UE has lower value SsearchDeltaP and “a highest beam measurement value does not change more than a threshold during a time period within a same transmission reception point (TRP) or other TRPs of the cell” – See [¶0266]) and
identifying the user equipment for measurement modification because the user equipment is stationary (“the flow includes relaxing RRM measurements by the UE based on determining that the one or more conditions are satisfied,” as explained supra – See [¶0255] and Fig. 9); and
modifying, with the user equipment, a time between measurements for radio resource management from a current time to a different time in response to the user equipment being identified for measurement modification (a new “time value (smaller than 24h) may be defined” which can be a “configurable value . . . defined (where a default setting could be potentially defined) which could be provided as a cell-specific value or as a value that could vary based on a given condition ( such as UE's beam of operation, UE's mobility speed, UE's power class, etc.). Moreover, this time value could also be set differently for intra-frequency or inter-frequency measurements” –See [¶¶0238-40]; see also, 3GPP TS 38.304:29 (“if both lowMobilityEvaluation and cellEdgeEvaluation are configured . . . if the relaxed measurement criterion in clause 5.2.4.9.2 is fulfilled: for any intra-frequency, NR inter-frequency, or inter-RAT frequency, if less than 1 hour has passed since measurements of corresponding frequency cell(s) for cell (re-)selection were last performed: the UE may choose not to perform measurement for measurements on this frequency cell(s)”, i.e., the relaxed RRM is set to 1 hour from the Tmeasure,NR_Intra/Inter defined in §§ 4.2.2.3-4, 3GPP TS 38.133).
In the alternative that Yiu does not explicitly teach UE stationarity, which it does based on UE low mobility signal quality variation, UE position, and UE best beam variation, Johansson teaches a method “to allow UE to be aware of its mobility states, via either explicit configuration or self-estimation, and adjust its wakeup and measurement behaviors” – See [¶0008], e.g., “[i]n dynamic mode, the UE could perform dynamic switching between the different mobility states. A UE configured as dynamic operation mode can estimate its current mobility state and switch among different mobility states” – See [¶0025].
Johansson teaches determining by the user equipment that the user equipment is stationary (“the UE switches to stationary mobility state when the UE has been camping on the same serving cell during a predefined duration Z, and the signal strength variation of the serving cell is less than a predefined amount W during the predefined duration Z” – See [¶0026] and Fig.3, wherein “[t]he normal mobility state and the limited mobility state together can be considered as a single mobility state with normal mobility measurement behavior, while stationary mobility state is another single mobility state with relaxed mobility measurement behavior” – See [¶0027]).
In addition to teaching specifically a stationary state determined by the UE based on similar conditions as described in Yiu, Johansson teaches that “in stationary mobility state, UE 401 does not perform normal periodic neighbor cell measurements even the serving cell is below certain threshold . . . because since UE 401 is not moving, measuring neighbor cell does not help” – See [¶0029] and Fig. 4, i.e., “the UE stops performing neighbor cell measurements with the predefined periodicity when the UE stays in the stationary mobility state and when the UE satisfies a list of criteria” – See [¶0033].
Thus, Yiu and Johansson each teaches a method for identifying the user equipment for measurement modification because the user equipment is stationary. A person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have understood that the self-estimation of UE’s stationarity based on the signal strength variation of the serving cell as taught by Johansson could have been combined with the estimates of lowMobilityEvaluation, cellEdgeEvaluation, and best beam quality value variation for RRM relaxation, as taught in Yiu, because both provide for user equipment (UE) mobility states and power consumption enhancements. Furthermore, a person of ordinary skill in the art would have been able to carry out the combination through techniques known in the art. Finally, the combination achieves the predictable result of UE being aware of its mobility states, including cases when the UE activity limitation cannot be determined by the base station, e.g., using self-estimation of stationarity by the UE, for more aggressive power consumption reduction, as taught in Johansson.
