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 .
Status of Claims
Claims 1-20 are pending.
Claims 1, 9, and 15 have been amended.
This non-final office action is in response to the “Amendments and Remarks” received on 01/16/2026
Response to Applicant’s Arguments/Remarks
Amendments and Remarks filed on 01/16/2026 have been fully considered and are addressed as follow:
Regarding the Claim Rejections Under 35 U.S.C. § 103: Applicants “Amendment and Remarks” have been fully considered. Applicant has amended the independent claim and these amendments have changed the scope of the original application and the Office has supplied new grounds for rejection attached below in the non-final office action, and therefore the prior arguments are considered moot.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 11/05/2025 is being considered by the examiner.
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 1-4, 8, 9, 10, and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rodrigues (US PGPub 2023/0221136) in view of Corte (US 2023/0237813).
With respect to claim 1: Rodrigues teaches a method comprising:
receiving satellite data and probe data of an autonomous vehicle traveling on a roadway [Rodrigues ¶ 0025 and Fig. 1 elements 110 and 120];
extracting road features from the satellite data [Rodrigues ¶ 0026, "space map pipeline unit 134 determines locations of roadways based on the spatial imagery"];
generating a road boundary estimation network to classify the sections of the roadway based on the road features and the lane groups [Rodrigues ¶ 0043, "lane network"]; and
based on the road boundary estimation network, generating a trajectory for the autonomous vehicle incorporating the classified road features and lane group [Rodrigues ¶ 0051 “The shapefiles are layered in order to determine vectors for traveling along a network of roadways. The shapefiles are usable in app such as navigation systems and autonomous driving for identifying directions of travel for vehicles.”];
autonomously controlling the autonomous vehicle in accordance with the generated trajectory [Rodrigues ¶ 0051].
Rodrigues does not teach determining lane groups for sections of the roadway based on the probe data, wherein the lane groups are categorized based on lane transition and creations in the roadway, wherein lane transitions and creations are detected based on a changing width of one or more affected lanes within a respective lane group.
However, in a related field of invention, Corte does teach determining lane groups for sections of the roadway based on the probe data, wherein the lane groups are categorized based on lane transition and creations in the roadway, wherein lane transitions and creations are detect based on a changing width of one or more affected lanes within a respective lane group [Corte ¶ 0101 "For example, the physical feature extractor 504 may determine that the first traffic lane is intersecting the second traffic lane when the distance between the boundary points defining opposite edges of the first traffic lane exceeds a threshold defined by the typical width of a traffic lane. "].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system where a lane network is generated based on object detection as taught by Rodrigues with determining lane groups for sections of the roadway base on shared features as taught in Corte in order to improve differentiation between different physical features present in the sensor data [Corte ¶ 0095].
With respect to claim 2: Rodrigues and Corte teach the method of claim 1. Rodrigues further teaches wherein the road boundary estimation network is generated using a CNN network [Rodrigues ¶ 0056].
With respect to claim 3: Rodrigues and Corte teach the method of claim 1. Rodrigues further teaches wherein generating the road boundary estimation network comprises featurizing the probe data [Rodrigues ¶ 0028].
With respect to claim 4: Rodrigues and Corte teach the method of claim 1. Rodrigues further teaches wherein the probe data is featurized by extracting a plurality of road boundary key points from the probe data [Rodrigues ¶ 0028].
With respect to claim 8: Rodrigues and Corte teach the method of claim 1. Rodrigues further teaches wherein each lane group comprises a left and right road boundary [Rodrigues ¶ 0098 and Fig. 9B element 930].
With respect to claim 9: Rodrigues teaches A vehicle control system, comprising:
One or more processors [Rodrigues ¶ 0099 and Fig. 10 element 1002]; and
a memory coupled to the one or more processors to store instructions, which when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to [Rodrigues ¶ 0099 Fig. 10 element 1004]:
receive satellite data and probe data of an autonomous vehicle traveling on a roadway [Rodrigues ¶ 0025 and Fig. 1 elements 110 and 120];
extract road features from the satellite data [Rodrigues ¶ 0026, "space map pipeline unit 134 determines locations of roadways based on the spatial imagery"];
extract a plurality of road boundary key points from the probe data [Rodrigues ¶ 0028];
generate a road boundary estimation network to classify sections of the roadway based on the road features and the plurality of road boundary key points [Rodrigues ¶ 0043, "lane network"]; and
based on the road boundary estimation network, generating a trajectory for the autonomous vehicle incorporating the classified road features and lane groups; and [Rodrigues ¶ 0051 “The shapefiles are layered in order to determine vectors for traveling along a network of roadways. The shapefiles are usable in app such as navigation systems and autonomous driving for identifying directions of travel for vehicles.”];
autonomously controlling the autonomous vehicle in accordance with the generated trajectory [Rodrigues ¶ 0051].
Rodrigues does not teach determine lane groups for section of the roadway, wherein the lane groups are categorized based on lane transitions and creations in the road features, wherein lane transitions and creations are detected based on a changing width of one or more affected lanes within a respective lane group.
