DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Remarks
2. This Office action is responsive to the Request for Continued Examination (RCE) filed under 37 CFR §1.53(d) for the instant application on September 8, 2026. Applicants have properly set forth the RCE, which has been entered into the application, and an examination on the merits follows herewith.
Claims 1, 4-6, and 8-17 have been examined and rejected. This Office action is responsive to the amendment filed on September 8, 2026, which has been entered in the above identified application.
Claim Objections
3. The corrections to claim 11 have been approved, and the objection to the claim is withdrawn.
4. Claim 1 is objected to because of the following informalities: Claim 1 recites the limitation “the at least one object” in [line 31] of the claim. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
5. The corrections to claim 14 has been approved, and the rejection to claim 16 is withdrawn.
6. 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.
7. Claims 1, 4-6, and 8-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
7-1. Claim 1 recites the limitation "the person" in [line 22] of the claim. It is unclear which of the at least one person in [line 5] of the claim is being referred to.
7-2. Claim 4 recites the limitation "the sensor unit" in [lines 3-4] of the claim. It is unclear whether “the sensor unit” in claim 4 refers to the sensor unit for detecting the at least one person in [claim 1, line 5], the sensor unit on the entrance side in [claim 1, line 28] or the sensor unit on the exit side in [claim 1, line 28].
7-3. Claim 5 recites the limitation "the sensor unit" in [line 4] of the claim. It is unclear whether “the sensor unit” in claim 5 refers to the sensor unit for detecting the at least one person in [claim 1, line 5], the sensor unit on the entrance side in [claim 1, line 28] or the sensor unit on the exit side in [claim 1, line 28].
7-4. Claim 6 recites the limitation “if the authenticated person intends to pass through the door system” in [line 3] of the claim. It is unclear how the intent of the authenticated person can be known. Examiner suggests amending the claim to clarify how the system is configured to make a judgment that the unauthorized person has the intent to pass through the door system, rather than reciting the actual intent of the unauthorized person.
7-5. Claim 6 recites the limitation “and configured whereby only the authenticated person passes through the door system” in [lines 5-6] of the claim. It is unclear what is configured in the claim.
7-6. Claim 9 recites the limitation "the sensor unit" in [line 3] and [line 5] of the claim. It is unclear whether “the sensor unit” in claim 4 refers to the sensor unit for detecting the at least one person in [claim 1, line 5], the sensor unit on the entrance side in [claim 1, line 28] or the sensor unit on the exit side in [claim 1, line 28].
7-7. Claim 10 recites the limitation "the sensor unit" in [line 3] of the claim. It is unclear whether “the sensor unit” in claim 4 refers to the sensor unit for detecting the at least one person in [claim 1, line 5], the sensor unit on the entrance side in [claim 1, line 28] or the sensor unit on the exit side in [claim 1, line 28].
7-8. Claim 13 recites the limitation "the sensor unit" in [line 2] of the claim. It is unclear whether “the sensor unit” in claim 4 refers to the sensor unit for detecting the at least one person in [claim 1, line 5], the sensor unit on the entrance side in [claim 1, line 28] or the sensor unit on the exit side in [claim 1, line 28].
7-9. Claim 15 recites the limitation "the sensor unit" in [line 2] and [lines 3-4] of the claim. It is unclear whether “the sensor unit” in claim 4 refers to the sensor unit for detecting the at least one person in [claim 1, line 5], the sensor unit on the entrance side in [claim 1, line 28] or the sensor unit on the exit side in [claim 1, line 28].
7-10. Claim 17 recites the limitation "the sensor unit" twice in [line 2] and in [line 4] of the claim. It is unclear whether “the sensor unit” in claim 4 refers to the sensor unit for detecting the at least one person in [claim 1, line 5], the sensor unit on the entrance side in [claim 1, line 28] or the sensor unit on the exit side in [claim 1, line 28].
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
8. 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.
9. Claims 1, 4-6, 8-12, 14-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Busch-Sorensen et al (Pub. No. US 2017/0061715) in view of Hauri (U.S. Patent No. 12,331,578).
9-1. Regarding claim 1, Busch-Sorensen teaches the claim for controlling a door system for separating an entrance side in front of the door system from an exit side behind the door system, wherein the door system has at least one door drive for moving at least one leaf element between an open position and a closed position, by disclosing methods for implementing vision-based fare collection [paragraph 3] that is used to control gate barriers of a vison-based fare collection system, wherein the gate barriers separate a restricted access area from an unrestricted access area, wherein the gate barriers may be sliding doors [paragraph 24, lines 13-16] that may be retracted and restored [paragraph 24, lines 10-13; paragraph 30, lines 16-23; figure 1].
