DETAILED ACTION
This communication is in response to Application No. 18/290,766 filed on 1/20/2024. The preliminary amendment presented on 1/20/2024, which amends claims 3-7, is hereby acknowledged. Claims 1-9 have been examined.
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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 1/20/2024 is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claim 9 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter.
Claim 9 is drawn toward an abnormality detection program which is merely software, per se. As such, software, per se does not establish a statutory category of invention. The examiner suggests to storing the program in a memory or any storage device.
Correction is required.
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.
Claims 1-7 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 pre-AIA the applicant regards as the invention.
Claim element “an on-board apparatus comprising a receiving unit configured to receive, a delay processing unit configured to perform, and a detecting unit configured to detect” is a limitation that invokes 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. However, the written description fails to disclose the corresponding structure, material, or acts for the claimed function such that one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize what structure, material, or acts perform the claimed function.
Applicant may:
(a) Amend the claim so that the claim limitation will no longer be interpreted as a limitation under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph; or
(b) Amend the written description of the specification such that it expressly recites what structure, material, or acts perform the claimed function, without introducing any new matter (35 U.S.C. 132(a)).
If applicant is of the opinion that the written description of the specification already implicitly or inherently discloses the corresponding structure, material, or acts so that one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize what structure, material, or acts perform the claimed function applicant should clarify the record by either:
(a) Amending the written description of the specification such that it expressly recites the corresponding structure, material, or acts for performing the claimed function and clearly links or associates the structure, material, or acts to the claimed function, without introducing any new matter (35 U.S.C. 132(a)); or
(b) Stating on the record what the corresponding structure, material, or acts, which are implicitly or inherently set forth in the written description of the specification, perform the claimed function. For more information, see 37 CFR 1.75(d) and MPEP §§ 608.01(o) and 2181.
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.
Claims 1, 3, 8, and 9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ogawa (WO 2020/111134)(cited US 11,790,771 for English translation).
Regarding claims 1, 8, and 9, Ogawa teaches as follows:
An on-board apparatus to be mounted in a vehicle (interpreted as the vehicle-mounted device 120 in figure 4), comprising:
a receiving unit (interpreted as the sensor data collector 200 in figure 4) configured to receive, via a transmission path (interpreted as communication line between the sensor device and the sensor data collector), a plurality of pieces of change information respectively indicating changes in measurement results of a plurality of sensors mounted in the vehicle (the sensor device 122 is a sensor installed in the vehicle 106. Although various sensors are installed in the vehicle, the sensor device among these various sensors is provided for generating driving assistance information. Examples of the sensor device include an image sensor, a laser sensor, and a millimeter-wave radar, see, col. 14, lines 23-33)(the vehicle-mounted device 120 includes a sensor data collector 200 that collects sensor data detected by the sensor device 122, see, col. 15, lines 24-33 and figure 4);
a delay processing unit (interpreted as the buffer input controller 202 and the buffer output controller 212 in figure 4) configured to perform delay processing for delaying and outputting at least one of the plurality of pieces of change information received by the receiving unit (in a case where the buffer input controller 202 is to output sensor data to the buffer unit 204, the buffer input controller 202 outputs the sensor data to the first buffer 206. The first buffer 206, the second buffer 208, and the third buffer 210 each store the input data, shifts the previously-stored data when new data is to be input, and subsequently stores the newly-input data in an available region, see, col. 15, lines 53-67)(the buffer output controller 212 adds, to the sensor data, information for specifying the delay time of the sensor data read from each of the first buffer 206, the second buffer 208, and the third buffer 210, and outputs the sensor data with the added information to the packet transmitter 216, see, col. 17, line 1-17); and
a detection unit (interpreted as the shadowing detector 214 in figure 4) configured to detect an abnormality (interpreted as the communication failure)(a communication failure with the base station 104 in this case is an occurrence of shadowing. Information about the occurrence of shadowing is transmitted from the shadowing detector 214, see, col. 15, lines 39-52) based on an internal output sequence that is an output sequence in which the delay processing unit outputs the plurality of pieces of change information (the shadowing detector 214 determines whether or not shadowing is occurring based on the frequency of a communication failure input from the packet transmitter 216 or the line speed of the communication line, see, col. 18, lines 4-18 and figure 4).
