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 .
Response to Amendment
Amendments filed on 04/22/2026 are entered. The amendments changes the scopes of the previously presented claims overcome the previously presented rejections. Previously presented 35 U.S.C. 103/112 rejections are withdrawn. New grounds of rejections are applied to the currently amended claims. The current Office Action is made FINAL as necessitated by the claim amendments.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1-9, 15-18, 20-25 and 28-30 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.
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 24 is 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 24 recites the limitation "the second network entity" in line 5. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
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.
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) 1-2, 4-9, 15-16, 20-21, 23-25 and 28-30 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu (US 2023/0353305) in view of Ryu (US 2022/0174635).
Liu discloses the following features.
Regarding claim 1, a repeater (see relay device in Fig. 1) for wireless communication, comprising:
a memory (see Memory 1704 in Fig. 17); and
at least one processor (see Processor 1701 in Fig. 17) coupled to the memory, wherein the at least one processor is configured to cause the repeater to:
perform a forwarding timing advance procedure (see “uplink forwarding timing advance” recited in paragraph [0151]), wherein to perform the forwarding timing advance procedure, the at least one processor is configured to cause the repeater to:
determine a first time for receiving (see downlink receiving time at the relay device shown in Fig. 8), by the repeater, a transmission from a repeater (see “host device” shown in Fig. 1, Fig. 6, Fig. 8 and paragraph [0150]) based on forwarding timing advance information (see Fig. 8 and paragraph [0150], wherein the host device uses a timing advance to adjust the timing of the relay device that results in the uplink sending timing and downlink receiving timing shown in Fig. 8), wherein the forwarding timing advance information is based on an internal delay of the repeater, and wherein a target of the transmission is a first network entity (see terminal in Fig. 1 and “terminal” recited in paragraph [0168] that receives signal from the relay device during the downlink signal receive window), wherein the internal delay is a delay of the repeater that accounts for a propagation delay (see “the relay device receives the downlink signal after a period of time. Tp represents a propagation delay from the host device to the relay device” recited in paragraph [0149]);
receive, at the first time, the transmission from the repeater at the first time (see downlink receiving time of the relay device in Fig. 8); and
forward, at a second time, the transmission to the first network entity (see “the relay device obtains a symbol on which uplink amplification is performed and a symbol on which downlink amplification is performed, and may determine the uplink forwarding time window and the downlink forwarding time window by using the uplink forwarding timing advance” recited in paragraph [0168]).
Regarding claim 2, wherein the forwarding timing advance procedure is based on a timing advance value associated with a DL or an UL transmission from the repeater to the second network entity (see Fig. 1-4, wherein the relay device transmits downlink signal to a terminal/low-level node; and see “may determine the uplink forwarding time window and the downlink forwarding time window by using the uplink forwarding timing advance” recited in paragraph [0168], wherein the timing advance being used to determine the downlink transmission window towards the terminal).
Regarding claim 4, wherein the at least one processor is configured to: receive a forwarding configuration from the first network entity or the second network entity via L1, L2, or L3 signaling, wherein to forward the transmission, the at least one processor is configured to forward the transmission based on the forwarding configuration (see Fig. 6, wherein the relay device receives the first information from the host device and performs relay forwarding accordingly, and see “the host device may send the first information by using semi-static signaling such as RRC signaling and MAC layer signaling, or may send the first information by using dynamic signaling such as DCI” recited in paragraph [0118], wherein RRC is signaling being a L3 signaling, and MAC layer signaling being a L2 signaling).
Regarding claim 5, wherein the forwarding configuration comprises an indication of an UL forwarding window or a DL forwarding window associated with the forwarding timing advance procedure, and wherein the UL forwarding window or the DL forwarding window represents a time window configured for receiving the transmission and forwarding the transmission (see “After the relay device obtains a TDD configuration of uplink-downlink transmission, the relay device performs uplink amplification and forwarding in an uplink slot (or symbol), and performs downlink amplification and forwarding in a downlink slot (or symbol)” recited in paragraph [0121]).