Therefore, Amended Claim 1 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claim 2, dependent from Amended Claim 1, Yiu further teaches the method of claim 1, wherein the current time is configured with signaling received with the user equipment from the base station (“the UE shall perform measurements of E-UTRAN inter-frequencies or inter-RAT frequency cell . . . according to TS 36.133” – See [¶0186] and “for cell re-selection,” i.e., intra-frequency – See [¶0176] and 3GPP TS 36.133 (or 3GPP TS 38.133 for NR) further provides tables defining time spacing of intra/inter frequency cell measurements expressed in number of DRX cycles – See, e.g., § 4.2.2.2, 3GPP TS 38.133:43 (“The UE shall measure the SS-RSRP and SS-RSRQ level of the serving cell and evaluate the cell selection criterion S defined in TS 38.304 for the serving cell at least once every M1*N1 DRX cycle: where: M1=2 if SMTC periodicity (TSMTC) > 20 ms and DRX cycle ≤ 0.64 second, otherwise M1=1,” and parameter smtc for measurement timing configuration is configured through SIB2 by the base station, as explained in Regarding Amended Claim 1 supra); see also 3GPP TS 38.331:320 (defining the t-reselectionNR parameter and its scaling factor dependent on UE’s mobility speed in SIB2); § 5.2.4.2, 3GPP TS 38.304:22 (“If the UE supports relaxed measurement and relaxedMeasurement is present in SIB2, the UE may further relax the needed measurements, as specified in clause 5.2.4.9”)).
Yiu implicitly teaches that the different time is configured with signaling received with the user equipment from the base station (“A new configurable value may be defined (where a default setting could be potentially defined) which could be provided as a cell-specific value or as a value that could vary based on a given condition (such as UE's beam of operation, UE's mobility speed, UE's power class, etc.). Moreover this time value could also be set differently for intra-frequency or inter-frequency measurements” which is “preferable for NR to allow the network to account for its actual deployment e.g. cell size or allocation of frequencies” – See [¶0239], whereby a person of ordinary skills in the art would understand that cell-specific values allowing the network to account for size and frequencies are signaled to a UE by a serving cell base station either through broadcast SIBs or, in case the configuration is UE specific, through RRC).
Johansson also teaches wherein the current time is configured with signaling received with the user equipment from the base station (UE’s “[m]easurement configuration module 206 that receives measurement and reporting configuration from the network and configures its measurement interval and reporting criteria accordingly,” e.g., “reference signal received power and/or reference signal received quality (RSRP/RSRQ) over serving and neighboring cells” – See [¶0022]). Johansson further teaches that “UE 401 in stationary mobility state performs cell reselection to support network changes in the following ways: . . recurring and with configured longer periodicity,” – See [¶0030], i.e., a longer periodicity is signaled by the network.
Therefore, Claim 2 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claim 3, dependent from Amended Claim 1, Yiu further teaches wherein determining the estimate of the level of signal variation uses one or more parameters involving a state of the user equipment (“Measurement relaxation criteria can consider both low mobility and UE location in the cell (e.g. whether the UE is in cell-edge)” – See [¶0222]; e.g., “[a] new parameter SrxLevminthresh may be considered (e.g. when staying in a cell edge without cell (re)selection) to guarantee that the reference value to serving cell Srxlev meets the following new criteria ‘Srxlev>SrxLevminthres'” – See [¶0241], i.e., the new parameter involves the location of the UE at the edge of the cell and is used in determining the signal variations; see also ).
Therefore, Claim 3 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claim 4, dependent from Claim 3, Yiu further teaches wherein the one or more parameters involving the state of the user equipment comprise a received power (parameters such as Srxlev and SrxLevminthres as explained above are “[c]ell selection receive (RX) level value (in dB) measured by UE” – See [¶0206]; and the “serving cell/beam RSRP/RSRQ/SINR is above a threshold” – See [¶0226]; or, “the network may signal (s1, s2, s3, ... si ... sk) to the UE where ‘I’ is the SSB index when there are k SSB indices. The UE then perform SSB measurements, and measurement results correspond to (v1, v2, v3, ... vi ... vk). The UE then applies the scaling factor to the measurement value such as sl *v1, s2*v2 ... si*vi ... sk*vi). This new calculated value will be used for cell evaluation. The measurements may be for example based on RSRP, RSRQ, SINR” which are signal power measurements – See [¶0252]).
