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 .
This action is in response to the amendments filed on 08/06/2026, in which claims 1-2, 4-9, 11, 14, 16, and 18-21 are pending and addressed below.
Response to Amendment
Applicant has amended the claims to overcome the 35 U.S.C. 101 rejections. Accordingly, the 35 U.S.C. 101 rejections have been withdrawn.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 08/06/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
With respect to the 35 U.S.C. 103 rejections:
Applicant argues on pages 13-14 of the remarks that the obstacles determined by Oyama are not the traffic risks determined by the server based on the acquired information and “the entity of performing the determination differs.” Applicant argues on page 14 of the remarks that Oyama “performs vehicle-local driving control” instead of “the claimed server performs centralized, area-wide traffic-risk assessment.” Applicant also argues on page 14 of the remarks that Oyama fails to disclose “determining whether the traffic risk exists” performed by the “mobile object.”” Applicant further argues on page 15 of the remarks that Oyama “does not teach dispatching a vehicle to an area where danger exists” and “is silent about such a replacement of the communication mode.” Applicant argues on pages 15-16 of the remarks that Ko “does not disclose the “relaying” of communications or the replacement of the communication mode.” Additionally, applicant argues on page 16 of the remarks that “there is no need to move a vehicle to a high-risk area to perform relaying” or “motivation for deploying an additional relay node” in Ko because “communication is already established directly between the target UE and the server UE.”
In response to applicant’s arguments, the examiner respectfully disagrees that Oyama and Ko fail to teach the above elements as claimed. Oyama teaches traffic risks determined by the server based on acquired information regarding positions and speeds because Oyama teaches the server collecting field information to allow vehicles to avoid potential collisions (Oyama [0055], [0164]). The field information transmitted to the server includes positions and speeds of the vehicles (Oyama [0184]).
In response to applicant’s arguments that Oyama teaches localized driving control without a centralized server, the examiner respectfully disagrees. Oyama teaches the server generates primary processed information and relevant information is transmitted to all vehicles located in a predetermined section (Oyama [0133], [0349]). Oyama further teaches distributed control of servers (Oyama [0194], [0350]).
In response to applicant’s arguments that Oyama fails to disclose “determining whether the traffic risk exists” performed by the “mobile object,”” the examiner respectfully disagrees. Oyama teaches the mobile object determining whether the traffic risk exists because the traveling control ECU can determine the presence or absence of risk (Oyama [0154]). Oyama also teaches determining whether the traffic risk exists because vehicles repeatedly evaluate the reliability of a world map transmitted from the server (Oyama [0314]). Accordingly, Oyama teaches “determining whether the traffic risk exists” and “specifying a high traffic risk area” as recited in the independent claims.
In response to applicant’s arguments regarding Oyama dispatching a vehicle to an area where danger exists, Oyama teaches determining whether a course is obstructed by a hindrance (i.e., an area where danger exists) (Oyama [0154]-[0155]). After determining an area with a traffic risk, a vehicle is controlled to travel to prevent deviation from the designated course or range (Oyama [0160]-[0161]). Oyama also teaches a replacement of communication because servers and base stations communicate with terminal devices when the terminal device is moved within the range assigned to each base station (Oyama [0053], [0056]). Therefore, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, Oyama teaches controlling vehicles in an area where a risk exists and a replacement of communication.
In response to applicant’s arguments that Ko does not disclose “the “relaying” of communications or the replacement of the communication mode,” the examiner respectfully disagrees. Ko teaches estimating a location of user equipment without the assistance of a base station when the user equipment is outside the coverage of a base station (Ko [0152], [0154]). Applicant argues that there is no motivation for moving a vehicle or deploying an additional relay node “because communication is already established directly between the target UE and the server UE.” However, Ko teaches that efficient resource allocation is used to determine a position estimation and time delay is minimized by performing communication without a base station (Ko [0293]). Therefore, Ko teaches a motivation for switching a communication mode to avoid communication through the base station. As discussed above, Oyama teaches that communication with a base station is stopped when a vehicle operates outside the coverage of a base station. Accordingly, the combination of Oyama and Ko teach all limitations of the independent claims that are specifically challenged in the arguments.
Applicant’s arguments have been fully considered and have been found not persuasive.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 1-2, 9, and 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oyama et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2021/0201668 A1 (hereinafter Oyama), in view of Ko et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2022/0361142 A1 (hereinafter Ko), and further in view of Cho et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0112978 A1 (hereinafter Cho).