However, in a related field of invention, Corte does teach determine lane groups for section of the roadway, wherein the lane groups are categorized based on lane transitions and creations in the road features, wherein lane transitions and creations are detected based on a changing width of one or more affected lanes within a respective lane group [Corte ¶ 0101 "For example, the physical feature extractor 504 may determine that the first traffic lane is intersecting the second traffic lane when the distance between the boundary points defining opposite edges of the first traffic lane exceeds a threshold defined by the typical width of a traffic lane. "];
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system where a lane network is generated based on object detection as taught by Rodrigues with determining lane groups for sections of the roadway base on shared features as taught in Corte in order to improve differentiation between different physical features present in the sensor data [Corte ¶ 0095].
With respect to claim 10: Rodrigues and Corte teach the vehicle control system of claim 9. Rodrigues further teaches wherein the road boundary estimation network is generated using a CNN network [Rodrigues ¶ 0056].
With respect to claim 14: Rodrigues and Corte teach the vehicle control system of claim 9. Rodrigues further teaches wherein each lane group comprises a left and right road boundary [Rodrigues ¶ 0098 and Fig. 9B element 930].
Claim 5 and 11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rodrigues in view of Corte and in further view of Chen (US PGPub 2016/0167582).
With respect to claim 5: Rodrigues and Corte teach the method of claim 4. Rodrigues and Corte do not teach wherein the plurality of road boundary key points generates a histogram indicating probabilities of lane boundaries across the plurality of road boundary key points.
However, in a related field of invention, Chen does teach wherein the plurality of road boundary key points generates a histogram indicating probabilities of lane boundaries across the plurality of road boundary key points [Chen ¶ 0052-0053].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system as taught by Rodrigues and Corte with using a histogram indicating probabilities as taught in Chen in order to show the distribution of data and reveal patterns in the data which can correlate to road lanes [Chen ¶ 0052] and be used to create more accurate roadmaps.
With respect to claim 11: Rodrigues and Corte teach the vehicle control system of claim 9. Rodrigues and Corte do not teach wherein the plurality of road boundary key points generates a histogram indicating probabilities of lane boundaries across the plurality of road boundary key points.
However, in a related field of invention, Chen does teach wherein the plurality of road boundary key points generates a histogram indicating probabilities of lane boundaries across the plurality of road boundary key points [Chen ¶ 0052-0053].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system as taught by Rodrigues and Corte with using a histogram indicating probabilities as taught in Chen in order to show the distribution of data and reveal patterns in the data which can correlate to road lanes [Chen ¶ 0052] and be used to create more accurate roadmaps.
Claims 6, 7, 12, 13, 15, 16, 17, 19, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rodrigues in view of Corte and in further view of Giurgiu (US PGPub 2020/0398856).
With respect to claim 6: Rodrigues and Corte teach the method of claim 1. Rodrigues and Corte do not teach wherein the satellite data and the probe data are discretized into lateral slices of the roadway.
However, in a related field of invention, Giurgiu does teach wherein the satellite data and the probe data are discretized into lateral slices of the roadway [Giurgiu ¶ 0056].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system as taught by Rodrigues and Corte with discretized data into lateral slices as taught in Giurgiu in order to allow a system for mapping road lanes to process discrete, manageable chunks of data.
With respect to claim 7: Rodriguesm, Corte, and Giurgiu teach the method of claim 6. Rodrigues and Corte as modified by Giurgiu does not explicitly teach wherein each lateral slice comprises five meters of the roadway.
However, Rodrigues and Corte as modified by Giurgiu at least suggests the idea of wherein each lateral slice comprises five meters of the roadway [Giurgiu ¶ 0056]. Further, the “mere scaling up” or “limitations relating to the size” or “recitation of relative dimensions” are generally not patentably distinguishable from a prior art device with both functioning in the same manner. See MPEP 2144.04 IV. It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to achieve such dimensions in order to process discrete and manageable chunks of data.
With respect to claim 12: Rodrigues and Corte teach the vehicle control system of claim 9. Rodrigues and Corte does not teach wherein the satellite data and the probe data are discretized into lateral slices of the roadway.
However, in a related field of invention, Giurgiu does teach wherein the satellite data and the probe data are discretized into lateral slices of the roadway [Giurgiu ¶ 0056].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system as taught by Rodrigues and Corte with discretized data into lateral slices as taught in Giurgiu in order to allow a system for mapping road lanes to process discrete, manageable chunks of data.
With respect to claim 13: Rodrigues, Corte, and Giurgiu teach the vehicle control system of claim 12. Rodrigues as modified by Giurgiu does not explicitly teach wherein each lateral slice comprises five meters of the roadway.
However, Rodrigues as modified by Corte and Giurgiu at least suggests the idea of wherein each lateral slice comprises five meters of the roadway [Giurgiu ¶ 0056]. Further, the “mere scaling up” or “limitations relating to the size” or “recitation of relative dimensions” are generally not patentably distinguishable from a prior art device with both functioning in the same manner. See MPEP 2144.04 IV. It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to achieve such dimensions in order to process discrete and manageable chunks of data.