Therefore, Claim 4 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claim 5, dependent from Claim 3, Yiu teaches wherein the one or more parameters involving the state of the user equipment comprise a location of the user equipment within a cell formed with the base station (“Measurement relaxation criteria can consider both low mobility and UE location in the cell (e.g. whether the UE is in cell-edge)” – See [¶0222] and “the one or more conditions [to trigger relaxation] including at least one of a mobility state of the UE and a location of the UE in a cell of the gNB” – See [¶0256]).
Therefore, Claim 5 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Amended Claim 14, Yiu teaches determining, with a base station, one or more parameters to be used with a user equipment in order to identify the user equipment for measurement modification (“encode a broadcast system information block (SIB) message to a NR user equipment (UE), the SIB including UE configuration information including an indication of one or more conditions to trigger a relaxation of radio resource management (RRM) measurements by the UE in cell selection or reselection, the one or more conditions including at least one of a mobility state of the UE and a location of the UE in a cell of the RAN node,”– See [¶0298], whereby SIB2 IE contains the determined parameters s-SearchDeltaP, s-SearchThresholdP less than or equal to s-IntraSearchP and s-NonIntraSearchP - See 3GPP 38.331:321) and
signaling the one or more parameters to the user equipment (“cause transmission of the SIB message” – See [¶0298]) wherein the signaling has the same limitations as recited in Amended Claim 1 using the same language. Because Amended Claim 1 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson, Amended Claim 14 is also obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Amended Claim 15, dependent from Amended Claim 14, the claim language merely recites the limitations of Claim 2, from base station perspective, and no other limitations. Because Claim 2 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson, Amended Claim 15 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claim 20, dependent from Amended Claim 14, Yiu further teaches wherein the one or more parameters to be used with the user equipment in order to identify the user equipment for measurement modification are for determining that the user equipment is stationary (“In LTE, there is a determination as to whether the UE has spent less than 24 hours since the last performed neighboring measurements for cell reselection” and “the above number was chosen as the noted feature was targeting stationary MTC/NB-IoT devices” – See [¶0237]; whereby “[m]easurement relaxation criteria can consider both low mobility and UE location in the cell (e.g. whether the UE is in cell-edge)” – See [¶0222], e.g. “Serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period” – See [¶0224] and “serving cell/beam RSRP/RSRQ/SINR is above a threshold” – See [¶0226] during the time since the last performed measurements for cell reselection which is associated with the parameter number of cell reselections during time period TCRmax, as taught in 3GPP 38.304:22).
Johansson also teaches that “the UE switches to the stationary mobility state from the normal mobility state directly, e.g., when the UE has been camping on the same serving cell for the predefined duration Z and a serving cell signal strength variation is less than the value W for the duration Z” – See [¶0027].
Therefore, Claim 20 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claim 21, Yiu teaches a non-transitory computer program comprising program storage device readable with an apparatus, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable with the apparatus for performing the method of claim 1 (“The instructions 850 may reside, completely or partially, within at least one of the processors 810 (e.g., within the processor's cache memory), the memory/storage devices 820, or any suitable combination thereof. Furthermore, any portion of the instructions 850 may be transferred to the hardware resources 800 from any combination of the peripheral devices 804 or the databases 806. Accordingly, the memory of processors 810, the memory/storage devices 820, the peripheral devices 804, and the databases 806 are examples of computer-readable and machine-readable media” – See [¶0169] and Fig. 8; and the “computer program comprising instructions, wherein execution of the program by a processing element is to cause the processing element to carry out the method, techniques, or process as described” – See [¶0333]). Because Amended Claim 1 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson, Claim 21 is also obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Amended Claim 24, Yiu teaches an apparatus, comprising: at least one processor; and at least one non-transitory memory storing instructions that, when executed with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus to perform the steps of the method disclosed in Amended Claim 1 (“FIG. 5 illustrates an example of a platform 500 (or ‘device 500’) in accordance with various embodiments. In embodiments, the computer platform 500 may be suitable for use as UEs 101, 201, 301” and “[t]he processors (or cores) of the application circuitry 505 may be coupled with or