Regarding claim 1, Oyama discloses a system (Oyama Fig. 1) comprising:
a server communicably connected with a base station arranged in a predetermined region (see at least Oyama [0048]: “The server 6 may be coupled to the terminal devices 2 via the dedicated network 5. The wireless base stations 4, the dedicated network 5, and the server 6 may configure a system 3 on the base station side.”);
wherein the server is configured to acquire information representing positions and speeds of the plurality of mobile communication terminals, from the plurality of mobile communication terminals via the mobile communication through the base station (see at least Oyama [0060]: “Examples of the information to be collected from each of the vehicles 100 may include traveling information of the vehicle 100, occupant information related to the user, peripheral information of the vehicle 100, traffic information of a region. Examples of the traveling information of the vehicle 100 may include, in addition to the traveling direction and the traveling speed, a current location, a destination, and an attitude or movement of a vehicle body of the vehicle 100.”; [0091]: “The communication device 71 may transmit the information collected in Step ST1 to the wireless base station 4 with which the communication device 71 is able to communicate in a communication environment at the time of the transmission. The wireless base station 4 may transmit the information received from the communication device 71 of the vehicle 100 to the server 6 via the dedicated network 5.”);
determine, based on the acquired information representing positions and speeds of the plurality of mobile communication terminals, a traffic risk in a position in the predetermined region, where each of the plurality of mobile communication terminals is present (see at least Oyama [0055]: “By such communication, the server 6 may collect field information related to traveling of the vehicles 100. The field information to be collected may include information about a mobile body other than the vehicle 100, for example. On the basis of the collected field information, the server 6 may generate, for example, information on a course or a movable range in a short section for each of the vehicles 100. In one embodiment, the information on the course or the movable range may serve as “course-related information”. The courses or the movable ranges may allow the vehicles 100 to travel therewithin safely without colliding with each other, for example.”; [0184]: “On the basis of the actual positions and the speeds included in the field information of the vehicles 100, the server 6 may generate the vehicle operation diagrams of FIGS. 11B and 11C that illustrate the traveling conditions of the vehicles 100 for the respective lanes.”; under broadest reasonable interpretation a traffic risk is a potential collision);
thereby determining, from among a plurality of areas in the predetermined region, whether a high traffic risk area where a traffic risk is higher than a predetermined value exists (see at least Oyama [0053]: “In the mobility information provision system 1 described above, the terminal devices 2 of the vehicles 100 and the server 6 may transmit and receive data to and from each other, by data packet routing control on the communication network including the dedicated network 5 and the wireless base stations 4.”; [0155]: “The traveling control ECU 24 may thus determine the unobstructedness of the designated course on the basis of an error between the detection value and the included information…In a case where the error is equal to or greater than a threshold (Step ST65: NO), the traveling control ECU 24 may determine that the designated course or movable range is obstructed, and cause the process to proceed to Step ST67.”; [0154]: “For example, the traveling control ECU 24 may determine, on the basis of the acquired peripheral information detected by the own vehicle, an obstacle, abnormality, presence or absence of risk, and presence or absence of another passing mobile body within the designated course or movable range.”; under broadest reasonable interpretation a traffic risk higher than a predetermined value includes an error greater than a threshold indicating a traveling course is obstructed);
when the high traffic risk area exists, specify the high traffic area and cause the at least one of the one or more mobile objects to automatically move to the specified high traffic risk area so that the mobile relay communication between the server and the mobile communication terminals is carried out (see at least Oyama [0160]-[0161]: “In Step ST67, the traveling control ECU 24 may generate the traveling control data, on the basis of information independently detected by the autonomous sensor of the own vehicle, instead of the designated course. In the generation, the traveling control ECU 24 may use information on the designated course or movable range as subordinate information to obtain the traveling control data based on the autonomous sensor, and generate the traveling control data within the designated course or range…In the adjustment, the traveling control ECU 24 may adjust the operation performed by the user, to prevent the own vehicle from deviating from the designated movable range.”; [0148]-[0149]: “FIG. 9 is a flowchart illustrating a process of controlling the automatic driving or the driving assist of the vehicle 100 by the traveling control ECU 24 of the control system 20 of the vehicle 100 illustrated in FIG. 3. The traveling control ECU 24 that controls the traveling of the vehicle 100 may repeatedly execute the traveling control based on the primary processed information illustrated in FIG. 9. The traveling control ECU 24 may repeat the traveling control illustrated in FIG. 9 by, for example, a cycle shorter than time taken for the vehicle 100 to travel through the course based on the primary processed information.”; [0164]: “As described above, in the example embodiment, the server 6 may collect the field information related to the movement of the vehicles 100 serving as a plurality of mobile bodies. The server 6 may generate, on the basis of the collected field information, a course or a safely movable range in a short section for each of the mobile bodies…The server 6 may transmit the generated course or safely movable range in the short section to each of the communication devices 71 of the terminal devices 2, as the primary processed information.”; Fig. 9 shows determining an obstructed area in step ST65 (i.e., high traffic risk area), before proceeding to step ST67),