With respect to claim 15: Rodrigues teaches a non-transitory machine-readable medium having instructions stored therein, which when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to [Rodrigues ¶ 0099 and 0101 and Fig. 10 element 1004]:
receive satellite data and probe data of an autonomous vehicle traveling on a roadway [Rodrigues ¶ 0025 and Fig. 1 elements 110 and 120];
generate a road boundary estimation network to classify the lateral slices based on the plurality of road features and the lane groups [Rodrigues ¶ 0043, "lane network"];
based on the road boundary estimation network, generating a trajectory for the autonomous vehicle incorporating the classified road features and lane groups; and [Rodrigues ¶ 0051 “The shapefiles are layered in order to determine vectors for traveling along a network of roadways. The shapefiles are usable in app such as navigation systems and autonomous driving for identifying directions of travel for vehicles.”];
autonomously controlling the autonomous vehicle in accordance with the generated trajectory [Rodrigues ¶ 0051].
Rodrigues does not teach determine a plurality of road features for each lateral slice;
determine lane groups for portions of the lateral slices, wherein the lane groups are categorized based on lane transitions and creations in the roadway, wherein lane transitions and creations are detected based on a changing width of one or more affected lanes within a respective lane group;
However, in a related field of invention, Corte does teach determine a plurality of road features for each lateral slice [Corte ¶ 0097, "The physical feature extractor 504 may extract, based on the sensor data 502a and geographic data 502b, one or more physical features present within the sensor data 502a including, for example, traffic lanes, intersections, and/or the like."];
determine lane groups for portions of the lateral slices, wherein the lane groups are categorized based on lane transitions and creations in the roadway, wherein lane transitions and creations are detected based on a changing width of one or more affected lanes within a respective lane group [Corte ¶ 0101 "For example, the physical feature extractor 504 may determine that the first traffic lane is intersecting the second traffic lane when the distance between the boundary points defining opposite edges of the first traffic lane exceeds a threshold defined by the typical width of a traffic lane. "];
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system as taught by Rodrigues with determining lane groups for sections of the roadway as taught in Corte in order to improve differentiation between different physical features present in the sensor data [Corte ¶ 0095].
Rodrigues and Corte do not teach discretize the satellite data and the probe data into lateral slices of the roadway.
However, in a related field of invention, Giurgiu does teach discretize the satellite data and the probe data into lateral slices of the roadway [Giurgiu ¶ 0056];
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system as taught by Rodrigues and Corte with discretized data into lateral slices as taught in Giurgiu in order to allow a system for generating roadmaps to process discrete, manageable chunks of data.
With respect to claim 16: Rodrigues, Corte, and Giurgiu teach the non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 15. Rodrigues further teaches wherein the road boundary estimation network is generated using a CNN network [Rodrigues ¶ 0056]. The motivation in the rejection for claim 15 applies here.
With respect to claim 17: Rodrigues, Corte, and Giurgiu teach the non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 15. Rodrigues further teaches wherein determining the plurality of road features comprises extracting a plurality of road boundary key points from the probe data [Rodrigues ¶ 0028]. The motivation in the rejection for claim 15 applies here.
With respect to claim 19: Rodrigues, Corte, and Giurgiu teach the non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 15. Rodrigues and Corte as modified by Giurgiu does not explicitly teach wherein each lateral slice comprises five meters of the roadway.
However, Rodrigues and Corte as modified by Giurgiu at least suggests the idea of wherein each lateral slice comprises five meters of the roadway [Giurgiu ¶ 0056]. Further, the “mere scaling up” or “limitations relating to the size” or “recitation of relative dimensions” are generally not patentably distinguishable from a prior art device with both functioning in the same manner. See MPEP 2144.04 IV. It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to achieve such dimensions in order to process discrete and manageable chunks of data.
With respect to claim 20: Rodrigues, Corte, and Giurgiu teach the non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 15. Rodrigues further teaches wherein each lane group comprises a left and right road boundary [Rodrigues ¶ 0098 and Fig. 9B element 930]. The motivation in the rejection for claim 15 applies here.
Claim 18 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Rodrigues in view of Corte in view of Giurgiu and in further view of Chen.
With respect to claim 18: Rodrigues, Corte, and Giurgiu teach the non-transitory machine-readable medium of claim 17. Rodrigues, Corte, and Giurgiu do not teach wherein the plurality of road boundary key points generates a histogram indicating probabilities of lane boundaries across the plurality of road boundary key points.
However, in a related field of invention, Chen does teach wherein the plurality of road boundary key points generates a histogram indicating probabilities of lane boundaries across the plurality of road boundary key points [Chen ¶ 0052-0053].
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention with a reasonable expectation of success to combine the roadmap generation system as taught by Rodrigues, Corte, and Giurgiu with using a histogram indicating probabilities as taught in Chen in order to show the distribution of data and reveal patterns in the data which can correlate to road lanes [Chen ¶ 0052] and be used to create more accurate roadmaps.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JOSEPHINE RICH whose telephone number is (571)272-6384. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8-5pm.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Scott Browne can be reached at (571) 270-0151. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/J.E.R./Examiner, Art Unit 3666
/SCOTT A BROWNE/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3666
Prosecution Insights