may include memory/storage elements and may be configured to execute instructions stored in the memory/storage to enable various applications or operating systems to run on the system 500” – See [¶¶0098-99] and Fig. 5, whereby the one or more processors of “an apparatus of a user equipment (UE), the apparatus comprising: a Radio Frequency (RF) circuitry interface to send and receive messages to and from a RF circuitry; and one or more processors coupled to the RF circuitry interface” are caused to “decode a broadcast system information block (SIB) message from a NR Node B (gNB), the SIB including UE configuration information including an indication of one or more conditions to trigger a relaxation of radio resource management (RRM) measurements by the UE in cell selection or reselection, the one or more conditions including at least one of a mobility state of the UE and a location of the UE in a cell of the RAN node; configure the UE based on the configuration information; determine that the one or more conditions are satisfied; and relax RRM measurements by the UE based on determining that the one or more conditions are satisfied” – See [¶0259]; i.e., execute the steps of the method disclosed in Amended Claim 1 which is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Therefore, Amended Claim 24 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claims 25-28, dependent from Amended Claim 24, Yiu in view of Johansson teaches the apparatus of Amended Claim 24 with the limitations recited in Claims 2-5, respectively, using the same language. Because each of the Claims 2-5 are obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson, Claims 25-28 are also obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Amended Claim 37, Yiu teaches an apparatus comprising at least one processor; and at least one non-transitory memory storing instructions that, when executed with the at least one processor (“an apparatus of a radio access network node (RAN node), the apparatus comprising: a Radio Frequency (RF) circuitry interface to send and receive messages to and from a RF circuitry; and one or more processors coupled to the RF circuitry interface, the one or more processor” – See [¶0298] and Fig. 4 further detailed in [¶0085]), cause the apparatus to perform the steps of Amended Claim 14. Because Amended Claim 14 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson, Amended Claim 37 is also obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Amended Claim 38, dependent from Amended Claim 37, the claim language merely recites the limitations of Amended Claim 15 only executed by the apparatus of Amended Claim 37. Because Amended Claims 15 and 37 are obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson, Amended Claim 38 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claim 45, Yiu in view of Johansson further teaches a communication system comprising an apparatus of Amended Claim 24 (“FIG. 3 illustrates an architecture of a system 300 including a second CN 320 in accordance with various embodiments. The system 300 is shown to include a UE 301, which may be the same or similar to the UEs 101 and UE 201 discussed previously; a (R)AN 310, which may be the same or similar to the RAN 110 and RAN 210 discussed previously, and which may include RAN nodes 111 discussed previously; and a DN 303, which may be, for example, operator services, Internet access or 3rd party services; and a 5GC 320. The 5GC 320 may include an AUSF 322; an AMF 321; a SMF 324; a NEF 323; a PCF 326; a NRF 325; a UDM 327; an AF 328; a UPF 302; and a NSSF 329” – See Yiu:[¶0066] and Fig. 3).
Therefore, Claim 45 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Regarding Claim 48, Yiu further teaches a non-transitory program storage device readable with an apparatus, tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable with the apparatus (as explained in Regarding Claim 21 supra) for performing operations comprising the method of Amended Claim 14. Because Amended Claims 14 and 21 are each obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson, Claim 48 is also obvious Yiu in view of Johansson.
In sum, Claims 1-5, 14-15, 20-21, 24-28, 37-38, 45 and 48, as amended, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson.
Claims 7-12, 16, 18, 30-35, and 39, as amended, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Yiu in view of Johansson as applied to Amended Claims 1, 14, 24 and 37 above, and further in view of Lee et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2021/0068027 (hereinafter Lee).
Regarding Claim 7, dependent from Amended Claim 1, Yiu further teaches multiple groups of variations of signal (variation “SsearchDeltaP threshold may be configured differently based on a specific aspect or behavior, such as based on a UE's mobility state or a UE's preference or a UE's characteristics” – See [¶0248]; e.g., when a “serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period” whereby “‘(SrxlevRef - Srxlev) < SsearchDeltaP’)” defines a low mobility signal variation group – See [¶0232]; and an at the edge of a cell group is defined “[a] new parameter SrxLevminthresh may be considered (e.g. when staying in a cell edge without cell (re) selection) to guarantee that the reference value to serving cell Srxlev meets the following new criteria ‘Srxlev>SrxLevminthres’” – See [¶0241]).