wherein the at least one mobile objects, after automatically moving to the specified high traffic risk area is configured to perform, in the specified high traffic risk area, the mobile relay communication between the at least one mobile communication terminal carried by the pedestrians present in the specified high traffic risk area as well as the at least one mobile communication terminal provided in the vehicles present in the specified high traffic risk area, and the server (see at least Oyama [0164]: “As described above, in the example embodiment, the server 6 may collect the field information related to the movement of the vehicles 100 serving as a plurality of mobile bodies. The server 6 may generate, on the basis of the collected field information, a course or a safely movable range in a short section for each of the mobile bodies. The courses or the safely movable ranges may allow the plurality of mobile bodies to travel therewithin safely without colliding with each other, for example. The server 6 may transmit the generated course or safely movable range in the short section to each of the communication devices 71 of the terminal devices 2, as the primary processed information. The communication device 71 of the terminal device 2 may be configured to receive, from the server 6, the primary processed information related to and usable in the corresponding mobile body. Consequently, it is possible for the communication device 71 to obtain course information related to the own movement generated in consideration of a course in accordance with which another mobile body moves. Each of the mobile bodies may obtain its own course information generated in consideration of a course in accordance with which another mobile body moves, and travel on the basis of the course information”; Oyama [0160]-[0162] and Fig. 9 show controlling a vehicle in an obstructed area; this limitation is taught through the combination of Oyama and Ko, where Ko teaches mobile communication terminals carried by the pedestrians (Ko [0011], Fig. 22));
determine, in the specified high traffic risk area, whether the traffic risk exists (see at least Oyama [0314]: “The control system 20 of the vehicle 100 may repeatedly evaluate the reliability of the world map transmitted from the server 6 to the terminal device 2 while the vehicle 100 is traveling.”; [0154]: “For example, the traveling control ECU 24 may determine, on the basis of the acquired peripheral information detected by the own vehicle, an obstacle, abnormality, presence or absence of risk, and presence or absence of another passing mobile body within the designated course or movable range.”).
Oyama fails to expressly disclose mobile objects performing mobile communication with a terminal that is carried by a pedestrian, and operable to communicate with a server through a base station and performing communication without using the base station. However, Ko teaches
and one or more mobile objects having a function of performing, without using the base station, mobile relay communication between the server and a plurality of mobile communication terminals that are operable to perform mobile communication with the server via the base station (see at least Ko [0111]: “For such services, each vehicle may receive and send (or transmit) information as a user equipment capable of performing communication. And, depending upon the circumstances, each vehicle may select resources for communication with the help (or assistance) of the base station or without any help (or assistance) of the base station and transmit and receive messages to and from other UEs.”; [0154]: “In the present disclosure, as a method of sidelink positioning for estimating the location of a UE through communication only between a target UE and a server UE without the aid of a base station and an LCS server, an SL RTT technique is proposed in which a target UE and a server UE exchange a signal (hereinafter, PRS) for positioning and measure a round trip time (RTT) to measure a distance between the target UE and the server UE.”);
wherein the plurality of mobile communication terminals include mobile communication terminals carried by each of pedestrians in the predetermined region, and mobile communication terminals provided in each of vehicles traveling in the predetermined region (see at least Ko [0111]: “For such services, each vehicle may receive and send (or transmit) information as a user equipment capable of performing communication. And, depending upon the circumstances, each vehicle may select resources for communication with the help (or assistance) of the base station or without any help (or assistance) of the base station and transmit and receive messages to and from other UEs.”; Ko Fig. 22 shows user equipment includes handheld devices);