Regarding claim 6, wherein the indication comprises a first value or a first range associated with a start time of the UL forwarding window or the DL forwarding window and a second value or a second range associated with an end time of the UL forwarding window or the DL forwarding window, the start time being earlier than the second time (see “a start position of a time domain resource used for uplink transmission in a first periodicity, an end position of a time domain resource used for uplink transmission in the first periodicity, a start position of a time domain resource used for downlink transmission in the first periodicity, and an end position of a time domain resource used for downlink transmission in the first periodicity” recited in paragraph [0133]).
Regarding claim 7, wherein the forwarding advance timing procedure is based on a timing advance value associated with a DL transmission or an UL transmission from the repeater to the second network entity (see “the relay device obtains a symbol on which uplink amplification is performed and a symbol on which downlink amplification is performed, and may determine the uplink forwarding time window and the downlink forwarding time window by using the uplink forwarding timing advance” recited in paragraph [0168]), and wherein the start time is earlier than a start time of the DL transmission or the UL transmission based on the timing advance value by a third value (see “the relay device starts to perform uplink forwarding at a moment t1−T,” recited in paragraph [0161], wherein the start of the transmission is T earlier than the indicated start time t1) and the end time is later than an end of the DL transmission or the UL transmission by a fourth value (see “an uplink receive time window of the relay device is t1−T to t1−T+5Td” recited in paragraph [0161], wherein the indicated end time (t1+5Td) is T later than the actual end of the receive window (t1−T+5Td)).
Regarding claim 8, wherein the third value or the fourth value is associated with a channel type of the transmission, a beam associated with receiving or forwarding the transmission, or a set of time or frequency resources associated with the transmission (see “an uplink receive time window of the relay device is t1−T to t1−T+5Td” recited in paragraph [0161], wherein the T, representing the third and fourth value being associated with the 5 symbols (5Td), which represents a set of time/frequency resources with the transmission).
Regarding claim 9, wherein the channel type is one of: a PUSCH; a PUCCH; a PDSCH; a PDCCH; a PRACH; a SRS; a SSB; a CSI-RS; or a PRS (see “SSB…PDCCH…SRS…PDSCH…” recited in paragraph [0190] included in a specific signal, which is transmitted using the amplify-and-forward function as shown in paragraph [0188], which is associated with the use of the timing advance as shown in paragraph [0024] and [0168]).
Regarding claim 15, transmit an indication representing one or more values, one or more accuracies, or one or more uncertainty ranges associated with the internal delay or the first network entity or second network entity (see “the host device may send second information to the relay device. The second information indicates at least one of the following information: a start position of uplink transmission in the first periodicity, an end position of uplink transmission in the first periodicity, a start position of downlink transmission in the first periodicity, and an end position of downlink transmission in the first periodicity” recited in paragraph [0135], wherein the start and end position being the claimed “values” or “uncertainty ranges”, the range is an uncertainty range as paragraph [0134] discloses that a device may or may not use the time domain resource to perform transmission; the second information is “associated with” the internal delay as Qin as applied to the rejection of claim 1 shows that the forwarding node accounts for a digital processing latency such that any transmission including the forwarding/relay node would be associated with an internal delay such as the digital processing latency taught in Qin; the second information is also associated with the second or second network entity as paragraph [0135] shows the second information being transmitted by the host device and being used for the UL/DL transmission that must involve the claimed second/second network entity) via L1, L2, or L3 signaling (see “RRC signaling and MAC layer signaling…DCI” recited in paragraph [0118]).
Regarding claim 16, wherein the indication representing the one or more uncertainty ranges is an index (see “symbol index” recited in paragraph [0136]).
Regarding claim 20, wherein the repeater corresponds to a repeater or at least one component of the repeater, wherein the first network entity corresponds to a UE or at least one component of the UE, wherein the second network entity corresponds to a base station or one or more components of the base station (see base station host device, relay device and terminal UE in Fig. 1), and wherein the forwarding timing advance procedure is an UL forwarding timing advance procedure (see “uplink forwarding” recited in paragraph [0004] and “uplink forwarding timing advance” recited in paragraph [0151]).