Lee teaches the standard method for “estimating mobility states of a UE” – See [¶0066] wherein “the UE may determine itself as being in Normal/Medium/High-mobility state” – See [¶0084] and wherein multiple groups of variations of signal are defined (“[b]esides Normal-mobility state a High-mobility and a Medium-mobility state are applicable if the parameters (TCRmax, NCR_H, NCR_M and TCRmaxHyst) are sent in the system information broadcast of the serving cell” – See1 [¶0067]; and the Q1ow, Qmedium, Qhigh, and QhigherLev thresholds for ‘Srxlevprev- Srxlevnewest’ variation define multiple signal variation groups – See [¶¶0092-97] and Fig. 8).
Thus, Yiu in view of Johansson and Lee each teaches measurements of levels of signal variations received at a UE and used for determining mobility state of the UE. A person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have understood that the determination of the mobility group of the UE according to the level of variation of signal received, as taught by Lee, could have been used to improve the method of signal variation detection for low mobility/stationarity in Yiu in view of Johansson because both rely on variable receiving signal strength in the serving cell. Furthermore, a person of ordinary skill in the art would have been able to carry out the improvement through techniques known in the art. Finally, the improvement achieves the predictable result of using 3GPP specifications related to mobility parameters in a novel way that overcomes the situation where the UE cannot realize its own mobility as far as cell reselection has not occurred even though it is moving fast, as taught by Lee.
Therefore, Claim 7 is obvious over Yiu in view Johansson and further in view of Lee.
Regarding Claim 8, dependent from Claim 7, the method in Yiu in view of Johansson further teaches wherein the determining the selected one of the multiple groups comprises:
determining whether the user equipment has a location as being in an outer region of a cell or as not being in the outer region of the cell (e.g., not being in the outer region of the cell but being at the cell edge when the “new parameter SrxLevminthresh may be considered (e.g. when staying in a cell edge without cell (re) selection) to guarantee that the reference value to serving cell Srxlev meets the following new criteria ‘Srxlev>SrxLevminthres’” and “the network may configure value of Srxlevminthresh such that SnonintraSearchP>Srxlevminthresh and SIntraSearchp>Srxlevminthresh” – See Yiu:[¶¶0241,0247]). Although Yiu further teaches that variation of signal “SsearchDeltaP threshold may be configured differently based on a specific aspect or behavior, such as based on a UE's mobility state or a UE's preference or a UE's characteristics” – See [¶0248], Yiu in view of Johansson does not teach determining whether the user equipment is configured to have high variation in received signals.
Lee further teaches wherein the determining the selected one of the multiple groups uses results of determining whether the user equipment is configured to have high variation in received signals (the determining of the multiple groups uses “variation of measured serving cell RSRP . . . to estimate UE's mobility state, instead of number of cell reselection” by “comparing the newly measured Srxlev and right previous Srxlev value of the serving cell” – See [¶0091]; there, low-mobility, medium-mobility, high-mobility, and “N-level higher-Mobility state criteria” are defined in relationship with the Q1ow, Qmedium, Qhigh, and QhigherLev thresholds for ‘Srxlevprev- Srxlevnewest’ variation, whereby the UE configured with Qhigh or with QhigherLev thresholds is configured to have high variations in received signals – See [¶¶0092-97] and Fig. 8)
Lee further teaches wherein the determining the selected one of the multiple groups uses results of determining whether the user equipment is configured to have high variation in received signals and determining as not being in the outer region of the cell to determine the selected group ( if “a UE satisfies high-mobility state criteria more than Mhigh times in last t seconds, the UE may consider that the UE is in high-mobility state” – See [¶0107]; whereby “the UE is moving toward the serving cell in high speed, so Srxlev is increasing fast” – See [¶0114] and Fig. 10).
Therefore, Claim 8 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson and further in view of Lee.
Regarding Claim 9, dependent from Claim 8, although Yiu in view of Johansson teaches variation in received signals limited by SsearchDeltaP provided to the UE by the base station in a SIB, Yiu in view of Johansson does not teach differentiation in UE capabilities leading to high variation of received signal (i.e., a large value of SsearchDeltaP).