Busch-Sorensen teaches wherein the door system is configured with a sensor unit for detecting at least one person within a sensor detection region, by disclosing cameras 110 that provide visual coverage areas 112 of a walking area of a transit station, and used to track passengers [paragraph 27].
Busch-Sorensen teach and furthermore an authentication device for authenticating people is provided at least on the entrance side in front of the door system, by disclosing a station entry 106 having RFID transceivers that authorizes passengers based on RFID tags [paragraph 25] and ticket vending machines 108 that authorizes passengers after payment [paragraph 26].
Busch-Sorensen teach the method includes at least the following steps: granting an access authorization to the at least one person by the authentication device, by disclosing that when a passenger purchases a ticket, information associated with the passenger is modified so that the passenger is designated as permitted to access the restricted access area [paragraph 30, lines 5]. Additionally, the vision-based fare collection system may also determine that a passenger is permitted to access the restricted access area based on the passenger’s RFID tag [paragraph 31].
Busch-Sorensen teach detecting a position of an authenticated person in the sensor detection region by the sensor unit, continuous tracking of the authenticated person in the sensor detection region by the sensor unit, and activating an opening of the at least one leaf element of the door system by the at least one door drive when the authenticated person approaches the at least one leaf element, by disclosing continuously tracking an authorized passenger using cameras 110 and retracting the barrier within the gate array when the passenger approaches the gate array so that the passenger may continue to walk through the gate array [paragraphs 29-31].
Busch-Sorensen teach whereby a regulating unit is configured… wherein the regulating unit, in particular as part of the door system, is configured wherein the authenticated person is differentiated from the unauthenticated person with the regulating unit by the authenticated person being provided with an electronic tag after authentication, which is electronically attached to the authenticated person, by disclosing that after paying for a ticket, the passenger is issued an electronic ticket via digital delivery to the passenger’s electronic device, or is otherwise associated with information that permits access to the restricted access area [paragraph 26, paragraph 30, lines 1-5]. Additionally, a passenger may carry an RFID tag and is provided with an indication in the passenger’s account information that the passenger is permitted to access the restricted access area [paragraph 31].
Although Busch-Sorensen discloses continuously tracking the location of the passenger such that as the passenger approaches the gate array, the system determines that the passenger is near the gate array and allows access to the restricted access area by retracting the barrier within the gate array [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 30, lines 1-19; paragraph 31, lines 1-24], and after the passenger walks through the gate array, the barrier that was retracted may be restored to prevent a nearby unpermitted passenger from accessing the restricted access area [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 30, lines 19-22; paragraph 31, lines 25-26], as well as determining the speed of the passenger using the sensor unit [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 35, lines 11-12], Busch-Sorensen does not expressly teach that the regulating unit is configured to create a closed control loop including the regulating unit, the sensor unit, and the at least one door drive, wherein the regulating unit continuously and dynamically on an ongoing basis regulates a position of the at least one leaf element based on sensor data of the sensor unit as a function of movement and/or contour of the person, at least indirectly via the at least one door drive. Hauri discloses moving door leaves 1a, 1b between an open and a closed position using drive devices [column 8, lines 46-56]. At least one sensor device is provided to continuously acquire a person’s contour, position, and movement direction [column 9, lines 3-34; column 10, lines 37-46] within a monitoring region [column 9, line 51 to column 10, line 2]. A control and/or evaluation device regulates the door leaves in an ongoing basis such that the door leaves are open only to the extent necessary to allow the person to pass through in an unimpeded manner [column 10, line 50 to column 11, line 50; figures 3b-c]. Sensor devices may be provided to monitor both sides of the door system [column 9, line 63 to column 10, line 2] such that the door leaves can correspondingly be actuated in the closed phase [column 12, lines 52-60, figures 5a-c; column 13, lines 13-18]. This would provide energy savings. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to regulate a position of doors based on sensors that continually track the contour, position, and direction of movement of people on both sides of a door system, as taught by Hauri. This would provide energy savings, and when used in conjunction with the authorization of passengers, would increase security by preventing unauthorized tailgating.
Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach wherein a sensor unit is configured on both the entrance side and on the exit side of the door system in each case, by disclosing sensors that provide a coverage area of a walking area of a transit station, used to track passengers [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 27; Hauri, column 9, lines 3-8]. Sensor devices may be provided on the opposite side of the door system [Hauri, column 9, line 63 to column 10, line 2].
Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach wherein the sensor detection region of sensor units overlap, adjoin one another or at least have a distance from one another that is smaller than a dimension of a person such that the at least one object is detected passing from a first sensor detection region to a second sensor detection region and in particular without interruption, by disclosing the ability to continually track the passenger as the passenger moves between visual coverage areas of each camera by sending transmission information between cameras [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 29-31; Hauri, column 9, line 63 to column 10, line 2, column 12, lines 52-60, figures 5a-c, column 13, lines 13-18, column 14, lines 23-38, figure 6d].
