Detail Action
The office action is in response to the communication(s) filed on 12/08/2025.
Claims Status
Claims 1-51, 56, 58, 66, and 68 have been cancelled.
Claims 52, 57, 59-60, 62, 67 and 69-70 have been amended.
Claims 72-73 have been newly added.
Claims 52-55, 57, 59-65, 67, and 69-73 are pending in this application.
Notice of 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 .
Prior Art Made of Record
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Gao et al. (Publication No. US 2023/0276519), the prior art discloses that upon receiving the BFR signaling, the network device 110 performs 304 a link recovery procedure for a TRP or for a set of CORESETs; see ¶ 0077.
Response to Arguments
Applicant remarks, filed on 08/12/2025, argues that the cited portion of the prior art, individually or in combination, fails to discloses the features in claim 1, specifically:
(Feature I) “sending, by the UE to a network device, at least one of a first Media Access Control Control Element (MAC CE) or a second MAC CE, wherein the first MAC CE is used to report the beam failure of the first TRP to the network device, and the second MAC CE is used to report the beam failure of the second TRP to the network device”. Examiner respectfully disagrees. Deenoo discloses that the WTRU [UE] sends a MAC CE [second MAC CE], wherein the MAC CE of the MAC sub-PDU may include a bitmap of the Scell index, and the bit position corresponding to the failed [beam failure] Scell index may be set to 1, and the remaining bit positions set to zero, wherein the MAC CE may include an identity of a selected candidate beam, which may be in the form of an SS block index, CSI-RS resource identity; see ¶ 0235. Examiners notes that “the first MAC CE is used to …, and the second MAC CE is used to …” fails to carried patentable weight because is claiming the intended use of the first MAC CE and the second MAC CE.
In addition, Applicant argues that the beam failure detection and reporting scheme is performed at the granularity of SCell, not performed at the granularity of TRP. Examiner note that the claim fails to exclude the scenario wherein each TRP is associated with different cells. Therefore, the claim is met by the prior art which discloses multiple cells (e.g. PCell and SCell), and each cell is associated with a TRP.
In addition, Applicant argues that the prior art does not mention reporting of beam failure of different TRPs through different MAC-CE messages, nor does it disclose or suggest the specific information included in each MAC-CE message. Examiner notes that only one MAC CE is required based in the interpretation above, and a new embodiment of the prior art above was found disclosing the information included in the MAC-CE.
(Feature II) “wherein the first MAC CE comprises at least one of- second information used for determining an index of the first TRP where beam failure is detected; third information used for indicating whether a candidate reference signal identity (RS ID) is included in the first MAC CE; or fourth information, wherein the fourth information is a candidate RS ID" and "wherein the second MAC CE comprises at least one of- second information used for determining an index of the second TRP where beam failure is detected; third information used for indicating whether a candidate RS ID is included in the second MAC CE; or fourth information, wherein the fourth information is a candidate RS ID“. Examiner respectfully disagrees. Deenoo discloses that the WTRU [UE] sends a MAC CE [second MAC CE], wherein the MAC CE of the MAC sub-PDU may include a bitmap of the Scell index, and the bit position corresponding to the failed [beam failure] Scell index may be set to 1, and the remaining bit positions set to zero, wherein the MAC CE may include an identity of a selected candidate beam, which may be in the form of an SS block index, CSI-RS resource identity; see ¶ 0235. Examiners notes that “wherein the first MAC CE comprises …” has not been considered as part of the broadest reasonable interpretation of the claim because is part of the alternative limitation, wherein the alternative limitation recite “sending, by the UE to a network device, at least one of a first Media Access Control Control Element (MAC CE) or a second MAC CE”.
For these reasons discussed above that the claim is met by the prior art.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102 of this title, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negatived by the manner in which the invention was made.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 52-54 and 62-64 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gou et al. (Publication No. US 2019/0190582, hereinafter referred as Gou) in view of Kwon et al. (Publication No. US 2019/0268790, hereinafter referred as Kwon) and further in in view of Deenoo et al. (Publication No. US 2020/0374960, hereinafter referred as Deenoo).