Lee, teaching that higher variation of received signal level is associated with higher mobility state of the UE, as explained in Regarding Claim 8, supra, further teaches wherein determining whether the user equipment is configured to have high variation in received signals comprises determining that a capability of the user equipment is a capability that can lead to high variation and assigning the user equipment to have high variation in response (“in very high speed UE, such as being in high speed train . . . conditions for entering N-level higher mobility state was mitigated so that satisfying just once is enough to enter the [high] mobility state” and the “N-level higher mobility state of higher N value may have higher priority, than any other mobility states” so the UE is assigned to have high variation in response to “a UE satisfies N-level higher mobility criteria once, the UE may keep the higher mobility state for the period of time t unless the UE satisfies higher mobility state criteria” – See [¶0119]).
In addition, both Yiu and Lee teach a scaling factor to mobility control related parameters that can be assigned to the UE depending on UE’s mobility state (“The UE then applies the scaling factor to the measurement value” and “new calculated value will be used for cell evaluation. The measurements may be for example based on RSRP, RSRQ, SINR” – See Yiu:[¶0252] and “the scaling factor can be broadcast per cell or send to the UE via dedicated signaling” – See Yiu:[¶0250]; “If following the rules in legacy LTE network, the UE may scale the cell reselection-related parameters (i.e. Qhyst and TreselectionXRAT) or relax the measurement rules for cell reselection so that the UE” – See Lee:[¶0128]), whereby the IE SpeedStateScaleFactors “to be applied when the UE is in medium or high speed state, [is] used for scaling a mobility control related parameter” and defines the sf-High and sf-Medium values so “[t]he concerned mobility control related parameter is multiplied with this factor if the UE is in High[/Medium] Mobility state as defined in TS 38.304” – See 3GPP TS 38.331:627).
Therefore, Claim 9 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson and further in view of Lee.
Regarding Claim 10, dependent from Claim 7, Yiu in view of Johansson further teaches wherein the one or more parameters to be used to identify the user equipment for measurement modification are multiple parameters (“[a]new parameter SrxLevminthresh may be considered (e.g. when staying in a cell edge without cell (re) selection)” – See Yiu:[¶0241] and “the relaxed monitoring criterion has been met” if Srxlev>SrxLevminthresh, for TSearchDeltaP – See Yiu:[¶0244], whereby TSearchDeltaP is yet another parameter set by SIB; other parameters are defined in Yiu: [¶¶0206-214] and in § 5.2.4.9 of 3GPP 38.304:28); and
identifying the user equipment for measurement modification based at least on the estimate of the level of signal variation further comprises using the multiple parameters along with the estimate of the level of signal variation to identify the user equipment for measurement modification (“Measurement relaxation criteria can consider both low mobility and UE location in the cell (e.g. whether the UE is in cell-edge)” – See Yiu:[¶0222]; whereby the estimate of the level of signal variation is “[t]he same LTE relaxation monitoring criterion as currently being used (i.e.‘(SrxlevRef - Srxlev) < SsearchDeltaP’)” for TSearchDeltaP – See Yiu:[¶0232] and, in addition, whether the UE is in the cell/cell-edge uses the multiple parameters Srxlev>SrxLevminthresh, for TSearchDeltaP – See Yiu:[¶0244]).
In addition, Lee also teaches identifying the user equipment for measurement modification based at least on the estimate of the level of signal variation further comprises using the multiple parameters along with the estimate of the level of signal variation to identify the user equipment for measurement modification (“When the UE enters low mobility state (being stationary), it may mean the measured serving cell power varies very slowly. So it may be considered that the UE is in stationary state. If then, the UE may not perform neighbor cell measurement to reduce power consumption” – See [¶0120] wherein “the UE may use right next measured serving cell RSRP e.g. a Srxlevnewest, as long as the right next measurement has performed within certain time after evaluating Srxlevprev” – See [¶0100] and a “smaller difference means that the UE is moving slower, i.e. lower mobility” – See [¶0091]).
Therefore, Claim 10 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson and further in view of Lee.