Regarding claim 21, wherein the repeater corresponds to a repeater or at least one component of the repeater, wherein the first network entity corresponds to a UE or at least one component of the UE, wherein the second network entity corresponds to a base station or one or more components of the base station (see base station host device, relay device and terminal UE in Fig. 1), and wherein the forwarding timing advance procedure is a DL forwarding timing advance procedure (see “downlink amplification and forwarding” recited in paragraph [0009] and see “the uplink forwarding advance indicates an advance of a frame timing for performing uplink forwarding by the relay device relative to a frame timing for performing downlink forwarding by the relay device” recited in paragraph [0151]).
Regarding claim 23, a first network entity for wireless communication (see “host device” shown in Fig. 1, Fig. 6, Fig. 8, Fig. 18 and paragraph [0150]), comprising:
a memory (see memory 1803 in Fig. 18); and
at least one processor (see Processor 18041 in Fig. 18) coupled to the memory, wherein the at least one processor is configured to:
provide, to a repeater (see relay device in Fig. 1), a forwarding configuration (see step S602 in Fig. 6, wherein the first information is sent to the relay device), wherein the forwarding configuration is configured to enable the repeater to determine, based on an internal delay of the repeater, a first time for receiving a transmission from the first network entity or a third network entity and determine a second time for forwarding the transmission to the first network entity or the third network entity (see Fig. 8 and paragraph [0150], wherein the host device uses a timing advance to adjust the timing of the relay device that results in the uplink sending timing and downlink receiving timing shown in Fig. 8; and step S603 in Fig. 6 wherein the relay device performs relay forwarding based on the first information), wherein the internal delay is a delay of the repeater that accounts for a propagation delay (see “the relay device receives the downlink signal after a period of time. Tp represents a propagation delay from the host device to the relay device” recited in paragraph [0149]); and
perform one of:
a provision of the transmission to the repeater; or
a reception of the transmission from the repeater (see bi-directional communication between the host device and the relay device in Fig. 1).
Regarding claim 24, wherein the forwarding configuration comprises an indication of an UL forwarding window or a DL forwarding window, and wherein the UL forwarding window or the DL forwarding window represents a time window configured for receiving the transmission and forwarding the transmission at the repeater and forwarding the transmission from the second network entity (see “After the relay device obtains a TDD configuration of uplink-downlink transmission, the relay device performs uplink amplification and forwarding in an uplink slot (or symbol), and performs downlink amplification and forwarding in a downlink slot (or symbol)” recited in paragraph [0121]).
Regarding claim 25, wherein the indication comprises a first value or a first range associated with a start time of the UL forwarding window or the DL forwarding window and a second value or a second range associated with an end time of the UL forwarding window or the DL forwarding window, the start time being earlier than the second time (see “a start position of a time domain resource used for uplink transmission in a first periodicity, an end position of a time domain resource used for uplink transmission in the first periodicity, a start position of a time domain resource used for downlink transmission in the first periodicity, and an end position of a time domain resource used for downlink transmission in the first periodicity” recited in paragraph [0133]).
Regarding claim 28, receive an indication representing one or more values, one or more accuracies, or one or more uncertainty ranges associated with the internal delay of the repeater (see “the host device may send second information to the relay device. The second information indicates at least one of the following information: a start position of uplink transmission in the first periodicity, an end position of uplink transmission in the first periodicity, a start position of downlink transmission in the first periodicity, and an end position of downlink transmission in the first periodicity” recited in paragraph [0135], wherein the start and end position being the claimed “values” or “uncertainty ranges”, the range is an uncertainty range as paragraph [0134] discloses that a device may or may not use the time domain resource to perform transmission; the second information is “associated with” the internal delay as Qin as applied to the rejection of claim 1 shows that the forwarding node accounts for a digital processing latency such that any transmission including the forwarding/relay node would be associated with an internal delay such as the digital processing latency taught in Qin; the second information is also associated with the second or second network entity as paragraph [0135] shows the second information being transmitted by the host device and being used for the UL/DL transmission that must involve the claimed second/second network entity) via L1, L2, or L3 signaling (see “RRC signaling and MAC layer signaling…DCI” recited in paragraph [0118]).