so that the mobile relay communication between the server and the mobile communication terminals is carried out instead of the mobile communication, including the transmission of the information related to the traffic risk, previously performed between the server and the mobile communication terminals via the base station (see at least Ko [0111]: “For such services, each vehicle may receive and send (or transmit) information as a user equipment capable of performing communication. And, depending upon the circumstances, each vehicle may select resources for communication with the help (or assistance) of the base station or without any help (or assistance) of the base station and transmit and receive messages to and from other UEs.”; [0154]: “In the present disclosure, as a method of sidelink positioning for estimating the location of a UE through communication only between a target UE and a server UE without the aid of a base station and an LCS server, an SL RTT technique is proposed in which a target UE and a server UE exchange a signal (hereinafter, PRS) for positioning and measure a round trip time (RTT) to measure a distance between the target UE and the server UE.”; [0152]: “The existing technology is a technique for estimating a location of a UE based on a core network including an LCS server and MME that manages location estimation of a UE, and a random access network (RAN) including a plurality of base stations and TPs (Transmission Points), a Uu interface connecting the UE and the base station must be used, and the UE must exist within the coverage of the base station. However, if a UE is in an area outside the coverage of a base station or without the assistance of a base station, it is impossible to estimate the location of the UE based on the communication between the UEs. The present disclosure proposes a technique for estimating the location of a UE without the aid of a base station or an LCS server, based on an operation between UEs.”),
and transmit, without using the base station, the information related to the traffic risk to the at least one mobile communication terminal carried by the pedestrians present in the specified high traffic risk area and the at least one mobile communication terminal provided in the vehicles present in the specified high traffic risk area (This limitation is taught through the combination of Oyama and Ko. Oyama discloses “transmit…information related to traffic risk to at least one mobile communication terminal determined as having the traffic risk among the one or more mobile communication terminals in the specified high traffic area” (see at least Oyama [0164], [0318], [0338]). Oyama fails to expressly disclose transmitting information without using the base station. However, Ko teaches transmit, without using the base station, information…to at least one mobile communication terminal (see at least Ko [0111]: “For such services, each vehicle may receive and send (or transmit) information as a user equipment capable of performing communication. And, depending upon the circumstances, each vehicle may select resources for communication with the help (or assistance) of the base station or without any help (or assistance) of the base station and transmit and receive messages to and from other UEs.”; [0154]: “In the present disclosure, as a method of sidelink positioning for estimating the location of a UE through communication only between a target UE and a server UE without the aid of a base station and an LCS server, an SL RTT technique is proposed in which a target UE and a server UE exchange a signal (hereinafter, PRS) for positioning and measure a round trip time (RTT) to measure a distance between the target UE and the server UE.” ). Therefore, the combination of Oyama and Ko teach the entirety of this limitation.).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to modify the system disclosed by Oyama with Ko with reasonable expectation of success. Ko is directed towards the related field of a wireless communication system. Therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify Oyama with Ko to improve communication efficiency (see at least Ko [0015]: “The user equipment (UE) may efficiently perform SL communication.”).
Oyama in view of Ko fail to expressly disclose transmitting, via the base station, information related to the traffic risk to the mobile communication terminals when the high traffic risk area does not exist. However, Cho teaches
when the high traffic risk area does not exist, transmit, via the base station, information related to the traffic risk to the mobile communication terminals carried by each of the pedestrians in the predetermined region and to the mobile communication terminals provided in each of the vehicles traveling in the predetermined region (see at least Cho [0027]: “As described above, the method for transmitting and receiving broadcasting service information according to the present embodiment enables a mobile station user such as a driver of a vehicle or a pedestrian to use the vehicle related information by receiving vehicle or pedestrian related information from a mobile station through a mobile communication network and broadcasting the received vehicle or pedestrian related information. Accordingly, the method for transmitting and receiving broadcasting service information according to the present embodiment enables a driver to conveniently and safely drive a vehicle and reduces an accident occurrence probability.”; [0034]: “Therefore, each step of the method for transmitting broadcasting service information according to the present embodiment may be understood as operations of constituent elements included in a broadcasting service information transmitter such as a base station 100.”; under broadest reasonable interpretation the high traffic risk area does not exist because the accident occurrence probability is reduced)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to modify the system disclosed by Oyama in view of Ko with Cho with reasonable expectation of success. Cho is directed towards the related field of transmitting and receiving broadcasting information in a vehicle network. Therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify Oyama in view of Ko with Cho to improve driving safety (see at least Cho [0007]: “An embodiment of the present invention is directed to providing a method for transmitting and receiving broadcasting service information and a mobile station for a broadcasting service, which enable a driver to safely and conveniently drive a vehicle and reduce an accident occurrence probability.”).