Regarding Claim 11, dependent from Claim 10, Yiu in view of Johansson further teaches wherein the multiple parameters comprise a threshold (“parameter SrxLevminthresh may be considered” – See Yiu:[¶0241], “where the network may configure value of Srxlevminthresh such that SnonintraSearchP>Srxlevminthresh and SIntraSearchp>Srxlevminthresh” – See Yiu:[¶0247]). Yiu further teaches wherein identifying the user equipment for measurement modification identifying the UE for measurement modification based at least on the estimate of the level of signal variation comprises:
using with the user equipment a first of the multiple parameters (e.g., Srxlev) and the threshold (e.g., SrxLevminthresh ) to determine whether a first condition is fulfilled (if Srxlev>SrxLevminthresh, for TSearchDeltaP then “UE is not a cell edge, meaning that serving cell/beam RSRP/RSRQ/SINR is above a threshold” – See [¶0226] or “when staying in a cell edge without cell (re) selection” – See [¶0241]; therefore the UE inside the cell is a first condition)
using with the user equipment a second of the multiple parameters (e.g., SSearchDeltaP) and the threshold to determine whether a second condition is fulfilled (if “‘(SrxlevRef - Srxlev) < SsearchDeltaP’)” for TSearchDeltaP – See [¶0232] wherein SrxlevRef can be SrxLevminthresh , then the “Serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period” – See [¶0224]; therefore, a second condition is fulfilled)
otherwise, the user equipment uses the threshold to determine whether a third condition is fulfilled (if Srxlev < SrxLevminthresh for TSearchDeltaP then a condition where “neighbor cell RSRP should also be considered” – See [¶0227] because SnonintraSearchP>Srxlevminthresh – See [¶0247]) and
in response to any of the first, second, or third conditions being fulfilled, identifying the user equipment for measurement modification (“UE may activate relaxed measurement criteria if at least any of the following conditions are met: Serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period” or “serving cell/beam RSRP/RSRQ/SINR is above a threshold” – See [¶¶0223,0024,0226]).
However, Yiu in view of Johansson does not teach determining the first and second conditions in response to the UE having high or medium signal variation.
Lee teaches determining whether the UE has a high or medium signal variations by using the inequations in [¶0094] and [¶0095], respectively, wherein measurements of Srxlev, as taught by Yiu in view of Johansson, at different times are compared with high and medium levels of variation – See Fig. 8. A person of ordinary skills in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have understood that in response to the user equipment having a high signal variation (e.g., when the ‘Srxlevprev- Qhigh< Srxlevnewest > Srxlevprev- Qmedium ’– See Lee: [¶0095]) a criterium for relaxing measurements at the UE may be determined such as the UE not being at the cell edge, as taught by Yiu in view of Johansson (“triggering criteria for the UE to move between relaxed and normal RRM measurements . . . considers at least if UE is not at cell edge” – See Yiu:[¶0218]; and a “UE may activate relaxed measurement criteria if . . . UE is not at cell edge, meaning that serving cell/beam RSRP/RSRQ/SINR is above a threshold” – See Yiu:[¶¶0223,0226]).
Similarly, in response to the user equipment having a medium signal variation (e.g., when the ‘Srxlevprev- Qmedium < Srxlevnewest> Srxlevprev- Qlow’ – See Lee:[¶0094]), a person of ordinary skills in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention would have understood that a second condition is fulfilled for relaxing measurements at the UE, even though the first is not, as taught by Yiu in view of Johansson, because “a Serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period” – See Yiu:[¶0224].
Therefore, Claim 11 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson and further in view of Lee.
Regarding Claim 12, dependent from Claim 10, the method in Yiu in view of Johansson teaches a threshold (e.g., Srxlevminthresh which can be SrxlevRef) and a first and second parameter (e.g. Srxlev and SsearchDeltaP ) which function as explained in Regarding Claim 11, supra. However, Yiu in view of Johansson does not teach a first timer and a second timer.
