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 .
This office action is responsive to the amendment filed 12/18/25.
Claims 1-2, 4-12, and 14-22 are pending.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
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.
Claim(s) 1, 7, 11, 17, and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park et al., US 2025/0048391, (“Park”), in view of Lee et al., US 2025/0392932, (“Lee”), newly cited.
Independent Claims
Regarding claim 1, Park teaches “A wireless device (Fig. 24, first device 100) comprising:
one or more processors (Fig. 24, processor 102); and
memory (Fig. 24, memory 104) storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the wireless device to:
select a first resource for transmission of a sidelink data (Fig. 18, resource S1810, Fig. 21, step S2130; paragraph no. 0341, “In step S2130, the first device may select a first sidelink (SL) transmission resource”);
trigger resource selection for the transmission (Fig. 18), in response to determining:
a channel occupancy time (COT) duration (Fig. 21, steps S2140, S2150; paragraph no. 0341, “In step S2140, the first device may obtain a first Channel Occupancy Time (COT). In step S2150, the first device may remove the first SL transmission resource based on a reselection of the first SL transmission resource”);
select, based on the triggering, a second resource for the transmission, wherein the second resource is within the COT duration (Fig. 21, step S2160; paragraph no. 0341, “In step S2160, the first device may select a second SL transmission resource based on the first COT”; see also, paragraph no. 0343; see also, Fig. 18, second resource S1830 which is within the first COT); and
transmit the sidelink data via the second resource” (paragraph no. 0317, “For example, the transmission UE may reselect the selected resource prior to transmission by indicating the resource selected for sidelink data transmission in a SCI. For example, the transmission UE may perform the sidelink data transmission while performing a Type 2 LBT (e.g., a Type 2A LBT, Type 2B LBT, or Type 2C LBT) within a COT created by performing the LBT itself (or a COT shared from a counterpart UE)”; see also, paragraph no. 0340, “Fig. 21 shows a method for performing wireless communication by a first device”).
With regard to the newly added limitation “that the first resource is not within the COT duration” of claim 1, Park teaches that the first transmission resource (denoted by S1820 in Fig. 18) is not within the first COT, see Fig. 18. However, it appears that Park teaches that the reselection of the first transmission resource is triggered if the first transmission resource is used by an other UE (see paragraph no. 0322) and not based on the first transmission resource being outside the first COT.
Lee teaches that a UE may trigger reselection of a resource if the resource is not within the COT, see paragraph nos. 0462, 0464-0466.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this claimed invention to modify Park by incorporating the teachings of Lee to further improve the resource reselection process for each sidelink grant in sidelink resource allocation mode 2, as suggested by Lee in paragraph nos. 0457, 0464, and 0465. Furthermore, such a modification would decrease the likelihood of resource collisions between the transmission UE and other UEs engaged in SL transmissions by allowing the transmission UE to exclude resources outside of the COT.
Regarding independent claims 11 and 20, these independent claims are corresponding method and computer readable medium claims of the apparatus claim 1 and recite similar subject matter. As such, the rationale behind the above rejection of claim 1 applies with equal force to these independent claims and as further amplified below to highlight the minor differences between the claims.
Regarding independent claim 20, see Park, Fig.24, memory 104 for a non-transitory computer readable medium.
Dependent Claims
Regarding claims 7 and 17, Park teaches “where the instructions further cause the wireless device to: select the first resource from a first set of candidate resources within a selection window of the sidelink data; and select the second resource from a second set of candidate resources within the selection window” (see Fig. 18).
Claim(s) 2, 12, 21 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park and Lee as applied to claims 1 and 11, 20 above and further in view of Liu et al., US 11,470,645, (“Liu”).
Park teaches “where the instructions further cause the wireless device to:
receive, from a second wireless device, COT sharing information indicating the COT duration (paragraph no. 0342); or initiate a COT with the COT duration” (paragraph no. 0342) as recited in claims 2, 12, and 21.
Park does not teach but Liu teaches “wherein the COT duration starts before a first symbol of the first resource” (Fig. 7, any one of the resources 8 and 11 can be considered a “first resource” and the COT starts prior to resource 6 in which a COT duration is defined by T’2,0) as required by claims 2 and 12.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this claimed invention to modify Park and Lee by incorporating the teachings of Liu to enable the transmitting UE to remove an initially selected first resource which is outside and beyond the duration of the COT, thereby improving the SL communications within the COT.