Regarding claim 2, Oyama in view of Ko and Cho teach all elements of the system according to claim 1 as explained above. Oyama further discloses wherein the server specifies, as the high traffic risk area, at least one of:
an area where rapid deceleration of a vehicle occurs, an area where a vehicle’s collision reducing brake system is activated, an area where an inter-vehicle distance is shorter than a predetermined value, an area where a traveling speed of a vehicle is higher than a predetermined value, or an area where traffic rule violation occurs (see at least Oyama [0204]: “The server CPU 14 may continue to generate the movement prohibitive information on the basis of the past mapping data until it is determined that the circumstance in which the movement prohibitive information should be generated on the basis of the mapping data is released. Possible examples of the movement prohibitive information generated on the basis of the mapping data may include information on a vehicle or van of a moving company parked on a street so as to occupy a certain location of the road, information on a vehicle in a state of emergency, and information on a sagging road or fallen trees.”; Oyama discloses at least an area where traffic rule violation occurs because a vehicle can be parked in a road causing movement prohibition).
Regarding claim 9, Oyama in view of Ko and Cho teach all elements of the system according to claim 1 as explained above. Oyama discloses the system
further comprising the mobile object (see at least Oyama [0043]: “The respective terminal devices 2 are usable in a plurality of vehicles 100 that travel on a road. The vehicles 100 may serve as a plurality of mobile bodies.”).
Regarding claim 19, this claim recites a method performed by the system of claim 1. Oyama in view of Ko and Cho also disclose a method performed by the system of claim 1 as outlined in the rejection to claim 1 above. Therefore, claim 19 is rejected for the same rationale as claim 1.
Regarding claim 20, this claim recites a medium embodying the system of claim 1. Oyama in view of Ko and Cho also disclose a non-transitory computer readable storage medium (Oyama [0358]) embodying the disclosed system as outlined in the rejection of claim 1 above. Therefore, claim 20 is rejected for the same rationale as claim 1.
Claims 4 and 11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oyama in view of Ko and Cho, and further in view of Li et al., “UAV Communications for 5G and Beyond: Recent Advances and Future Trends” (hereinafter Li).
Regarding claim 4, Oyama in view of Ko and Cho teach all elements of the system according to claim 1 as explained above. Oyama in view of Ko and Cho fail to expressly disclose instructing a mobile object to move to an area specified by a communication load higher than a predetermined value. However, Li teaches wherein the server is further configured to
specify a communication load of the mobile communication for each of the plurality of areas and specifies, from among the plurality of areas, a high communication load area where the communication load is higher than a predetermined value (see at least Li page 2: “On the standpoint of wireless communication aspects, UAVs can be employed as aerial communication platforms (e.g., flying BSs or mobile relays) by mounting communication transceivers to provide/enhance communication services to ground targets in high traffic demand and overloaded situations, which is commonly referred to as UAV-assisted communications [5]–[9]”; page 15: “In UAV-enabled networks, the resource-constrained mobile devices are able to offload their computation-intensive tasks to a flying UAV with high computing ability and flexible connectivity at the edge of network, thereby saving their energy and reducing traffic load at the fixed cloud servers.”);
and cause at least one of the one or more mobile objects to automatically move to the specified high communication load area so that a mobile communication between the mobile communication terminal and at least one mobile object is carried out instead of the mobile communication performed between the mobile communication terminal and the base stations (see at least Li page 13: “As an initial study, Mehta and Prasad [103] introduced the concept of aerialHetNet to offload the data traffic from the congested ground BSs in hotspots, where a fleet of small UAVs were deployed as an ad-hoc network with variable operational altitudes in the air.”; page 2: “Dynamic Deployment Ability: Compared with stationary ground infrastructures, UAVs can be dynamically deployed according to real-time requirements, which is more robust against the environment changes. In addition, UAVs as aerial BSs do not require the site rental costs, thus removing the need for towers and cables”; page 17: “Even though SBSs are densely deployed to accommodate the vast amount of traffic, a heavy burden will be imposed on the backhaul links. In fact, the backhaul network cannot deal with the explosive growth in mobile traffic. One promising method is to intelligently caching some popular contents at the network edge (i.e., UAVs, relays, or D2D devices), such that the demands from users for the same popular contents can be accommodated easily without