DETAILED ACTION
This communication is in response to Application No. 18/326,508 filed on 5/31/2023. The amendment presented on 3/26/2026, which cancels claims 11-20 and adds new claims 21-30, is hereby acknowledged. Claims 1-10 and 21-30 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 .
Election/Restrictions
Claims 11-20 are withdrawn from further consideration pursuant to 37 CFR 1.142(b) as being drawn to nonelected species, there being no allowable generic or linking claim. Election was made without traverse in the reply filed on 3/26/2026.
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 1-7, 21-27, and 30 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Dao et al. (hereinafter Dao)(US 2020/0112907).
Regarding claims 1, 21, and 30, Dao teaches as follows:
An electronic device (interpreted as the electronic device 900 in figure 9)(a network element hosting any of the network functions described herein may be configured as the electronic device 900, see, ¶ [0351]) corresponding to an application function (AF) network element, comprising: at least one memory (920 in figure 9) and at least one processor (910 in figure 9) coupled to the memory (the device includes a processor 910, memory 920, non-transitory mass storage 930, I/O interface 940, network interface 950, and a transceiver 960, all of which are communicatively coupled via bi-directional bus, see, ¶ [0352] and figure 9), the at least one processor being configured to perform:
sending a wireless network information exposure request to a network exposure function (NEF) network element (at operation 530, the AF 302 may send a Network QoS Information request to the CN functions such as PCF 205 or NEF 301, see, ¶ [0196] and figure 5), the wireless network information exposure request carrying an AF identity (ID) of the AF network element and type information of target wireless network information (the Network QoS Information request may include one or more of the following information: UE information; Network information (e.g. S-NSSAI, DNN, AF-Service-Identifier)(equivalent to applicant’s type information); AF Transaction ID (equivalent to applicant’s AF identity), and UE Travel Information, see, ¶ [0196]), wherein the type information and an AF address corresponding to the AF ID are transmitted by the NEF network element to a base station, and the base station acquires the target wireless network information according to the type information, and sends the target wireless network information and the AF address to an anchor user plane function (UPF) network element (the SMF 104, at operation 560a, may send a Network QoS Information request message to the NWDAF 105. The request message may include one or more of PDU Session information, Application QoS Level(s), PQCNC, and UE Travel Information… Upon receiving the Network QoS Information request, the NWDAF 105, at operation 560b, may send the Network QoS Information response message to the SMF 104 according to the PQCNC, see, ¶ [0201]-[0202] and figure 5); and
acquiring the target wireless network information returned by the anchor UPF network element according to the AF address (upon receiving the Network QoS Information response from the NWDAF 105, the SMF 104, at operation 570, may send the Network QoS Information response towards the AF 302 indirectly via the PCF 205 and then NEF 301. If the SMF 104 sends the Network QoS Information to the AF 302 via the NEF 301, the SMF 104 may include the AF Transaction ID (equivalent to applicant’s AF address), UE ID (such as SUPI, SUCI, GPSI) and Network QoS Information. The NEF 301 may convert some network parameters into parameters that the AF 302 can readily process. For example, the NEF 301 may convert the UE ID (SUPI) into GPSI or External UE ID, see, ¶ [0206] and figure 5)(the AF may send the network QoS information request to the PCF either directly or via NEF. The PCF may obtain network QoS information using NWDAF services and send the network QoS information to the AF, see, ¶ [0250]).
Dao further teaches the communication between NWDAF, UPF, RAN node, and AF as follows:
The CN 810 comprises a User Plane Function (UPF) 805 and CP functions. The CP functions shown in this illustrative embodiment include an Authentication Server Function (AUSF) 802, a Unified Data Management (UDM) Function 203, an Access and Mobility management Function (AMF) 103, a Session Management Function (SMF) 104, a Policy Control Function (PCF) 205, and a Network Data Analytics (NWDA) function 803. It is noted that the term NWDA function is also referred to as a NWDAF (see, ¶ [0305] and figure 8);
the UPF 805 is representative of any of a number of different user plane functions. Different UPFs can be used to provide functions such as mapping IP packets to QoS flows, forwarding packets, traffic measurement and preparing and sending reports… The RAN node 102 (equivalent to applicant’s base station) can use the N3 interface to forward packets to (and receive packets from) the UPF 805, and also use the N2 interface to connect to the AMF 103 (see, ¶ [0306] and figure 8); and
The NWDAF 803 may collect the Network QoS information reports from one or more of the UE 101, AF 302 and/or RAN report, and/or CP functions, and NMF 801. The NWDAF 803 may collect the reports in order to analyze the network performance using some methods such as deep learning, neural network. The NWDAF 803 may integrate the Network QoS Experience reported by the UE 101, RAN PDU Session Context (with RAN radio transmission parameters), and PDU Session context (from SMF 104, AMF 103). Through the integration, the NWDAF 803 may obtain more detailed and/or more accurate collection of statistical QoS values at specific geographical location, RAN node ID, Cell ID, time of the day, and/or day of the week (see, ¶ [0325] and figure 8).
Dao does not explicitly teach the base station providing requested network information but teaches NWDAF collecting Network QoS information reports from the RAN report from RAN node which is equivalent to base station.
