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 .
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.
Claim(s) 1, 2, 11, 15-18, and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Pezeshki US 20200329395 in view of Chen US 20210022128, Bai 20220217725, and BAGHERI CN 117914457.
Regarding claims 1, 15-17, Pezeshki teaches a method performed by a base station, the method comprising:
transmitting downlink control information (DCI) with a transmission configuration indicator (TCI), spatial information, or a combination thereof and a transmission configuration indicator TCI bitmap field / “three-bit indicator”, wherein each bit in the transmission configuration indicator TCI bitmap field indicates whether the TCI transmission configuration indicator, the spatial information, or the combination thereof applies to a channel / (PDSCH, PUSCH) or resource group (The DCI may include a three-bit indicator, which may indicate the TCI state or spatial relation for a scheduled PDSCH or PUSCH, respectively, [0044]).
Pezeshki is silent on wherein the TCI, the spatial information, or the combination thereof applies to channels in a carrier indicated by a carrier indicator field of the DCI and to a bandwidth part indicated by a bandwidth part indicator field of the DCI.
Chen teaches wherein the TCI applies to channels in a carrier indicated by a carrier indicator field of the DCI (claim 11) and to a bandwidth part indicated by a bandwidth part indicator field of the DCI ([0099, 0102, 0103]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify the system of Pezeshki by wherein the TCI, applies to channels in a carrier indicated by a carrier indicator field of the DCI and to a bandwidth part indicated by a bandwidth part indicator field of the DCI, as shown by Chen. This modification would benefit the system by associating the TCI with both channels in a carrier indicated by a carrier indicator field of the DCI and to a bandwidth part indicated by a bandwidth part indicator field of the DCI.
The combination is silent on wherein the TCI bitmap field is configured by radio resource control (RRC) signaling.
Bai teaches wherein the TCI bitmap field is configured by
radio resource control (RRC) signaling ([0094] To configure the TCI states for the multiple channels and/or reference signals, the TCI state information within the message 210 (e.g., RRC signaling).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify the system of the combination by wherein the TCI bitmap field is configured by radio resource control (RRC) signaling, as shown by Bai. This modification would benefit the system by providing a proven, reliable method for transmitting TCI information.
The combination is silent on the TCI bitmap field to control applicability of the TCI, the spatial information, or the combination thereof to one or more channels or resource groups within a carrier indicated by a carrier indicator field of the DCI.
Bagheri teaches the TCI bitmap field (see paragraph According to TS 38.214V15.4.0: TCI field), to control applicability of the TCI, the spatial information, or the combination thereof to one or more channels or resource groups within a carrier indicated by a carrier indicator field of the DCI (see paragraph According to TS 38.214V15.4.0: The UE assumes that the TCI state or QCL hypothesis for PDSCH is the same as any of the TCI state or QCL hypothesis for CORESET for physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) transmission. if tci-PresentInDCI is set as "enabled", the TCI field in the DCI in the scheduling component carrier points to the activated TCI state in the scheduled component carrier or the downlink bandwidth part (BWP).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify the system of the combination by the TCI bitmap field to control applicability of the TCI, the spatial information, or the combination thereof to one or more channels or resource groups within a carrier indicated by a carrier indicator field of the DCI, as shown by Bagheri. This modification would benefit the system by since adhering to preexisting standards, TS 38.214V15.4.0, will enable the system of the combination to be more easily implemented into larger systems.
Regarding claim 2, 18, the channel comprises a physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH), a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH), or a combination thereof (PDSCH or PUSCH, [0044]), and the resource group comprises a control resource set (CORESET) group, a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) resource group, or a combination thereof.
Regarding claim 11, although Pezeshki teaches DCI, the reference is silent on DCI downlink control information format 0_1, 0 2,1 1, or 1_2. However, these were common DCI formats at the time of the instant application and would have been obvious implementations at the time of the instant application.
Regarding claim 20, wherein the TCI, the spatial information, or the combination thereof applies to channels in a carrier indicated by a carrier indicator field of the DCI and to a bandwidth part indicated by a bandwidth part indicator field of the DCI (Chen: claim 11, [0099, 0102, 0103]).
Claim(s) 3 and 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over the combination of Pezeshki Chen, Bai, and BAGHERI as applied to claims 2 and 18 above, and further in view of Yu US 20200322109 and Ji US 20230023719.
The combination is silent on the CORESET group is defined by radio resource control (RRC) signaling to be a set of CORESETs that share the same TCI state
Yu teaches a CORESET group is defined by radio resource control (RRC) signaling ([0035]) and Ji teaches a CORESET group
to be a set of CORESETs that share the same TCI state ([0367]).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5-10, 12-14 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.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to the amended 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RONALD B ABELSON whose telephone number is (571)272-3165. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:00-4:30.
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/RONALD B ABELSON/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2476
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