duplicate transmissions via the backhaul links. In general, mobile users are constantly moving, and thus a more flexible caching strategy is desired. UAV as a flying BS can dynamically cache the popular contents, track the mobility patterns of wireless devices and then effectively serve them.”; Li teaches mobile communication between the mobile communication terminal and at least one mobile object instead of the mobile communication performed between the mobile communication terminal and the base stations because the UAV communicates with the mobile users instead of the mobile users communicating with the base station (SBS)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to modify the system disclosed by Oyama in view of Ko and Cho with the moving to a high communication load area taught by Li with reasonable expectation of success. Li is directed towards the related field of a UAV communication network for offloading. Therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify Oyama in view of Ko and Cho with Li to reduce latency (see at least Li page 15: “With the deployment of MEC server, mobile users can offload their computation tasks to the edge of network by empowering the cloud computing functionalities. It serves two important purposes. 1) Reduction in application latency (i.e., execution time), if a remote device has enormous computing resources. 2) Improving battery performance because application is being executed at a remote device. In UAV-enabled networks, the resource-constrained mobile devices are able to offload their computation-intensive tasks to a flying UAV with high computing ability and flexible connectivity at the edge of network, thereby saving their energy and reducing traffic load at the fixed cloud servers.”).
Regarding claim 11, this claim recites a system similar to the system according to claim 4 as explained above. Therefore, claim 11 is rejected for the same rationale as claim 4.
Claims 5 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oyama in view of Ko, Cho, and Li, and further in view of Narasimham et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2024/0049060 A1 (hereinafter Narasimham).
Regarding claim 5, Oyama in view of Ko, Cho, and Li teach all elements of the system according to claim 4 as explained above. Oyama in view of Ko, Cho, and Li fail to expressly disclose a communication load higher than a predetermined value based on an event schedule or congestion information inferred from history information. However, Narasimham teaches
wherein the server specifies the high communication load area based on at least one of (i) information on an event holding schedule, or (ii) a congestion situation of the mobile communication terminal inferred from history information of position information of the mobile communication terminal received from the mobile communication terminal and history information of at least one of dates, weathers, or time periods associated with the position information (see at least Narasimham [0164]: “By deleting at least one of the one or more subscriptions in this Action 204, the first node 111 may then be enabled to dynamically stop receiving notifications of the subscribed event, in real time, whenever, such notifications may no longer be necessary, e.g., one hour after a football match may be over, and the load of the communications network 10 in a particular area may return to normal levels.”; [0171]: “In addition to QoS, congestion and load information, other custom factors may also be included for analysis, for example, day of week, time of day, location, event schedule etc.”; Narasimham teaches at least based on information on an event holding schedule).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to modify the system disclosed by Oyama in view of Ko, Cho, and Li with the high communication load determination taught by Narasimham with reasonable expectation of success. Narasimham is directed towards the related field of handling quality of service in a communications network. Therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify Oyama in view of Ko, Cho, and Li with Narasimham to improve quality of service in areas of congestion (see at least Narasimham [0011]-[0013]: “Additionally, certain tracking areas may experience sudden congestion due to ongoing events and user density, such as major sports, cultural, political, social gatherings, food court, malls etc or just due to the intensity of device density. Whenever there is a such a gathering of many users, the Quality of Service (QoS) for a given tracking area may degrade, and data upload and/or download speeds may decrease. This will lead to customers being dissatisfied with the network and the data speed. Existing methods to manage network resources do not enable to secure the QoS by providing a guaranteed bitrate. Existing methods may therefore result in long latencies and failed communications, resulting in a poor operation of a communications network. It is an object of embodiments herein to improve the handling of quality of service in a communications network.”).
Regarding claim 14, this claim recites a system similar to the system according to claim 5 as explained above. Therefore, claim 14 is rejected for the same rationale as claim 5.
