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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 June 20, 2025 has been entered.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55 for JP2022033655 dated March 4, 2022.
Should applicant desire to obtain the benefit of foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d) prior to declaration of an interference, a certified English translation of the foreign application must be submitted in reply to this action. 37 CFR 41.154(b) and 41.202(e).
Failure to provide a certified translation may result in no benefit being accorded for the non-English application. No action on the part of the applicant is requested at this time.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDSs) submitted on February 15, 2023, February 15, 2024, and April 24, 2026, are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
Response to Amendment
In response to Applicant’s amendments dated January 22, 2026, Examiner maintains the grounds of rejection under 35 U.S.C. 103.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, filed January 22, 2026, with respect to claims 1 and 4-8 have been considered but are not persuasive. Noguchi (US 20200311623 A1) gives a notification to the user which prompts the selection of an exit plan (Paragraph [0042], “The HMI 30 presents various types of information to a user of the vehicle M and receives an input operation from the user. “ and Paragraph [0068], “. The self-driving parking controller 142 controls the communication device 20 to transmit a parking request to the parking management apparatus 400 when the self-driving parking event is started. Then, the vehicle M moves from the boarding area 310 to the parking area PA according to guidance of the parking management apparatus 400 or while performing sensing by itself.” And then, Paragraph [0071], “The acquirer 422 acquires reservation information on the exit of a vehicle from the parking lot input by a parking lot user and operation information on a means of transportation.”), and Kim (US 20190129412 A1) modifies this with the selection of a plurality of directions in advance (Paragraph [0071], “The application controller 40 may provide, to the device controller 60, information that the driver has selected remote parking-space-exiting and information on a parking-space-exit direction and a parking-space-exit period selected in advance by the driver.” And Figure 3). The remaining arguments are essentially the same as those addressed above and/or below and are unpersuasive and/or moot for at least the same reasons. Therefore, Examiner maintains the corresponding rejections.
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 and 5-8 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Noguchi (US 20200311623 A1), previously of record, in view of Maise (US 20150285645 A1), previously of record, Kim (US 20190129412 A1), previously of record, and Yoon (US 20190204821 A1), previously of record, herein after referred to as Noguchi, Maise, Kim, and Yoon respectively.
Regarding Claim 1,
Noguchi discloses the following limitations,
A control device of a moving object, comprising: (Paragraph [0081], “The self-driving parking controller 142 and the communication device 20 maintain operating states even when the vehicle M is parked. For example, when the communication device 20 has received a pickup request (call request) that is an example of an exit instruction from the parking management apparatus 400, the self-driving parking controller 142 starts the system of the vehicle M and causes the vehicle M to move to the boarding area 310.” – the controller 142 is the control device)
a controller configured to perform parking control to park the moving object at a predetermined parking space (Paragraph [0070], “The controller 420 guides a vehicle to a parking space PS on the basis of information acquired through the communicator 410 and information stored in the storage 430. The parking lot map information 432 is information geometrically representing the structure of the parking area PA. The parking lot map information 432 includes coordinates of each parking space PS.” – the parking spaces are predetermined, i.e., they are known in a table) and exit control to move the moving object from the predetermined parking space (Paragraph [0055], “The action plan generator 140 may set an automated driving event upon generation of a target trajectory. Automated driving events include a constant-speed traveling event, a constant-speed takeover event, a lane change event, a branch event, a merging event, a takeover event, a self-driving parking event of parking in a parking lot through automated traveling, such as valet parking, and the like” – the autonomous vehicle can park and be requested to unpark) and receive an action plan of the exit control, (Paragraph [0072], “The exit manager 424 registers reservation information on the exit of the vehicle from the parking lot acquired by the acquirer 422 in the parking reservation table 434 of the storage 430. The exit manager 424 changes reservation information on the exit of the vehicle from the parking lot on the basis of operation information of the means of transportation acquired by the acquirer 422. In the present embodiment, a means of transportation is a means of transportation used before a user takes a vehicle out of the parking lot and may include a train, an airplane, a ship, or the like, for example. When the operation of the means of transportation has been delayed, the exit manager 424 postpones the time at which the vehicle exits the parking lot according to a degree of the delay.” – the reservation is an action plan, which is acted upon at a scheduled time to perform exit control, either at the given time, in the case of a user being delayed in returning to a pickup zone, the exit control can be performed after a delay)
wherein the controller is configured to receive the action plan in advance during the parking control; (Paragraph [0068], “The self-driving parking controller 142 controls the communication device 20 to transmit a parking request to the parking management apparatus 400 when the self-driving parking event is started. “ – data is requested from the user during the parking control, which is followed with or includes requesting reservation information, Paragraph [0071], “The acquirer 422 acquires reservation information on the exit of a vehicle from the parking lot input by a parking lot user and operation information on a means of transportation.” – further note that the disclosed text of acquiring reservation information is contained under a header titled, ‘Self-Driving Parking Event – During Entry’ – and is thus described so as to occur during the parking control)
when the action plan is received in advance during the exit control, the controller performs the exit control based on the action plan received in advance (Paragraph [0081], “The self-driving parking controller 142 and the communication device 20 maintain operating states even when the vehicle M is parked. For example, when the communication device 20 has received a pickup request (call request) that is an example of an exit instruction from the parking management apparatus 400, the self-driving parking controller 142 starts the system of the vehicle M and causes the vehicle M to move to the boarding area 310.”)