Claim(s) 4, 14, 22 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park and Lee as applied to claims 1, 11, 20 above and further in view of Lee et al., US 2023/0319852, (“LG” formerly known as “Lee”).
Park would appear to implicitly teach “where the instructions further cause the wireless device to create a sidelink grant, comprising the first resource, for a first sidelink process associated with the sidelink data” since the resource selection of a first resource disclosed in paragraph no. 0341 would implicitly include the creation of a sidelink grant by the first device for transmitting the sidelink data.
LG teaches these limitations explicitly, see paragraph no. 0326.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this claimed invention to modify Park and Lee by incorporating the teachings of LG to enable the transmitting UE to transmit the sidelink data, via a sidelink grant, using the resources selected in resource selection process as is well known in the art.
Claim(s) 5-6 and 15-16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park, Lee, and LG as applied to claims 4 and 14 above and further in view of Kusashima et al., US 2024/0406983, (“Kusashima”).
Regarding claims 5 and 17, Park and LG teach “where the instructions further cause the wireless device to remove the first resource from the sidelink grant” (see claim 4, 14 rejections above) but not “in response to the first resource not being within the COT duration” as required by claims 5 and 17.
Kusashima teaches “in response to the first resource not being within the COT duration” (see paragraph no. 0248, last 5 lines) as required by claims 5 and 17.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this claimed invention to modify Park, Lee, and LG by incorporating the teachings of Kusashima in order to improve the SL transmission within the shared COT.
Regarding claims 6 and 16, Park teaches “where the instructions further cause the wireless device to trigger resource re-selection, wherein: the resource re-selection comprises selecting the second resource” (Fig. 21, steps S2150, S2160).
Park does not teach the limitations associated with the “sidelink grant” as required by claims 6 and 16. LG teaches that a TX UE autonomously selects or reselects sidelink resources to create a sidelink grant used for transmission to a RX UE, see paragraph no. 0326. Hence, Lee remedies the deficiencies of Park.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this claimed invention to modify Park, Lee, and LG and Kusashima by incorporating the additional teachings of LG to enable the transmitting UE to transmit the sidelink data, via a sidelink grant, using a re-selected resource, namely the second resource, selected in a resource re-selection process as is well known in the art.
Claim(s) 10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park and Lee as applied to claim 1 above and further in view of Liu and Huang et al., US 12,388,558, (“Huang”).
Park does not teach but Liu teaches “where the instructions further cause the wireless device to receive one or more messages comprising a first parameter indicating sidelink resource selection, based on the COT duration, is enabled” (see col. 22, line 66 – col. 23, line 30 which disclose that the SCI message may carry COT-SI information; the claimed “first parameter” reads on the COT-SI information since this information triggers the receiving UE to select resources within the shared COT).
Liu does not teach receiving the COT-SI information via “one or more RRC messages” as required by claim 10. Instead, Liu teaches the use of the SCI message to carry this information.
Huang teaches the use of the well known RRC message to convey information to other UEs, see col. 13, lines 35-50.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this claimed invention to modify Park and Lee by incorporating the teachings of Liu to enable the receiving UE to receive COT-SI information carrying information such as the start/end of the UE’s COT, as suggested by Liu in col. 22, lines 66-67, thereby improving the SL communications using a shared COT. In addition, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this claimed invention to further modify Park, Lee, and Liu by incorporating the teachings of Huang since the use of the well known RRC message in place of the well known SCI message is but one known equivalent means of carrying control information to other UEs, as suggested by Huang in col. 13, lines 44-50.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 8-9 and 18-19 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Regarding claims 8 and 18, the prior art of record does not teach or fairly suggest the claim limitations “wherein the instructions further cause the wireless device to determine:
the first set of candidate resources based on a first reference signal received power (RSRP) threshold; and
the second set of candidate resources based on a second RSRP threshold, wherein the second RSRP threshold is:
associated with the COT duration; and
greater than the first RSRP threshold” as recited in claim 8 and similarly recited in claim 18.
Dependent claims 9 and 19 depend from claims 8 and 18, respectively.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to each independent claim(s) have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
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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/WON TAE C KIM/Examiner, Art Unit 2414