Claims 6-8, 16, and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oyama in view of Ko and Cho, and further in view of Kugelmass, U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2014/0316616 A1.
Regarding claim 6, Oyama in view of Ko and Cho teach all elements of the system according to claim 1 as explained above. Oyama in view of Ko and Cho fail to expressly disclose causing a mobile object to travel around a route passing a plurality of high traffic risk areas. However, Kugelmass teaches
wherein the server is further configured to cause, when a plurality of high traffic risk areas are specified, the at least one mobile object to automatically travel around a route passing the specified plurality of high traffic risk areas (see at least Kugelmass [0042]: “Block S150 can assign a greater distance of the highway to a first UAV furthest from the accident, assign low image resolution and/or low image density to a second UAV over low-congestion area, assign a third UAV (initially assigned to a stretch of highway including the accident) to circle the accident and capture high-resolution images at a high image capture rate, as shown in FIG. 4, and shift flight paths of adjacent fourth and fifth UAVs to cover the area of highway no longer imaged by the third UAV.”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to modify the system disclosed by Oyama in view of Ko and Cho with the traveling around a route taught by Kugelmass with reasonable expectation of success. Kugelmass is directed towards the related field of controlling unmanned aerial vehicles. Therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify Oyama in view of Ko and Cho with Kugelmass to focus on an area of interest (see at least Kugelmass [0042]: “In the example described above in which the area of interest is a highway with an identified point of interest that is an accident, Block S150 can assign a greater distance of the highway to a first UAV furthest from the accident, assign low image resolution and/or low image density to a second UAV over low-congestion area, assign a third UAV (initially assigned to a stretch of highway including the accident) to circle the accident and capture high-resolution images at a high image capture rate, as shown in FIG. 4, and shift flight paths of adjacent fourth and fifth UAVs to cover the area of highway no longer imaged by the third UAV.”).
Regarding claim 7, Oyama in view of Ko, Cho, and Kugelmass teach all elements of the system according to claim 6 as explained above. Kugelmass further teaches
wherein the server is further configured to cause, when a plurality of high traffic risk areas are specified, a plurality of the mobile objects to automatically travel around a route passing the specified plurality of high traffic risk areas (see at least Kugelmass [0042]: “Block S150 can assign a greater distance of the highway to a first UAV furthest from the accident, assign low image resolution and/or low image density to a second UAV over low-congestion area, assign a third UAV (initially assigned to a stretch of highway including the accident) to circle the accident and capture high-resolution images at a high image capture rate, as shown in FIG. 4, and shift flight paths of adjacent fourth and fifth UAVs to cover the area of highway no longer imaged by the third UAV.”; [0020]: “For example, flight paths can be communicated to the UAV 100 via the mobile computing device 150 that supports cellular, Wi-Fi, and/or other medium-to-long-range communication protocols, wherein the autopilot module 130 receives flight paths from the mobile computing device 150 over a short range (e.g., BTLE) communication protocol or over a wired connection to the mobile computing device 150.”; Kugelmass Fig. 2 shows routes for a plurality of mobile objects).
Regarding claim 8, Oyama in view of Ko, Cho, and Kugelmass teach all elements of the system according to claim 6 as explained above. Oyama further teaches
wherein the server is further configured to specify one or more carriers providing mobile communication to the mobile communication terminal present within the specified high traffic risk area (see at least Oyama [0352]: “The plurality of servers 6 may be assigned to different zones or overlapping zones including a wide area and a narrow area, for example. The servers 6 may be provided in a distributed manner in the mobility information provision system 1 involving a plurality of carriers.”),
and to cause one or more mobile objects providing the mobile communication of the specified one or more carriers to automatically move to the specified high traffic risk area (see at least Oyama [0053]: “If the terminal device 2 moves together with the vehicle 100, and the wireless base station 4 in charge of an area accommodating the terminal device 2 changes, the wireless base stations 4 and the server 6 may switch the routing. The server 6 may thus communicate with the terminal device 2 via the wireless base station 4 in charge of an area that newly accommodates the moving vehicle 100. The wireless base stations 4 before and after the switching may transmit and receive information related to the moving vehicle 100 and the terminal device 2 to and from each other.”).
Regarding claim 16, this claim recites a system similar to the system according to claim 6 as explained above. Therefore, claim 16 is rejected for the same rationale as claim 6.