Regarding claim 29, a method of wireless communication performed by a repeater (see relay device in Fig. 1), the method comprising: performing a forwarding timing advance procedure (see “uplink forwarding timing advance” recited in paragraph [0151]) comprising: determining a first time for receiving, by the repeater, a transmission from a first network entity (see “host device” shown in Fig. 1, Fig. 6, Fig. 8 and paragraph [0150]) based on forwarding timing advance information (see Fig. 8 and paragraph [0150], wherein the host device uses a timing advance to adjust the timing of the relay device that results in the uplink sending timing and downlink receiving timing shown in Fig. 8), wherein the forwarding timing advance information is based on an internal delay of the repeater, and wherein a target of the transmission is a second network entity (see terminal in Fig. 1 and “terminal” recited in paragraph [0168] that receives signal from the relay device during the downlink signal receive window), wherein the internal delay is a delay of the repeater that accounts for a propagation delay (see “the relay device receives the downlink signal after a period of time. Tp represents a propagation delay from the host device to the relay device” recited in paragraph [0149]); receiving the transmission from the first network entity at the first time (see downlink receiving time of the relay device in Fig. 8); and forwarding the transmission to the second network entity at a second time (see “the relay device obtains a symbol on which uplink amplification is performed and a symbol on which downlink amplification is performed, and may determine the uplink forwarding time window and the downlink forwarding time window by using the uplink forwarding timing advance” recited in paragraph [0168]).
Regarding claim 30, a method of wireless communication performed by a first network entity (see “host device” shown in Fig. 1, Fig. 6, Fig. 8, Fig. 18 and paragraph [0150]), comprising: providing, to a repeater (see relay device in Fig. 1), a forwarding configuration (see step S602 in Fig. 6, wherein the first information is sent to the relay device), wherein the forwarding configuration is configured to enable the repeater to determine a first time for receiving a transmission from the first network entity or a third network entity and determine a second time for forwarding the transmission to the first network entity or the third network entity (see Fig. 8 and paragraph [0150], wherein the host device uses a timing advance to adjust the timing of the relay device that results in the uplink sending timing and downlink receiving timing shown in Fig. 8; and step S603 in Fig. 6 wherein the relay device performs relay forwarding based on the first information), wherein the internal delay is a delay of the repeater that accounts for a propagation delay (see “the relay device receives the downlink signal after a period of time. Tp represents a propagation delay from the host device to the relay device” recited in paragraph [0149]); and performing one of: a provision of the transmission to the repeater; or a reception of the transmission from the repeater (see bi-directional communication between the host device and the relay device in Fig. 1).
Liu does not disclose the following features: regarding claims 1, 23 and 29-30, wherein the internal delay also includes a processing delay associated with forwarding the transmission from the repeater.
Ryu discloses the following features.
Regarding claims 1, 23 and 29-30, wherein the internal delay also includes a processing delay associated with forwarding the transmission from the repeater (see “if the satellite only amplifies and forwards the received signal without any local processing, the TA value is determined by the overall propagation delay including both feeder link and user link. However, if local processing is involved at the satellite relay, two TA values should be configured. One is for the user link and another for feeder link, to take account of this local processing” recited in paragraph [0062], which shows that local processing involved at a relay may be applied to the timing advance in addition to the propagation delay).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of the current application to modify the system of Liu using features, as taught by Ryu, in order to account for local processing delays (see paragraph [0062] of Ryu).
Claim(s) 3 and 17-18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu and Ryu as applied to claims 2 and 15 above, and further in view of Chen (US 2025/0233647).
Liu and Ryu disclose the features as shown above.
