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 .
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 06/23/2026 has been entered.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement submitted on 06/23/2026 has been considered by the Examiner and made of record in the application file.
Remarks
The present Office Action is in response to Applicant’s amendment filed on 04/06/2026. Claims 1-3, 7, 8 and 11-18 are still pending in the present application; however, Claim(s) 11-14 and 16 is/are withdrawn from consideration. (Note: claim 15 is dependent claim to claim 1 which was incorrectly withdrawn from consideration in pervious office actions).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claim(s) 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 17 recites, “wherein the determining is responsive to a loss of connection between the IAB-node and the source donor”; and claim 1 discloses the determination step, “determining, by the source donor and when the IAB-node communicates with the RAN via the source donor, that the IAB-node is to migrate from the source donor to a target donor to establish a new radio connection with the RAN”. However, it is not clear if the connection is between the IAB-node and the source donor is lost, then how the source donor can determine the IAB-node is to migrate from the source donor to a target donor. If the connection is lost how can the donor source communicate with the IAB-node in order to signal the IAB-node to migrate or handover to the target donor.
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.
Claim(s) 1 and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu et al. -US 20230171651 A1- (hereinafter Liu) in view of GENG et al. -US 20210298092 A1- (hereinafter Geng).
Regarding claim 1, Liu discloses a method in a source donor for managing a connection between a user equipment (UE) and a radio access network (RAN) via an integrated access backhaul (IAB)-node (FIG. 10 and FIG. 11, par. 0197, for “before the handover, a parent node of the IAB node 3 (namely, a source parent node of the IAB node 3) is an IAB node 1, a source IAB donor DU is an IAB donor DU 1, and a source IAB donor CU is an IAB donor CU 1. After the handover, a parent node of the IAB node 3 (namely, a target parent node of the IAB node 3) is an IAB node 4, a target IAB donor DU is an IAB donor DU 2, and a target IAB donor CU is an IAB donor CU 2” FIG. FIG. 3 5G-RAN), the method comprising:
determining, by the source donor and when the IAB-node communicates with the RAN via the source donor, that the IAB-node is to migrate from the source donor to a target donor to establish a new radio connection with the RAN (FIG. 9A-9B to FIG. 11, FIG. 17, par. 0417, “The IAB donor CU 1 may determine, based on the received measurement report, to hand over the IAB node 3 from the IAB node 1 to the IAB node 4”; par. 0051, “the source donor node is a source donor node during access relay node handover or intermediate relay node handover, and the target donor node is a target donor node during the access relay node handover or the intermediate relay node handover. The intermediate relay node is connected to the access relay node. A relay node on which handover occurs may be referred to as a migration relay node.”);
based on the determining, establishing, by the source donor, connectivity with the target donor (FIG. 9A-9B, par. 0154, “S902: The source base station sends a handover request message to a target base station”; FIG. 17A and FIG. 18A, pa. 0419-0420, “S503: The IAB donor CU 1 sends a handover request message to the IAB donor CU 2, where the handover request message includes capability indication information.”);
subsequently to the establishing, receiving, by the source donor and from a core network (CN), a downlink (DL) data packet addressed to the UE (FIG. 8, par. 0150, “As shown in FIG. 8, a source base station receives downlink data of a terminal from a core network”; FIG. 9A, par. 0163, “S906 and S907 describe a process in which the source base station forwards a sequence number (SN) status and data. The source base station may forward, to the target base station, a part of downlink data that is of the terminal and that is received from the core network”); and
facilitating, by the source donor and via the target donor, communication of the DL data packet to the UE after migrating the IAB-node to the target donor (FIG. 9A, par. 0163, “S906 and S907 describe a process in which the source base station forwards a sequence number (SN) status and data. The source base station may forward, to the target base station, a part of downlink data that is of the terminal and that is received from the core network”).
However, Liu fails to explicitly disclose receiving, by the source donor and from the target donor, an indication message providing information for forwarding downlink (DL) data packets to the target donor; and facilitating, by the source donor and via the target donor, communication of the DL data packet to the UE, including transmitting the DL data packet to the target donor in accordance with the information for forwarding DL data packets.
In the same field of endeavor, Geng discloses receiving, by the source donor and from the target donor, an indication message providing information for forwarding downlink (DL) data packets to the target donor (FIG. 7, par. 0285, “step S740: The target base station sends, to the source base station, the receiving address for receiving the downlink data packet.”); and
facilitating, by the source donor and via the target donor, communication of the DL data packet to the UE, including transmitting the DL data packet to the target donor in accordance with the information for forwarding DL data packets (FIG. 7, par. 0289, 0291 and 0297, “step S750: The source base station sends the downlink data packet to the target base station… when the target base station and the source base station are different base stations, after receiving the receiving address, of the downlink data packet, sent by the target base station, the source base station may forward the downlink data packet to the target base station… Step S770: The target base station sends the downlink data packet to the UE.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate proving an address for forwarding the downlink data packet as taught by Geng to forwarding data from the donor source base station to the donor target base station as disclosed by Liu for purpose sending a data forwarding address indication message from the target IAB donor to the source IAB donor in order to forward downlink data packet through donor target IAB donor to the terminal.
Regarding claim 15, as applied to claim 1 above, Liu (as modified by Geng) discloses donor in an integrated access backhaul (IAB) topology of a radio access network (RAN), the donor including processing hardware and configured to implement the method of claim 1 (FIG. 21 and 22, par. 0567-0569, “FIG. 21 may be a schematic diagram a structure of a donor node… The DU 1101 may include at least one antenna 11011, at least one radio frequency unit 11012, at least one processor 11013, and at least one memory 11014… The CU 1102 may include at least one processor 11022 and at least one memory 11021”; and par. 0539, “The apparatuses in FIG. 19 to FIG. 22 may complete the methods in FIG. 13 to FIG. 18D.”).