Regarding claims 52 and 62, Gou discloses obtaining, by a user equipment (UE), a first set of beam failure detection reference signals (RSs) and a second set of beam failure detection RSs (A serving gNB configure a UE with a first set of reference signal (RS) for the UE to detect beam failure of a first cell, and a second set of RS for the UE to detect beam failure of a second cell; see figure 13 numeral 1302 & ¶ 0437.),
performing, by the UE, beam failure detection and beam failure recovery for the first TRP according to the first set of beam failure detection RSs and performing beam failure detection and beam failure recovery for the second TRP according to the second set of beam failure detection RSs (Based on the RSs configuration received from the serving gNB, the UE begin to monitor the configured RSs; see figure 13 numeral 1303 & ¶ 0437. The UE detects whether beam failure of a first cell happens and whether beam failure of a second cell happens, if the number of consecutive beam failure instance of that cell reaches one threshold; see figure 13 numeral 1303-1304 & ¶ 0438. After the UE sends beam failure recovery request to a serving gNB; see ¶ 0439.).
Gou fails to discloses that the first set of beam failure detection RSs is a source of quasi-co-location (QCL) assumption for a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) associated with a first transmission/reception point (TRP), and the second set of beam failure detection RSs is a source of QCL assumption for a PDCCH associated with a second TRP. However, in analogous art, Kwon discloses determined in accordance with periods of one or more periodic beam failure detection (BFD) reference signals (RSs) of a BFD RS set, wherein the BFD RSs of the one or more BFD RSs of the BFD RS set have a quasi-co-located (QCL) relationship with demodulation RSs (DMRSs) of PDCCH receptions monitored by the UE, monitoring, by the UE, a subset of the one or more BFD RSs having the QCL relationship with the DMRSs of PDCCH receptions monitored by the UE that occur during a measurement period, and determining, by the UE, that measures of all BFD RSs in the subset of the one or more BFD RSs do not meet a specified threshold, and based thereon, reporting, by the UE, a beam failure (BF) instance; see ¶ 0006. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the measuring mechanism in order to mitigate beams blockage; see ¶ 0004.
Gou, as modified, fails to discloses sending, by the UE to a network device, at least one of a first Media Access Control Control Element (MAC CE) (Note: This limitation is claimed in the alternative form. Therefore, not required as part of the broadest reasonable interpretation.) or a second MAC CE,
wherein the first MAC CE is used to report the beam failure of the first TRP to the network device, and the second MAC CE is used to report the beam failure of the second TRP to the network device (Note: This limitation fails to carried patentable weight because is claiming the intended use of the first MAC CE and the second MAC CE.);
wherein the first MAC CE comprises at least one of: second information used for determining an index of the first TRP where beam failure is detected; third information used for indicating whether a candidate reference signal identity (RS ID) is included in the first MAC CE: or fourth information, wherein the fourth information is a candidate RS ID (Note: This limitation has not been considered as part of the broadest reasonable interpretation because is part of the alternative limitation above.);
wherein the second MAC CE comprises at least one of : second information used for determining an index of the second TRP where beam failure is detected; third information used for indicating whether a candidate RS ID is included in the second MAC CE; or fourth information, wherein the fourth information is a candidate RS ID. However, in analogous art, Deenoo discloses that the WTRU [UE] sends a MAC CE [second MAC CE], wherein the MAC CE of the MAC sub-PDU may include a bitmap of the Scell index, and the bit position corresponding to the failed Scell index may be set to 1, and the remaining bit positions set to zero; see ¶ 0235. Furthermore, the MAC CE may include an identity of a selected candidate beam, which may be in the form of an SS block index, CSI-RS resource identity; see ¶ 0235. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the bitmap mechanism in order to improved broadband performance; see ¶ 0073.
Regarding claims 53 and 63, Gou discloses receiving, by the UE, first configuration information and second configuration information, wherein the first configuration information is used to determine the first set of beam failure detection RSs, and the second configuration information is used to determine the second set of beam failure detection RSs (A serving gNB configure a UE with a first set of reference signal (RS) for the UE to detect beam failure of a first cell, and a second set of RS for the UE to detect beam failure of a second cell; see figure 13 numeral 1302 & ¶ 0437.); and
obtaining, by the UE, the first set of beam failure detection RSs according to the first configuration information and obtaining the second set of beam failure detection RSs according to the second configuration information (Based on the RSs configuration received from the serving gNB, the UE begin to monitor the configured RSs; see figure 13 numeral 1303 & ¶ 0437. The UE detects whether beam failure of a first cell happens and whether beam failure of a second cell happens, if the number of consecutive beam failure instance of that cell reaches one threshold; see figure 13 numeral 1303-1304 & ¶ 0438.).