Ogawa does not teach detecting abnormality (detecting communication failure/shadowing) based on an internal output sequence (buffered sensor data).
Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ogawa to include continuously monitoring the communication failure (shadowing) for sensor data delayed by the buffer or directly transmitted without the buffer in order to efficiently monitor all data traffic.
Regarding claim 3, Ogawa teaches as follows:
Wherein the delay processing unit delays the change information such that the internal output sequence differs from a receiving sequence in which the receiving unit receives the plurality of pieces of change information (the vehicle-mounted device 120 buffers the sensor data during a period in which shadowing is occurring, and can concurrently transmit the buffered sensor data when the shadowing is resolved. In this case, since the buffered sensor data is transmitted such that data with a shorter delay time is transmitted with priority, the server 102 can effectively use the received sensor data., see, col. 18, lines 46-53)(therefore, the buffers delay the sensor data with different periods based on the priority level).
Claims 2 and 4-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ogawa (WO 2020/111134)(cited US 11,790,771 for English translation) in view of Tsuruoka (US 2015/0156129).
Regarding claims 2 and 4-5, Ogawa teaches all limitations as presented above except for adjusting a delay time based on a load amount of the transmission path.
Tsuruoka teaches as follows:
The traffic controller 26 adjusts a retention time (equivalent to applicant’s delay time) for which an ACK packet P2 is delayed (an amount of delay) according to the bandwidth of the link 24. Adjustment of the amount of delay is performed through adjustment of the time period for retaining ACK packets P2 in the queue 28. Adjustment is performed so that the retention time is shorter when the bandwidth on the receiving side of the link 24 is wider, and the retention time is longer when the bandwidth on the receiving side of the link 24 is narrower (see, ¶ [0060] and figure 2).
Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ogawa with Tsuruoka to include the traffic controller as taught by Tsuruoka in order to efficiently adjust delay time accordance with the bandwidth of the transmission path.
Regarding claim 6, Ogawa teaches all limitations as presented above except for the relation between a transmission path and a delaying time.
Tsuruoka teaches as follows:
FIG. 4 indicates an example of changes in the insert delay D with respect to changes in the link bandwidth (BW)… The link bandwidth BW and the insert delay D change in an inversely proportional relationship. The insert delay D, however, gradually changes continuously at the gradient K to a target amount of delay (see, ¶ [0066] and figure 4).
Therefore, it is rejected for similar reason as presented above.
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ogawa (WO 2020/111134)(cited US 11,790,771 for English translation) in view of Sakai et al. (hereinafter Sakai)(US 2020/0223439).
Regarding claim 7, Ogawa teaches all limitations as presented above except for the abnormality type information.
Sakai teaches as follows:
The abnormality detection portion 32 detects an abnormality around the vehicle 10, for example, by referring to a reference table indicative of the correspondence between the type of at expected abnormality and a combination of the type of the matter that can cause an abnormality, detected from the image, the state of the vehicle 10 such as the speed of the vehicle 10, acquired by the sensor portion 12, traffic information at the current position of the vehicle 10, a road structure shown on the map data, and so on. Note that such a reference table is stored in the memory 22 in advance, for example. The discriminator has learned, in advance, to determine the type of an expected abnormality with respect to the combination. Such a discriminator can be a multilayer-perception neural network or a support vector machine, for example (see, ¶ [0043] and figure 2)
Therefore, it would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Ogawa with Sakai to include the discriminator as taught by Sakai in order to efficiently determine the type of abnormalities.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Jeong S Park whose telephone number is (571)270-1597. The examiner can normally be reached Monday through Friday 8:00-4:30 ET.
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/JEONG S PARK/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2454
January 10, 2026