Regarding claim 18, this claim recites a system similar to the system according to claim 7 as explained above. Therefore, claim 18 is rejected for the same rationale as claim 7.
Claim 21 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Oyama in view of Ko and Cho, and further in view of Muehlenstaedt et al., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2022/0261519 A1 (hereinafter Muehlenstaedt).
Regarding claim 21, Oyama in view of Ko and Cho teach all elements of the system according to claim 1 as explained above. Oyama in view of Ko and Cho fail to expressly disclose specifying a high traffic risk area based on a pedestrian present in an area and a possibility of danger arising from a vehicle or pedestrian behavior including traffic rule violations. However, Muehlenstaedt teaches
wherein the server is further configured to specify from among the plurality of areas in the predetermined region, the high traffic risk area where (i) at least one mobile communication terminals carried by the pedestrians is present (see at least Muehlenstaedt [0027]: “A safety threshold violation is a condition in which another vehicle, a pedestrian or other actor in the scene either (a) moved in a manner that violated a traffic regulation (such as a vehicle running through a red light or stop sign without stopping, a vehicle making an illegal turn, or a pedestrian jaywalking)”; this limitation is taught through the combination of Ko and Muehlenstaedt, where Ko [0011] and Fig. 22 teaches pedestrians can hold user equipment acting as mobile communication terminals),
(ii) a possibility that a danger arising from a behavior of at least one of the vehicles or a behavior of at least one of the pedestrians exists, and (iii) a traffic risk is higher than a predetermined value (see at least Muehlenstaedt [0027]: “A safety threshold violation is a condition in which another vehicle, a pedestrian or other actor in the scene either (a) moved in a manner that violated a traffic regulation (such as a vehicle running through a red light or stop sign without stopping, a vehicle making an illegal turn, or a pedestrian jaywalking); or (b) moved within a near-collision threshold distance of the AV, and/or caused the AV to alter its trajectory to avoid a collision. The scenes may be pre-labeled as having near-collision events or other safety violations, and the actors involved in the actions also may be pre-labeled, in which case at 202 the system may search the data store for scenes that are tagged with such a label. Alternatively, the system may process the scenes to automatically identify those scenes having near-collision events, such as scenes in which an actor moves to a position that is less than a safety threshold safety distance from the AV. For example, the system may examine the scene data to search for any actor that came within a threshold distance from the AV, any actor that moved at or above a threshold speed, any actor that was moving toward the vehicle, or any actor who meets a combination of these and other criteria. To process the scenes, the system may measure (in the perception data) the distance from the AV to a LiDAR bounding box of the actor. If the closest corner of the bounding box is within a threshold safety distance from the AV, this may indicate a near-collision event, or it may be one factor to be analyzed with other factors (such as speeds and directions of the AV and the actor) to determine whether a near-collision event exists.”),
the behavior of the at least one of the vehicles includes at least one of a rapid deceleration, an operation of damage collision reducing brake, reducing an inter-vehicle distance, speeding, and a traffic rule violation, and the behavior of the at least one of the pedestrians includes a traffic rule violation (see at least Muehlenstaedt [0027]: “A safety threshold violation is a condition in which another vehicle, a pedestrian or other actor in the scene either (a) moved in a manner that violated a traffic regulation (such as a vehicle running through a red light or stop sign without stopping, a vehicle making an illegal turn, or a pedestrian jaywalking)”).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the instant application to modify the system disclosed by Oyama in view of Ko and Cho with Muehlenstaedt with reasonable expectation of success. Muehlenstaedt is directed towards the related field of autonomous vehicle motion planning. Therefore, one of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to modify Oyama in view of Ko and Cho with Muehlenstaedt to improve the identification of corner cases (see at least Muehlenstaedt [0003]: “Such “edge events” or “corner cases” may include situations in which an actor commits a traffic violation, or in which an actor deviates from expected behavior (such as when a vehicle slips while traveling on an icy road). It is desirable to train the vehicle's motion planning model on corner cases so that the vehicle can learn how to react to them, but it is neither efficient nor practical to train the model on every possible corner case, especially those that are extremely unlikely to happen. Therefore, methods of identifying and developing an effective set of relatively more realistic and likely corner cases, and training the vehicle's model on such corner cases, is needed.”).
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.
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/ELIZABETH J SLOWIK/Examiner, Art Unit 3662
/ANISS CHAD/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3662