wherein the action plan includes an exit direction of the moving object during the exit control. (Paragraph [0081], “The suitable route from the parking space PS to the boarding area 310 is an example of information for the vehicle M requested to exit to autonomously travel from the parking position in the parking lot to the boarding area.” – a given boarding area 310 is the destination for the exit control, which is known in advance for the user, and thus the action plan includes an exit direction)
during the parking control, the controller performs notification to prompt a user of the moving object to perform a reservation operation … (Paragraph [0068], “The self-driving parking controller 142 controls the communication device 20 to transmit a parking request to the parking management apparatus 400 when the self-driving parking event is started. “ – data is requested from the user during the parking control, which is followed with or includes requesting reservation information, Paragraph [0071], “The acquirer 422 acquires reservation information on the exit of a vehicle from the parking lot input by a parking lot user and operation information on a means of transportation.” – further note that the disclosed text of acquiring reservation information is contained under a header titled, ‘Self-Driving Parking Event – During Entry’ – and is thus described so as to occur during the parking control)
However, Noguchi does not disclose the following limitation,
when the action plan is not received in advance during the exit control, the controller receives the action plan and performs the exit control based on the received action plan;
In Noguchi, it is taken as a given that the user will make a reservation request (Figure 13), and while it accounts for a possible delay in a return of a user who may retrieve their car (Figure 12), it does not describe the case in which a user may request exit on another basis, such as if they have arrived earlier. However, this is described by Maise, which teaches a manner of retrieving a vehicle based on a reservation or on request (Paragraph [0056], “The central processing unit 5 parks the vehicle 3 on a suitable area at the parking site 7 and controls the vehicle 3 back to the handoff location 1 if the user sends a provisional enquiry via the smartphone 9 to the central processing unit 5 or the relay station 11 or if an appointed retrieval time specified by the user in advance approaches.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention and with a reasonable likelihood of success, to have modified the autonomous valet of Noguchi with a retrieval on demand as taught by Maise, as this increases the flexibility of the service and ensures a vehicle is delivered quickly (Paragraph [0045], “The central processing unit is configured, depending on a request by a user, to control a vehicle of the user after a parking operation so that the user can accept the vehicle as rapidly as possible at a retrieval location.”). Further, the combination could be performed using known methods, yielding results which are predictable to one of ordinary skill in the art.
However, the combination of Noguchi and Maise does not teach the following limitation,
the exit direction being a direction in which the moving object moves from a parking space of the moving object
the exit direction is selectable from a plurality of directions by a user of the moving object
a reservation operation to select the exit direction in the exit control in advance from the plurality of directions.
However, Kim, in the same field of endeavor, teaches that a user may select a destination in advance for a vehicle summoning (Figure 3(d), an option to exit later is placed explicitly alongside a selection of a parking direction (Paragraph [0071], “When the driver selects remote parking-space-exiting (S450), as illustrated in (b) of FIG. 3, the application controller 40 may display the message 3D, which says that “remote parking-space-exiting is being performed,” on the display unit 30. The application controller 40 may provide, to the device controller 60, information that the driver has selected remote parking-space-exiting and information on a parking-space-exit direction and a parking-space-exit period selected in advance by the driver.”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effecting filing date of the claimed invention and with a reasonable likelihood of success, to have modified the reservation of Noguchi, as previously modified by Maise, with the direction selection of Kim, as this allows provides a convenience for a user in exiting a parking space (Paragraph [0110], “The above-mentioned present invention has an advantageous effect in that convenience of a driver can be promoted s”). Further, the combination is could be performed using known methods, yielding results which are predictable to one of ordinary skill in the art.
