DETAILED ACTION
Status of Case
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
This Office Action is in response to the amendment filed on 10/21/2025.
Claims 1-6 and 21-34 are pending.
Election/Restrictions
Applicant’s response to the restriction requirement is hereby acknowledged. Applicant has elected Invention I, claims 1-6, without traverse. Claims 7-20 are canceled. Applicant has added claims 21-34 to recite similar features as claims 1-6.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) filed on 8/8/2023, 3/4/2024, and 10/21/2025 have been considered by Examiner.
Claim Objections
Claims 6, 27, and 34 are objected to because of the following informalities: the acronym “DCI” should be defined in the claims. Appropriate correction is required.
Claims 29 and 30 are objected to because of the following informalities: there is at typo in these claims wherein the term “satsified” should be changed to “satisfied” Appropriate correction is required.
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 1-2, 21-22, 28-29 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ryu (USPAN 2020/0196265) in view of Takeda (USPAN 2021/0243779) and Venugopal (USPAN 2021/0195616).
Consider claims 1 and 21, Ryu discloses an apparatus (see apparatus 120a in figure 2) comprising: interface circuitry; and processing circuitry coupled with the interface circuitry (see figure 2, wherein disclosed is said interface circuitry 252a-r and processing circuitry 280), and a corresponding method (see paragraphs 47-48 and 57, claims 2 and 5, and figures 4 and 7 (figure 7 is reproduced below for convenience), wherein disclosed is said method), to:
receive, from a base station via the interface circuitry, a first uplink (UL) configured grant (CG) configuration to schedule a first UL transmission (the first SRS resource set) and a second UL CG configuration to schedule a second UL transmission (the second SRS resource set; see paragraphs 47-48 and 57, claim 2, and figures 4 and 7: the SRI received via DCI is received from a base station);
detect a condition (see paragraph 57: the TA command, which is sent by the base station);
determine the first and second UL transmissions are to be transmitted using a, broadly construed, simultaneous uplink transmissions across multiple panels (STxMP) scheme based on the condition (see paragraph 57: different TAs for different uplink transmission with different signal paths, such that the uplink transmissions arrive simultaneously at the BS); and
output, via the interface circuitry, the first and second UL transmissions for simultaneous transmission using at least two antenna panels of the UE based on the STxMP scheme (see paragraph 57 and figures 4 and 7: a first uplink transmission 702 using a first antenna or antenna panel and a second uplink transmission 704 using a second antenna or antenna panel).
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Ryu does not specifically disclose that the second UL transmission overlaps with the first UL transmission in a time domain.
Takeda discloses that a second UL transmission overlaps with a first UL transmission in a time domain (see claim 1: “receiving a first uplink grant that indicates a first uplink channel transmission occasion and a first priority index for a first uplink transmission on the first uplink carrier; receiving a second uplink grant that indicates a second uplink channel transmission occasion that at least partially overlaps in time with the first uplink channel transmission occasion”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Ryu and combine it with the noted teachings of Takeda. The motivation to combine these references is to provide an improved method that supports simultaneous transmission of physical uplink control channel (PUCCH)-physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) with different priorities (see paragraph 4 of Takeda).
Although Ryu can be construed to disclose the simultaneous uplink transmissions across multiple panels (STxMP) scheme (see above), Ryu does not explicitly disclose this.
Venugopal discloses the use of the simultaneous uplink transmissions across multiple panels (STxMP) scheme (see paragraph 26: enabling simultaneous transmission across multiple panels (STxMP)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Ryu and combine it with the noted teachings of Venugopal. The motivation to combine these references is to allow uplink transmissions to be received at a base station simultaneously, as well as to provide a method for signaling uplink transmission configuration indicator status (see paragraph 2 of Venugopal).
Consider claims 2, 22, and 29, Ryu discloses that to detect the condition the processing circuitry is to: determine the first UL CG configuration is associated with a first sounding reference signal (SRS) resource set and the second UL CG configuration is associated with a second SRS resource set (see paragraph 48: the UE is configured with one or more SRS resource sets configuring SRS resources for SRS transmission. Each SRS resource set may be associated with a UE antenna panel for both codebook-based (e.g., beamformed) and non-codebook based (e.g., non-beamformed) PUSCH transmission. In some examples, the SRS resource indicator (SRI) field in downlink control information (DCI) may be used to indicate (by the BS) and select (by the UE) SRS resources from the configured SRS resource sets. For example, the BS and UE may be configured with a table or mapping of the SRI field (e.g., SRI values) to which SRS resource from which SRS resource set is to be used for a multi-panel uplink transmission. In some examples, the SRI in the DCI may indicate multiple SRS resources from one SRS resource set. In some examples, of the multiple SRS resources indicated by the BS, the UE may select one to use for uplink transmission).