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 Dao to include utilizing the UPF in order to efficiently forward the Network QoS information reports from the RAN report to the AF initiated the network QoS information request.
Regarding claims 2 and 22, Dao teaches as follows:
The wireless network information exposure request further comprises at least one of a target network slice or a target data network name (DNN), and the target wireless network information belongs to a target quality of service (QoS) flow of target user equipment (UE) that creates a target session according to at least one of the target network slice or the target DNN (the Network QoS Information request may include one or more of the following information: UE information (e.g. External UE ID, UE Address (IP address or Ethernet address), PDU Session ID if available); Network slice information (e.g. S-NSSAI, DNN, AF-Service-Identifier); AF Transaction ID, and UE Travel Information. The Network QoS Information request may optionally include one or more of Application QoS Level(s) and PQCNC, see, ¶ [0196] and [0249]).
Regarding claims 3 and 23, Dao teaches as follows:
Wherein the type information comprises average data bit rate information (the network QoS information that may be useful for the V2X applications may be one or more of the followings: [0159] important QoS parameters such as GBR QoS Flow (e.g. GFBR, MFBR, PDB), Delay critical QoS flows (e.g. GFBR, MFBR, MDBV, PDB), Non-GBR (e.g. Average Bit Rate (ABR), session aggregate maximum bit rate (Session-AMBR)), see, ¶ [0158]).
Regarding claims 4-5 and 24-25, Dao teaches as follows:
Measurement configuration data may be sent from the NWDAF 803 to the UPF 805 over the Nd2 reference point. Such measurement configuration data may include a measurement periodicity (e.g. how often a report is sent to the NWDAF 803), a report schedule (equivalent to applicant’s periodic reporting), events to be monitored (equivalent to applicant’s event triggering), an indication of types of reports requested, types of PDU sessions to be monitored, a number of PDU sessions between a UPF 805 and (R)AN node 102 for each type of PDU sessions, and the characteristics of PDU sessions (e.g. length, bit rate variations (min and max), etc.). The UPF 805 may, as instructed, send measurement reports to the NWDAF 803 over the Nd2 interface (see, ¶ [0317]).
Dao does not explicitly include the report mode in the Network QoS Information request.
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 Dao to include specifying the report mode in the Network QoS Information request in order to efficiently predefine QoS information update period.
Regarding claims 6-7 and 26-27, Dao teaches as follows:
The Network QoS Information request may include one or more of the following information: UE information (e.g. External UE ID, UE Address (IP address or Ethernet address), PDU Session ID if available)(equivalent to applicant’s target UE ID); Network information (e.g. S-NSSAI, DNN, AF-Service-Identifier); AF Transaction ID, and UE Travel Information. The Network QoS Information request may optionally include one or more of Application QoS Level(s) and PQCNC (see, ¶ [0196]); and
upon receiving the Network QoS Information response (or notification) from the NWDAF 105, the SMF 104, at operation 570, may send the Network QoS Information response towards the AF 302 indirectly via the NEF 301. If the SMF 104 sends the Network QoS Information to the AF 302 via the NEF 301, the SMF 104 may include the AF Transaction ID, UE ID (such as SUPI, SUCI, GPSI)(equivalent to applicant’s target UE ID) and Network QoS Information. The NEF 301 may convert some network parameters into parameters that the AF 302 can readily process. For example, the NEF 301 may convert the UE ID (SUPI) into GPSI or External UE ID (see, ¶ [0206]).
Claims 8-9 and 28-29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Dao et al. (hereinafter Dao)(US 2020/0112907) in view of Huang et al. (hereinafter Huang)(US 2021/0250850).
Regarding claims 8-9 and 28-29, Dao teaches all limitations as presented above except for creating a radio access network (RAN) exposure information (REI) container by an intermediate UPF network element.
Examiner interpreted the claimed REI container as a packet carrying claimed information.
Huang teaches as follows:
A plurality of communication tunnels are established between the UPF network element and the access network device, and each communication tunnel corresponds to one terminal. In this way, during downlink transmission, the UPF network element may remove a destination address field from a packet header of a first data packet, to generate a second data packet. The UPF network element determines, based on the destination address field in the packet header of the first data packet, a terminal that receives the data packet, and sends the second data packet to the access network device by using the communication tunnel corresponding to the terminal (see. ¶ [0168]).
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 Dao with Huang to include generating a data packet by the UPF network element as taught by Huang in order to efficiently forward data packet information from the received data packet.
Regarding claim 10, Huang further teaches the well-known encapsulation as follows:
In an industrial control system, the size of the data packet of the service is usually fixed, is usually 20 bytes to 30 bytes, and is less than a minimum length of the payload of the Ethernet data frame. In this way, the data packet of the service can be encapsulated into the payload of the Ethernet data frame by using the padding. Therefore, the transmitting end sends the payload of the entire Ethernet data frame to the receiving end (see, ¶ [0236]).
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 Dao with Huang to include the well-known encapsulation as taught by Huang in order to efficiently exchange data in different formats (protocols).
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
April 29, 2026
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