However, the combination of Noguchi, Maise, and Kim, as shown, does not teach the following limitations
the plurality of directions including a forward direction, forward-right direction, forward-left, backward direction, backward-right direction, and backward-left direction
However, Yoon, in the same field of endeavor, teaches all 6 possible directions of a selectable parking direction exit control (Figures 4B-4D, Paragraph [0060], “FIG. 4B is an exemplary view in which a remote forward movement/coming-out mode and a remote forward/rearward movement mode in a rear side blocking and left/right side blocking situation are displayed through activation of display of a button according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention and with a reasonable likelihood of success, to have modified the exit direction control of Noguchi, as previously modified by Maise and Kim, with the 6-way directional selection of Yoon, as this improves flexibility and convenience of a parking control for a user (Paragraph [0111], “The present technology automatically determines a surrounding situation of a vehicle, provides the user with a remote control mode screen that is suitable for a situation, and easily and conveniently controls a movement speed of the vehicle during remote control, thereby improving convenience of the user.”). Furthermore, the combination is a simple substitution of elements, yielding results which are predictable to one of ordinary skill in the art.
Regarding Claim 5,
The combination of Noguchi, Maise, Kim, and Yoon as shown, teaches all the limitations of Claim 1. Noguchi further discloses the following limitation,
wherein the controller is configured to receive the action plan based on an input operation performed on an information terminal carried by the user of the moving object. (Paragraph [0071], “For example, the acquirer 422 acquires reservation information on the exit of the vehicle input by the parking lot user to the terminal device 300 through the communicator 410.” and Paragraph [0041], “Although the terminal device 300 may be a portable terminal carried by the user U, such as a smartphone or a tablet terminal, for example, the terminal device 300 is not limited thereto and may be a management terminal, a server device or the like used by a manager or the like set in advance.”)
Regarding Claim 6,
The combination of Noguchi, Maise, Kim, and Yoon, as shown, teaches all the limitations of Claim 1. Noguchi further discloses the following limitation,
wherein the controller notifies the user that the exit control based on the action plan is available, when the information terminal carried by the user of the moving object is close to the moving object and the action plan is received in advance (Paragraph [0096], “The parking manager 428 determines whether the means of transportation used by the user has arrived at a use end point on the basis of the operation information of the means of transportation acquired from the various server devices (step S38). Then, the parking manager 428 inquires of the user U about whether to cause the vehicle M to exit from the parking lot by transmitting a request signal to the terminal device 300 carried by the user U when it is determined that the means of transportation has arrived at the use end point (step S40).” – proximity to the vehicle is detected because the user has arrived at a boarding area through some means of transportation, and then the controller notifies the user that exit control is available, based on the exit control described in the action plan received in advance)
Regarding Claim 7,
Claim 7 recites essentially the same limitations to that of Claim 1, as a method which corresponds to the apparatus of Claim 1. The combination of Noguchi, Maise, Kim, and Yoon, as shown, teaches all the limitations of Claim 1. Therefore, the limitations of Claim 7 are also taught.
Regarding Claim 8
Claim 8 recites essentially the same limitations to that of Claim 1, except as an alternative apparatus which describes a non-transitory memory causing a processor to execute instructions. The control device of Noguchi is a computer with a memory and a processor (Paragraph [0101], “The storage device 100-5 stores a program 100-5 a executed by the CPU 100-2.”). The combination of Noguchi, Maise, Kim, and Yoon, further, as shown, teaches all the limitations of Claim 1. Therefore, Claim 8 is also taught.
Claim 4 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Noguchi, Maise, Kim and Yoon, as applied to Claim 1 above, further in view of Khurewattanakul (US 20200406887 A1), previously of record, herein after referred to as Khurewattanakul.
Regarding Claim 4,
The combination of Noguchi, Maise, Kim, and Yoon, as shown, teaches all the limitations of Claim 1. However, the combination does not teach the following limitation,
wherein the controller performs a process of discarding the action plan after a predetermined time since the action plan is received
However, this is taught by Khurewattanakul (Paragraph [0114], “Various types of information remain stored in the storage portions 302, 402, and 502 until the AVP service (loading or unloading) is complete. After the service is complete, the information is automatically erased at a specified timing. This can prevent a leak of personal information, for example, contained in application information db or vehicle information Dc.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the action plan of Noguchi, as previously modified by Maise and Kim, with the plan discarding as taught by Khurewattanakul, as this improves the security of a valet vehicle system (Paragraph [0114], “This can prevent a leak of personal information, for example, contained in application information db or vehicle information Dc.”). Further, the combination is a simple substitution of elements, yielding results which are predictable to one of ordinary skill in the art.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Cho (US 20200211400 A1), previously of record, teaches an action plan including a starting area which is close to the vehicle (Paragraph [0087]). Kramer (US 20200401127 A1), previously of record, teaches that a vehicle park-out can include a selectable direction (Paragraph [0038]). Pan (US 20230100961 A1), newly of record, teaches an action plan entry notification that arises during parking control (Paragraph [0052]).
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KAREN LYNELLE FURGASON whose telephone number is (571)272-5619. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 7:30 AM - 6 PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Erin Bishop, can be reached at 571-270-3713. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/K.L.F./Examiner, Art Unit 3665
/DONALD J WALLACE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3665
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