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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
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.
Claim(s) 1-8, 11-18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over 3GPP, TSG CT: Non-Access Stratum (NAS) protocol for 5g, 06 January 2023, provided by applicant in view of Won (WO 2022/238226).
Regarding claim 1, 3gpp discloses a method performed by user equipment in a wireless system, the method comprising: identifying an access attempt occurred due to a reason (page 438, determining a control plane service type from the service request message, as well as page 79, an access attempt is used to establish a new PDU session or an existing PDU session is triggered by the service request procedure). 3gpp does not disclose determining, based on the reason for the access attempt, whether to provide at least one single network slice selection assistance information (S-NSSAI) related to the access attempt from a non-access stratus (NAS) layer to a lower layer.
However, Won teaches in an analogous art, that based on an access attempt, providing at least one single network slice selection assistance information (S-NSSAI) related to the access attempt from a non-access stratus (NAS) layer to a lower layer (para 50, 58-61, especially page 15;10-16;5) Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include NSSAI information to a lower layer to denote the type of service as stated by the S-NSSAI information.
Regarding claim 11, 3gpp discloses a user equipment in a wireless communication system, the UE comprising a transceiver and one or more processor coupled to the transceiver (page 27, disclosure of UE) and configured to identify an access attempt occurred due to a reason (page 438, determining a control plane service type from the service request message, as well as page 79, an access attempt is used to establish a new PDU session or an existing PDU session is triggered by the service request procedure). 3gpp does not disclose determine, based on the reason for the access attempt, whether to provide at least one single network slice selection assistance information (S-NSSAI) related to the access attempt from a non-access stratus (NAS) layer to a lower layer.
However, Won teaches in an analogous art, a User equipment (120, Figure 3) that includes a transceiver (transmitter/receiver) and a processor (320) that based on an access attempt, providing at least one single network slice selection assistance information (S-NSSAI) related to the access attempt from a non-access stratus (NAS) layer to a lower layer (para 50, 58-61, especially page 15;10-16;5) Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include NSSAI information to a lower layer to denote the type of service as stated by the S-NSSAI information.
Regarding claims 2-3, 12-13, 3gpp further discloses further comprising in case the reason for the access attempt is cellular internet of things (CIoT) user data, providing the at least one S-NSSAI to the lower layer from the NAS layer and the CIoT user data is included in a control plane service request message or an uplink NAS transport message (see page 493: "the MME does not provide the UE with the mapped PDU session for a PDN connection but provides the UE with an S-NSSAI if the PDN connection is not for emergency bearer services", see page 431: "If the UE is using 5GS services with control plane CloT 5GS optimization, this procedure can be used for UE initiated transfer of user
data via the control plane from 5GMM-IDLE mode", and see page 435: "If the UE is sending the SERVICE REQUEST message from 5GMM-IDLE mode and the UE needs to send non-cleartext IEs, the UE shall send the SERVICE REQUEST message including the NAS message container IE").
Regarding claims 4 and 14, 3gpp further discloses wherein the at least one S-NSSAI is associated with a PDU session (see page 435: "If the UE has established the PDU session(s) over the non-3GPP access for which the associated S-NSSAI(s) are included in the allowed NSSAI for 3GPP access, the UE shall indicate the PDU session(s) for which the UE allows the user-plane resources to be re-established over 3GPP access in the Allowed PDU session status IE”).
Regarding claim 5 and 15, 3gpp further discloses wherein the access attempt is performed by the UE in a 5g mobility management (5gmm) idle mode or a 5gmm connected mode with a radio resource control (RRC) inactive information (see page 103,”one or more S-NSSAIs related to an access attempt for the purpose for network slice random access, when the access attempt is made by the UE in 5gmm-idle mode or 5gmm-connected mode with rrc inactive indication”).
Regarding claim 6 and 16, 3gpp further discloses wherein case the reason for the access attempt is associated with a deregistration procedure, no S-NSSAI is provided (see page 99: "For a REGISTRATION REQUEST message which is triggered by emergency services, 3 DEREGISTRATION REQUEST message, and a SERVICE REQUEST message which is triggered by emergency services (e.g. a SERVICE REQUEST message includes the service type IE set to "emergency services" or "emergency services fallback", a SERVICE REQUEST message triggered for emergency services includes the service type IE set to “high priority access" as specified in subclause 5.6.1.2.1), no NSSAI is provided to the lower layers").
Regarding claim 7 and 17, 3gpp further discloses wherein, in case the reason for the access attempt is associated with a UE-initiated NAS transport procedure for sending at least one of a SMS , LTE positioning protocol (LPP), steering of roaming (SoR), UE policy container, UE parameters update transparent container, or locations service message, no S-NSSAI is provided (see page 368 “The UE shall not initiate the NAS transport procedure except for sending CIoT user data container, SMS, an LPP message, a location services message, an SOR transparent container, a UE policy container or a UE parameters update transparent container, until the UE receives an allowed NSSAI”).
Regarding claim 8 and 18, 3gpp further disclose further comprising that if the access attempt is associated with at least one of: a service level AA container, a PDU session modification procedure, or a user plane (UP) resource, providing the N-SSAI from the NAS to the lower layer (see page 524: "the service-level-AA procedure of the UE completes successfully, the service-level-AA response is transported from the network to the UE as a part of the network-requested PDU session modification procedure in the PDU SESSION MODIFICATION COMMAND message" and see page 531: "Upon receipt of the PDU SESSION MODIFICATION COMMAND message, if the UE provided an S-NSSAI and a DNN during the PDU session establishment, the UE shall stop timer T3584, if it is running for the [S-NSSAI of the PDU session, DNN] combination provided by the UB").
Claim(s) 9-10, 19-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over 3gpp and Won as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Jano (WO2023/151781).
Regarding claims 8-9, the combination of 3gpp and Won disclose all the particulars of the claims except the use of a network slice access group (NSAG), wherein the NSAG information includes at least one S-NSSAI related to the access attempt. Or the NSAG information triggering an initial NAS message. However, Jano teaches in an analogous art, the use of network slice access groups (para 35 and 44) where the NSAG can include S-NSSAI information and is also related to NAS messaging (para 134-148). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to include a network slice access group to handle multiple priorities of access for a user in the 5g network.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Watfa (12556938) discloses 5g PDU transport layer communications.
Lee (2020/0236528) discloses the use of NSSAI signaling in packet data networks.
Fujishiro (2024/0298228) disclose the use of slice groups with priority data.
Tiwari (11985584) discloses NSSI and PDU session related signaling
Lee (12219468) discloses management of NSSAI information with respect to UE ina 5g network.
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WILLIAM GEORGE TROST IV
Primary Patent Examiner
Art Unit 2641
/WILLIAM G TROST IV/Primary Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2641