Regarding claims 54 and 64, Gou discloses generating, by the UE, a first beam failure instance indication from a measurement result of the first set of beam failure detection RSs, and determining that beam failure of the first TRP happens when a number of consecutive first beam failure instance indications reaches a first threshold (Based on the RSs configuration received from the serving gNB, the UE begin to monitor the configured RSs; see figure 13 numeral 1303 & ¶ 0437. The UE detects whether beam failure of a first cell happens and whether beam failure of a second cell happens, if the number of consecutive beam failure instance of that cell reaches one threshold; see figure 13 numeral 1303-1304 & ¶ 0438. After a UE sends beam failure recovery request to a serving gNB; see ¶ 0439.); and
generating, by the UE, a second beam failure instance indication from a measurement result of the second set of beam failure detection RSs, and determining that beam failure of the second TRP happens when a number of consecutive second beam failure instance indications reaches a second threshold (Based on the RSs configuration received from the serving gNB, the UE begin to monitor the configured RSs; see figure 13 numeral 1303 & ¶ 0437. The UE detects whether beam failure of a first cell happens and whether beam failure of a second cell happens, if the number of consecutive beam failure instance of that cell reaches one threshold; see figure 13 numeral 1303-1304 & ¶ 0438. After a UE sends beam failure recovery request to a serving gNB; see ¶ 0439.).
Claims 55 and 65 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gou, Kwon, Deenoo, and further in view of Fan et al. (Publication No. US 2022/0141814, hereinafter referred as Fan).
Regarding claims 55 and 65, Gou, as modified by Kwon, fails to disclose generating, by the UE, the first beam failure instance indication from the measurement result of the first set of beam failure detection RSs comprises: measuring, by a physical layer in the UE, radio link quality of the first set of beam failure detection RSs, and reporting the first beam failure instance indication to a higher layer when the radio link quality of the first set of beam failure detection RSs is less than a third threshold; and
generating, by the UE, the second beam failure instance indication from the measurement result of the second set of beam failure detection RSs comprises: measuring, by the physical layer in the UE, radio link quality of the second set of beam failure detection RSs, and reporting the second beam failure instance indication to a higher layer when the radio link quality of the second set of beam failure detection RSs is less than a fourth threshold. However, in analogous art, Fan discloses that the terminal device may measure each beam failure detection resource in the first beam failure detection resource group, and when quality of each beam failure detection resource is lower than a first threshold, the terminal device determines that a beam failure occurs; see ¶ 0165. After the terminal device determines that the beam failure occurs, a first protocol layer entity of the terminal device reports beam failure indication information to a second protocol layer entity of the terminal device; see ¶ 0165. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the BFD mechanism in order to improve the performance of the multi-TRP transmission; see ¶ 0010.
Claims 57 and 67 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gou, Kwon, Deenoo, and further in view of He et al. (Publication No. US 2021/0044342, hereinafter referred as He).
Regarding claims 57 and 67, Gou, as modified, fails to discloses receiving, by the UE, third configuration information and fourth configuration information, wherein the third configuration information is used to determine a third set of candidate beam RSs for the beam failure recovery of the first TRP, and the fourth configuration information is used to determine a fourth set of candidate beam RSs for the beam failure recovery of the second TRP; wherein the method further comprises at least one of the following: when beam failure for the first TRP is detected, selecting, by the UE, a first RS in the third set of candidate beam RSs for the beam failure recovery of the first TRP, wherein radio link quality of the first RS is larger than or equal to a third threshold; or when beam failure for the second TRP is detected, selecting, by the UE, a second RS in the fourth set of candidate beam RSs for the beam failure recovery of the second TRP, wherein radio link quality of the second RS is larger than or equal to a fourth threshold. However, in analogous art, He discloses that the beam failure detection and recovery procedure performed by a UE in communication with a TRP and TRP in Mode 2 multi-TRP operation; see figure 8 & ¶ 0079. The UE receive a beam failure recovery (BFR) configuration for each of the TRP, wherein the BFR configuration includes their respective sets of candidate beams, wherein in each set of candidate beams may comprise periodic CSI-RS [reference signal] resource configuration indexes; see figure 8 numeral 816-818 & ¶ 0080. After the UE detect beam failure independently for each TRP, the UE select a new beam; wherein the new beam is selected based on the measure the RSRP of each beam in the set of candidate beams, identify a new beam having a RSRP over a pre-configured threshold; see figure 8 numeral 824/830 & ¶ 0083. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the configuration information of He in order to reduce the delay in beam failure recovery by enabling the UE to autonomously select a candidate beam in the event of beam failure.