Liu does not disclose the following features: regarding claim 3, wherein the forwarding timing advance information is equal to the timing advance value plus the internal delay; regarding claim 17, wherein the indication further indicates the internal delay is based on whether the transmission is an UL transmission or a DL transmission, and wherein a first value of the one or more values of the internal delay is associated with the transmission being the UL transmission and a second value of the one or more values of the internal delay is associated with the transmission being the DL transmission; regarding claim 18, wherein the indication further indicates that the one or more values of the internal delay are based on a direction or a set of antennas associated with the transmission.
Chen discloses the following features.
Regarding claim 3, wherein the forwarding timing advance information is equal to the timing advance value plus the internal delay (see paragraph [0013] and [0018], which shows that the difference between the gNB and the repeater includes TTA , which represents the timing advance, and T1, which represents the delay that includes the processing delay as shown in paragraph [0181]).
Regarding claim 17, wherein the indication further indicates the internal delay is based on whether the transmission is an UL transmission or a DL transmission, and wherein a first value of the one or more values of the internal delay is associated with the transmission being the UL transmission and a second value of the one or more values of the internal delay is associated with the transmission being the DL transmission (see “As shown in FIG. 8A, there is a delay T1 between downlink reception and downlink forwarding of the repeater; there is also a delay T2 between uplink reception and uplink forwarding. Here, take T1 being equal to T2 as an example, which are collectively referred as T1. This delay can be a processing delay, that is, a hardware processing time. The value of T1. can be predefined or reported to the base station by the UE capability report. In addition, the delay may also be indicated by the base station (for example, indicated by RRC, MAC CE or DCI)” recited in paragraph [0181]).
Regarding claim 18, wherein the indication further indicates that the one or more values of the internal delay are based on a direction or a set of antennas associated with the transmission (see “As shown in FIG. 8A, there is a delay T1 between downlink reception and downlink forwarding of the repeater; there is also a delay T2 between uplink reception and uplink forwarding. Here, take T1 being equal to T2 as an example, which are collectively referred as T1. This delay can be a processing delay, that is, a hardware processing time. The value of T1. can be predefined or reported to the base station by the UE capability report. In addition, the delay may also be indicated by the base station (for example, indicated by RRC, MAC CE or DCI)” recited in paragraph [0181]; wherein reporting to the base station or receiving indication from the base station require different direction of the antennas associated with the transmission).
Regarding claim 22, wherein the internal delay is a delay of the repeater accounting for a propagation delay and a processing delay associated with forwarding the transmission (see paragraph [0013] and [0018], which shows that the difference between the gNB and the repeater includes TTA , which is based on the timing advance that is based on the propagation delay as shown in Liu, and T1, which represents the delay that includes the processing delay as shown in paragraph [0181]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of Liu and Ryu using features, as taught by Chen, in order to account for the delay between the receiving and forwarding of the repeater (see paragraph [0180] of Chen).
Claim(s) 10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liu and Ryu as applied to claim 7 above, and further in view of Qin (US 2020/0163097).
Liu and Ryu disclose the features as shown above.
Liu does not disclose the following features: regarding claim 10, transmit a request for the third value or the fourth value to the second network entity or the third network entity via the L1, L2, or L3 signaling.
Qin discloses the following features.
Regarding claim 10, transmit a request for the third value or the fourth value to the second network entity or the third network entity (see Fig. 11, paragraph [0088], [0277], wherein a relay device sends a timing advance request to a network device, wherein the timing advance represents the claimed third/fourth value as shown in the rejection of claim 7 above) via the L1, L2 (see “the first relay device may send a system message or a message (Message, Msg) 3 to the network device, and add the TA request to the system message or the Msg3” recited in paragraph [0284]), or L3 signaling (see paragraph [0258], which shows the use of RRC layer and MAC layer for communication).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the effective filing date of Liu and Ryu using features, as taught by Qin, in order to improve signal transmission efficiency (see paragraph [0280] of Qin).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 11-14, 19, 26-27 and 31 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.
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 JUTAI KAO whose telephone number is (571)272-9719. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8:00-17:00 EST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Kwang Yao can be reached at (571)272-3182. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/JUTAI KAO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2473
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