9-2. Regarding claim 4, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 1, wherein at least one image evaluation unit is configured in connection with the sensor unit, wherein continuous tracking of movement of the authenticated person over an entire detection duration and/or an entire detection region being carried out at least in a supporting manner by the at least one image evaluation unit and made available to the regulating unit, by disclosing continuously tracking an authorized passenger using sensors such that the passenger may be identified, and retracting the barrier within the gate array when the passenger approaches the gate array so that the passenger may continue to walk through the gate array [Busch-Sorensen, paragraphs 29-31; Hauri, column 10, lines 37-46, column 10, line 50 to column 11, line 50; figures 3b-c].
9-3. Regarding claim 5, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 1, wherein the authenticated person carries with them an electronic communication means and wherein the door system and/or the sensor unit has a detection device as an authentication device, wherein if the authenticated person enters the sensor detection region, the electronic communication means is detected by the detection device in spatial connection with the authenticated person carrying it and wherein the electronic tag is attached to the authenticated person carrying it, by disclosing that a passenger carrying an RFID tag is provided with an indication in the passenger’s account information that the passenger is permitted to access the restricted access area, and RFID transceivers positioned on or near the station entry communicates with the RFID tag to permit access to restricted access area [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 31].
9-4. Regarding claim 6, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 1, whereby if the authenticated person intends to pass through the door system and approaches the at least one leaf element, the regulating unit opens the at least one leaf element at least indirectly via the at least one door drive whereby only the authenticated person passes through the door system, by disclosing continuously tracking an authorized passenger using sensors such that the passenger may be identified, and retracting the barrier within the gate array when the passenger approaches the gate array so that the passenger may continue to walk through the gate array [Busch-Sorensen, paragraphs 29-31; Hauri, column 10, lines 37-46, column 10, line 50 to column 11, line 50; figures 3b-c]. The barrier will retract and restore to prevent unauthorized passengers from accessing the restricted access area [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 36, lines 18-26].
9-5. Regarding claim 8, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 1, wherein the door system has two leaf elements, wherein movements of the two leaf elements are regulated continuously and dynamically on an ongoing basis independently of one another by the regulating unit, at least indirectly via the door drives, by disclosing barrier 104 [Busch-Sorensen, figure 5] that is retracted and restored based on the location of an authorized passenger [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 30, lines 1-22; paragraph 31, lines 1-26], and that comprises a left door leaf and a right door leaf that are independently controlled [Hauri, column 10, lines 37-46, column 10, line 50 to column 11, line 50; figures 3b-c].
9-6. Regarding claim 9, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 1, whereby with the sensor unit and with the associated sensor detection region, protection of closing edges of the at least one leaf element is carried out by an evaluation of sensor data of the sensor unit via the regulating unit, by disclosing that the door leaves are always moved in opening position to the extent that, for example, a safety and/or side spacing SA between the outermost or most lateral point of the contour of the person moving through the door and the respective adjacent main closing edge of the respective door leaf is available as additional space [Hauri, column 11, lines 57-63]. This would increase the safety of passengers who are authorized when passing through the gate. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to provide, for the vision-based fare collection system of Busch-Sorensen, a safety spacing as taught by Hauri. This would increase the safety of passengers who are authorized when passing through the gate.
9-7. Regarding claim 10, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 1, wherein the door system and/or the sensor unit has at least one imaging camera with which a face of the authenticated person, in particular in interaction with the regulating unit, is recognized, wherein the recognition of the authenticated person is also taken into account for determining an access authorization for the door system, by disclosing that passengers may be identified using various sensors that detect one or more unique identifiers associated with the passengers [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 18, lines 7-11] and include a biometric scanner that may gather identifying information about passengers who may enter a transit station such as facial scan [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 41]. The passenger’s account information, which is tied to their identity, is used to determine whether the passenger is permitted to access the restricted access area [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 31, lines 7-13].
9-8. Regarding claim 11, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 1, wherein a plurality of door systems are controlled by a common regulating unit or in that a plurality of door systems have respective regulating units between which data is exchanged, by disclosing that the vision based fare collection system comprises a processor 806 [Busch-Sorensen, figure 41] for controlling a plurality of barriers as shown in [Busch-Sorensen, figures 1-2].
Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach wherein when a person is authenticated by authentication device and/or a detection device at a first door system, the authenticated person can also pass through another door system configured to be accessible in parallel, by disclosing continuously tracking an authorized passenger using sensors such that the passenger may be identified, and retracting the barrier within the gate array when the passenger approaches the gate array so that the passenger may continue to walk through the gate array [Busch-Sorensen, paragraphs 29-31; Hauri, column 10, lines 37-46, column 10, line 50 to column 11, line 50; figures 3b-c].