Claim(s) 2 and 3 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu in view of Geng as applied to claim(s) 1 above, and further in view of Kim et al. -US 20230051568 A1- (hereinafter Kim).
Regarding claim 2, as applied to claim 1 above, Liu as modified by Geng discloses the claimed invention except wherein the determining includes: receiving, from the target donor, a request for a context of the IAB-node, the context associated with a protocol for controlling radio resources.
In the same field of endeavor, Kim discloses wherein the determining includes: receiving, from the target donor, a request for a context of the IAB-node, the context associated with a protocol for controlling radio resources (FIG. 17-23, par. 0276-0277, “the target base station may perform a retrieve UE context procedure by sending a retrieve UE context request message to the source base station (the last serving base station) of the UE… For RRC connection reestablishment procedure, the retrieve UE context request message may comprise at least one of a UE context ID, integrity protection parameters or a new cell identifier. The UE context ID may comprise at least one of C-RNTI contained the RRC reestablishment request message, a PCI of the source PCell (the last serving PCell). The integrity protection parameters for the RRC reestablishment may be the short MAC-I. The new cell identifier may be an identifier of the target cell wherein the target cell is a cell where the RRC connection has been requested to be re-established.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate messages retrieving contest request and retrieving context response between target and source station as taught by Kim to the method for handing over of a relay node from a source IAB doner to a target IAB donor as disclosed by Liu as modified by Geng for purpose of retrieving contexts of the wireless device based on an identity of the wireless device or IAB node.
Regarding claim 3, as applied to claim 2 above, Kim discloses transmitting, by the source donor and in response to the request for the context, the context of the IAB-node to the target donor (FIG. 17-23, par. 0278-0279, “If the source base station is able to identify the UE context by means of the UE context ID, and to successfully verify the UE by means of the integrity protection contained in the retrieve UE context request message, and decides to provide the UE context to the target base station, the source base station may respond to the target base station with a retrieve UE context response message.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate messages retrieving contest request and retrieving context response between target and source station as taught by Kim to the method for handing over of a relay node from a source IAB doner to a target IAB donor as disclosed by Liu for purpose of retrieving contexts of the wireless device based on an identity of the wireless device or IAB node.
Claim(s) 7 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu in view of Geng as applied to claim(s) 1 above, and further in view of Wisniewski et al. -US 20200045080 A1- (hereinafter Wisniewski).
Regarding claim 7, as applied to claim 1 above, Liu as modified by Geng discloses the claimed invention except wherein the facilitating includes: encrypting, by the source donor, the DL data packet in accordance with a context of the UE.
In the same field endeavor, Wisniewski discloses wherein the facilitating includes: encrypting, by the source donor, the DL data packet in accordance with a context of the UE (FIG. 6, par. 0054 and 0055, “At 650, transparent proxy 615-a may transmit the data stream with the modified source indicator, where the data stream is encrypted according to the specific encryption policy… Additionally, transparent proxy 615-a may establish a TLS or mTLS tunnel with transparent proxy 615-b (e.g., at target host 610) and transmit the data stream through the TLS or mTLS tunnel to transparent proxy 615-b… At 655, transparent proxy 615-b may decrypt the encrypted data stream based on the specific encryption policy. Subsequently, at 660, transparent proxy 615-b may then transmit the decrypted data stream to target host 610.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate source host with transparent proxy to encrypt and transfer data to a target host with transport proxy as taught by Wisniewski to the data forwarded from the source base station to the target base station as disclosed by Liu as modified by Geng for purpose of encrypting and decrypting data transmitted and received between source donor node and target donor node.
Claim(s) 8 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu in view of Geng as applied to claim(s) 1 above, and further in view of LIU et al. -US 20210022050 A1- (hereinafter Liu’2050) further in view of Agiwal -US 20220007423 A1- (hereinafter Agiwal).
Regarding claim 8, as applied to claim 1 above, Liu as modified by Geng discloses the claimed invention except subsequently to the establishing: receiving, by the source donor and from the target donor, an uplink (UL) data packet transmitted by the UE and forwarded to the source donor from the target donor; and decrypting, by the source donor, the uplink data packet.
In the same field of endeavor, Liu’2050 discloses receiving, by the source donor and from the target donor, an uplink (UL) data packet transmitted by the UE and forwarded to the source donor from the target donor (FIG. 3, par. 0058, “In S252, the target access network device may forward the uplink data to the source access network device through the data tunnel established between the source access network device and the target access network device.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate forwarding uplink data from a target access network to source access network as taught by Liu’2050 to the data transmitted and received between the source donor base station and the target donor base station as disclosed by Liu as modified by Geng for purpose of forwarding uplink data from the target donor base station to the source donor base station.
However, Liu as modified by Geng as modified by Liu’2050 fail to explicitly disclose decrypting, by the source donor, the uplink data packet.
In the same field of endeavor, Agiwal discloses decrypting, by the source donor, the uplink data packet (par. 0136, “The gNB decrypts the uplink data and verifies MAC I (if uplink data is integrity protected) and delivers the uplink data to a UP function (UPF) at operation 735.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate decrypting uplink data as taught by Agiwal to the forwarded the uplink data received from a target base station as disclosed by Liu as modified by Geng as modified by Liu’2050 for purpose of decrypting a received encrypted data form the target donor base station.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim(s) 17 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Claim(s) 18 is/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 claim(s) 1 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
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ALLAHYAR KASRAIA N whose telephone number is (571)270-1772. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 8:00 am - 5: 00 pm.
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/ALLAHYAR KASRAIA N/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2642
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