Lee further teaches wherein the multiple parameters comprise a first and second timer parameters, and wherein identifying the user equipment for measurement modification based at least on the estimate of the level of signal variation comprises:
using with the user equipment the first timer parameter (“Srxlevprev and Srxlevnewest evaluation [is] using [a] validity timer” – See [¶0099], whereby “the UE may use right next measured serving cell RSRP e.g. a Srxlevnewest, as long as the right next measurement has performed within certain time after evaluating Srxlevprev” the “certain time . . . may be referred as a first duration” and “a validity timer may be used to determine whether the first duration is passed or not” – See [¶0100] and Fig. 6) of the multiple parameters to determine the estimate of the level of signal variance as having a high signal variation (evaluate if ‘Srxlevprev- Srxlevnewest’ variation is high – See [¶0095]);
in response to the user equipment having the high signal variation, using with the user equipment a first of the multiple parameters (e.g., Srxlev) and the threshold (e.g., SrxLevminthresh) to determine whether a first condition is fulfilled (e.g., whether the UE inside the cell, as explained in Regarding Claim 11, supra);
using with the user equipment the second timer parameter of the multiple parameters (“the UE may wait for certain time after evaluating Srxlevprev” and “[t]he certain time . . . may be referred as a second duration. After the second duration expires, the UE may use first measured serving cell RSRP for Srxlevnewest, because too early measurement may not reflect the UE's [lower] mobility appropriately” – See [¶0102] and Fig. 7) to determine the estimate of the level of signal variance as having a medium signal variation (evaluate if ‘Srxlevprev- Srxlevnewest’ variation is medium – See [¶0094]);
in response to the user equipment having the medium signal variation, using with the user equipment a second of the multiple parameters (e.g., SSearchDeltaP) and the threshold to determine whether a second condition is fulfilled (e.g., whether the signal power level in the Serving Cell measurement does not change more than a relative threshold during a time period, as explained in Regarding Claim 11, supra);
otherwise, the user equipment uses the threshold to determine whether a third condition is fulfilled (as explained in Regarding Claim 11, supra); and
in response to any of the first, second, or third conditions being fulfilled, identifying the user equipment for measurement modification (as explained in Regarding Claim 11, supra).
Therefore, Claim 12 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson and further in view of Lee.
Regarding Claim 16, dependent from Amended Claim 14, the methods in both Lee and Yiu in view of Johansson teach wherein the one or more parameters comprise parameters for multiple groups indicating variations of the signal. Yiu further teaches values of the parameters for the multiple groups are determined with the base station using one or more of the following processes:
using one or more of site or cell measurement campaigns (“the network may signal (s1, s2, s3, ... si ... sk) to the UE where ‘i’ is the SSB index when there are k SSB indices. The UE then perform SSB measurements, and measurement results correspond to (v1, v2, v3, ... vi ... vk)” and the “calculated value will be used for cell evaluation. The measurements may be for example based on RSRP, RSRQ, SINR” – See [¶252]); or
using parameters affected with radio resource measurement modification (“to allow for the network to disable the usage of the RRM measurement relaxation feature within a configured region, the network could use dedicated signaling (e.g. in a RRCRelease message) to enable or disable the usage of this new feature within a cell or group of cells” – See [¶0253]).
Lee teaches “the UE may scale the cell reselection-related parameters (i.e. Qhyst and TreselectionXRAT) or relax the measurement rules for cell reselection” – See [¶0135], wherein Qhyst and TreselectionXRAT , including those with SF suffix, are parameters sent to the UE is SIB2 used, e.g., for speed dependent Scaling Factor in Medium and High Mobility state respectively – See 3GPP TS 38.331:320-321.
Therefore, Claim 16 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson and further in view of Lee.
Regarding Claim 18, dependent from Claim 16, the method in Yiu in view of Johansson does not teach wherein the parameters for the multiple groups comprise parameters for a medium variation group and a high variation group. However, Lee teaches parameters for both medium variation group and a high variation group (“According to the mobility state estimation, the UE may determine itself as being in Normal/Medium/High-mobility state” – See [¶0084] and “The larger difference [in Srxlev value] means that the UE is moving faster, i.e. higher mobility. The smaller difference means that the UE is moving slower, i.e. lower mobility” – See [¶0091]; based on parameters described in [¶¶0093-96]; see also 3GPP TS 38.331:320-321 supra).
Therefore, Claim 18 is obvious over Yiu in view of Johansson and further in view of Lee.
Regarding Claims 30-35, dependent from Amended Claim 24, obvious over Yiu in