9-9. Regarding claim 12, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 4, wherein specific attributes of the authenticated person, in particular size or other contour, are recognized by the at least one image evaluation unit, in that continuous tracking of the movement of the authenticated person can take place, based on the attributes, by disclosing that passengers may be identified using various sensors that detect one or more unique identifiers associated with the passengers [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 18, lines 7-11] and include a biometric scanner that may gather identifying information about passengers who may enter a transit station such as height, weight and 3-D/2-D gestures [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 41] and contour [Hauri, column 9, lines 29-34]. When tracking a passenger who has moved between visual coverage areas, a camera sends transition information to another camera that includes the identity of the passenger, the location of the passenger immediately prior to or at the transition point, and one or more biometric identifiers of the passenger [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 29].
9-10. Regarding claim 14, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach the door system with a control unit configured for carrying out a method according to claim 1, by disclosing that the method performed in claim 1 is done by a vision-based fare collection system having a processor [Busch-Sorensen, paragraphs 24, 41; figure 8].
9-11. Regarding claim 15, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 14, wherein the control unit, in connection with the sensor unit, is designed to distinguish an authenticated person from an unauthenticated person by the control unit and/or the sensor unit tracking a person who has been authenticated once within the sensor detection region, by disclosing distinguishing between authorized passengers and unauthorized passengers [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 36].
9-12. Regarding claim 16, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 14, wherein the door system and/or in particular the control unit has a sound output means, light output means and/or voice output means in order to give a signal or provide a message to the authenticated person, by disclosing activating an audible alarm and/or a visual alarm if an unauthorized person passes through the gate [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 36, lines 14-18].
9-13. Regarding claim 17, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 14, wherein the sensor unit has at least one, camera and/or in that the sensor unit has at least one light source with which a light grid can be projected into the sensor detection region and/or wherein the sensor unit has an imaging camera for facial recognition of the authenticated person, in particular in connection with the control unit, by disclosing that passengers may be identified using various sensors that detect one or more unique identifiers associated with the passengers [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 18, lines 7-11] and include a biometric scanner that may gather identifying information about passengers who may enter a transit station such as facial scan [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 41]. The passenger’s account information, which is tied to their identity, is used to determine whether the passenger is permitted to access the restricted access area [Busch-Sorensen, paragraph 31, lines 7-13].
10. Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Busch-Sorensen et al (Pub. No. US 2017/0061715), in view of Hauri (U.S. Patent No. 12,331,578), and further in view of Tiso et al (U.S. Patent No. 12,211,356).
10-1. Regarding claim 13, Busch-Sorensen-Hauri teach all the limitations of claim 1. Busch-Sorensen-Hauri do not expressly teach whereby data of the sensor unit is analyzed by artificial intelligence, in particular an artificial intelligence system, in particular as part of the regulating unit, wherein the artificial Intelligence system has and/or implements a machine learning system, a deep learning system, a neural network, contour recognition and/or pattern recognition, wherein the contour recognition and/or pattern recognition are used for re-authentication and/or for continuous tracking of movement of the authenticated person. Tiso discloses a controlled access gate that uses artificial intelligence to more accurately identify subjects [column 7, lines 49-58; column 9, lines 5-18]. A control unit receives signals from sensors and processes them through machine-learning and/or deep learning techniques to learn the characteristics of the passage and predict the forms and probabilistic directions of each subject [column 8, lines 47-65]. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to analyze data from the sensors of Busch-Sorensen-Hauri using artificial intelligence for identification of passengers and to predict movement of passengers, as taught by Tiso. This would provide more accurate results.
Response to Arguments
11. The Examiner acknowledges the Applicant’s amendments to claims 1, 6, 11, and 14 and the cancellation of claim 7.
Regarding independent claim 1, Applicant alleges that Busch-Sorensen et al (Pub. No. US 2017/0061715) and Tiso et al (U.S. Patent No. 12,211,356) do not teach the claim as amended. Examiner had rejected claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Busch-Sorensen et al (Pub. No. US 2017/0061715) in view of Hauri (U.S. Patent No. 12,331,578). Applicant’s arguments have been considered but are moot in view of the new grounds of rejection.
Applicant states that dependent claims 4-6 and 8-17 recite all the limitations of the independent claim, and thus, are allowable in view of the remarks set forth regarding independent claim 1. However, as discussed above, Busch-Sorensen in view of Hauri are considered to teach claim 1, and consequently, claims 4-6 and 8-17 are rejected.
Conclusion
12. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ALVIN H TAN whose telephone number is (571)272-8595. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 10AM-6PM.
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/ALVIN H TAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2118