Claims 58-61 and 68-71 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gou, Kwon, Deenoo, and further in view of Kang et al. (Publication No. US 2023/0103308, hereinafter referred as Kang).
Regarding claims 58 and 68, Gou, as modified, fails to disclose sending, by the UE to a network device, at least one of a first Media Access Control Control Element (MAC CE) or a second MAC CE, wherein the first MAC CE is used to report the beam failure of the first TRP to the network device, and the second MAC CE is used to report the beam failure of the second TRP to the network device. However, in analogous art, Kang discloses that the UE transmit a MAC CE including information related to an occurred beam failure as a report; wherein the information includes: a cell the index in which the beam failure has occurred; see ¶ 0297-0302. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the report mechanism of Kang in order to improved mobile broadband communication compared to the existing radio access technology (RAT); see ¶ 0067.
Regarding claims 59 and 69, Gou, as modified, fails to disclose that the first MAC CE comprises at least one of: first information used for determining a serving cell index for a cell where beam failure is detected. However, in analogous art, Kang discloses that the UE transmit a MAC CE including information related to an occurred beam failure as a report; wherein the information includes: a cell the index in which the beam failure has occurred; see ¶ 0297-0302. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the report mechanism of Kang in order to improved mobile broadband communication compared to the existing radio access technology (RAT); see ¶ 0067.
Regarding claims 60 and 70, Gou, as modified, fails to disclose that the second MAC CE comprises at least one of: first information used for determining a serving cell index for a cell where beam failure is detected. However, in analogous art, Kang discloses that the UE transmit a MAC CE including information related to an occurred beam failure as a report; wherein the information includes: a cell the index in which the beam failure has occurred; see ¶ 0297-0302. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the report mechanism of Kang in order to improved mobile broadband communication compared to the existing radio access technology (RAT); see ¶ 0067.
Regarding claims 61 and 71, Gou, as modified, fails to disclose the first information is a first bitmap, the first bitmap comprises a plurality of bits, each of the plurality of bits corresponds to a service cell index, and a value of each bit indicates whether the beam failure is detected in a cell indicated by the service cell index corresponding to the bit. However, in analogous art, Deenoo discloses that a MAC CE of the MAC sub-PDU may include a bitmap of the Scell index (e.g., using the same format as activation/deactivation MAC CE), and the bit position corresponding to the failed Scell index may be set to 1, and the remaining bit positions set to zero; see ¶ 0235. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the bitmap mechanism of Kang in order to improved broadband performance; see ¶ 0073.
Claims 72-73 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gou, Kwon, Deenoo, and further in view of Zeineddineet al. (Publication No. US 2023/0198602, hereinafter referred as Zeineddine).
Regarding claims 72 and 73, Gou, as modified, fails to disclose the second information is a value of a control resource set (CORESET) pool index coresetPoolIndex, and coresetPoolIndex is an index of a CORESET associated with a PDCCH for a TRP where the beam failure is detected. However, in analogous art, Zeineddine discloses The UE physical layer may indicate a BFI indication to a MAC entity (e.g., higher layers) if a quality of all configured BFD reference signals in a CORESET pool is below a configured threshold Q.sub.out_LR; see ¶ 0098. The UE physical layer may also indicate an indication of which CORESET pool (e.g., CORESET pool index) to the MAC entity; see ¶ 0098. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Gou with the CORESET indication of Zeineddine in order to enable the identification of the specific CORESET associated with the beam failure by the base station.
Conclusion
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.
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/H.R/Examiner, Art Unit 2472
/KEVIN T BATES/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2472
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