Consider 28, Ryu discloses a method (see paragraphs 47-48 and 57, claims 2 and 5, and figures 4 and 7 (figure 7 is reproduced below for convenience), wherein disclosed is said method) comprising:
generating, for transmission to a user equipment (UE), a first uplink (UL) configured grant (CG) configuration to schedule a first UL transmission (the first SRS resource set) and a second UL CG configuration to schedule a second UL transmission (the first SRS resource set), wherein the first UL CG configuration or the second UL CG configuration is to serve as a basis for the UE to detect a condition to transmit the first and second UL transmissions as simultaneous transmissions from at least two antenna panels of the UE based on, broadly construed, a simultaneous uplink transmissions across multiple panels (STxMP) scheme (see paragraph 57: the TA command, which is sent by the base station; different Tas for different uplink transmission with different signal paths, such that the uplink transmissions arrive simultaneously at the BS; see figure 7: a first uplink transmission 702 using a first antenna or antenna panel and a second uplink transmission 704 using a second antenna or antenna panel); and
receiving the first and second UL transmissions from the UE (see paragraph 57 and figures 4 and 7: a first uplink transmission 702 using a first antenna or antenna panel and a second uplink transmission 704 using a second antenna or antenna panel).
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Ryu does not specifically disclose that the second UL transmission overlaps with the first UL transmission in a time domain.
Takeda discloses that a second UL transmission overlaps with a first UL transmission in a time domain (see claim 1: “receiving a first uplink grant that indicates a first uplink channel transmission occasion and a first priority index for a first uplink transmission on the first uplink carrier; receiving a second uplink grant that indicates a second uplink channel transmission occasion that at least partially overlaps in time with the first uplink channel transmission occasion”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Ryu and combine it with the noted teachings of Takeda. The motivation to combine these references is to provide an improved method that supports simultaneous transmission of physical uplink control channel (PUCCH)-physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) with different priorities (see paragraph 4 of Takeda).
Although Ryu can be construed to disclose the simultaneous uplink transmissions across multiple panels (STxMP) scheme (see above), Ryu does not explicitly disclose this.
Venugopal discloses the use of the simultaneous uplink transmissions across multiple panels (STxMP) scheme (see paragraph 26: enabling simultaneous transmission across multiple panels (STxMP)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Ryu and combine it with the noted teachings of Venugopal. The motivation to combine these references is to allow uplink transmissions to be received at a base station simultaneously, as well as to provide a method for signaling uplink transmission configuration indicator status (see paragraph 2 of Venugopal).
Claims 3, 23, and 30 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ryu (USPAN 2020/0196265) in view of Takeda (USPAN 2021/0243779), Venugopal (USPAN 2021/0195616), and Cirik (CA3126029A1).
Consider claims 3, 23, and 30, Ryu does not specifically disclose that to detect the condition the processing circuitry is to: determine the first UL CG configuration and the second UL CG configuration are associated with different pool indexes.
Cirik discloses that to detect the condition the processing circuitry is to: determine the first UL CG configuration and the second UL CG configuration are associated with different pool indexes (see paragraph 258: a first coreset pool index of a first coreset and a second coreset pool index of a second coreset may be different).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify the invention of Ryu and combine it with the noted teachings of Cirik. The motivation to combine these references is to provide different pool indexes for different uplink configurations, as well as provide an efficient power control method that minimize variations according to different propagation paths (see paragraph 2 of Cirik).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4-6, 24-27, and 31-34 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.
Claims 4, 24, 25, 31, and 32 recite using RRC parameters to indicate that the first UL CG configuration and the second UL CG configuration are associated with different pool indexes, which the prior art does not disclose.
Claims 5, 26, and 33 are dependent on the above claims and thus objected to by virtue of their dependency.
Claims 6, 27, and 34 recite detecting in a first CORESET, a first activation DCI to trigger the first UL transmission, the first CORESET associated with a first SRS resource set indicator, and detecting in a second CORESET, a second activation DCI to trigger the second UL transmission, the second CORESET associated with a second SRS resource set indicator, which the prior art does not disclose.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Jamal Javaid whose telephone number is 571-270-5137 and email address is Jamal.Javaid@uspto.gov.
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/JAMAL JAVAID/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2412