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 .
Claims 1-20 are pending.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-8, 13-17 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Jha, et al. (“Design and Simulation of Different Variants of Charging Lithium-Ion Batteries in Search for Optimum Charging Algorithm”, published in the 2022 4th Internation Conference on Smart Systems and Inventive Technology (ICSSIT), 20-22 January 2022, herein Jha).1 2 Regarding claims 1 and 14, Jha teaches an electronic device and method for an electronic device to charge a battery comprising: a battery (Section II-A); a memory storing a first charging pattern as a main charging pattern (Section I); and at least one processor, operatively coupled to the battery and the memory (Section II-A: the process must necessarily be executed by a processor), configured to: obtain data related to charging of the battery in a situation where the battery is charged based on the main charging pattern (Section III-A), identify a first life expectancy based on the configured first charging pattern and the obtained data (Section III-A), identify a second charging pattern that satisfies a second life expectancy relatively longer than the identified first life expectancy (Section III-C), change the main charging pattern from the first charging pattern to the second charging pattern (Section III-C), and determine a charging current corresponding to a charging voltage of the battery based on the second charging pattern in response to a charging request signal (Section III-D). Regarding claims 2 and 15, Jha teaches the at least one processor is configured to: identify a first charging time based on the first charging pattern and the obtained data (Section III-C), and identify the second charging pattern that satisfies a second charging time relatively shorter than the identified first charging time (Section III-C). Regarding claims 3 and 16, Jha teaches the at least one processor is configured to identify an n-th charging time and an n-th life expectancy corresponding to each of a plurality of charging patterns stored in the memory (Section III-C), and identify the second charging pattern based on the identified n-th charging time and the n-th life expectancy (Section III-C). Regarding claim 4, Jha teaches the first charging pattern and the second charging pattern include respective patterns in which the charging voltage supplied to the battery by a unit charging voltage and the charging current corresponding to the charging voltage supplied by the unit charging voltage are determined (Section III-C). Regarding claims 5 and 17, Jha teaches the second charging pattern includes m unit charging sections, a first unit charging section of the m unit charging sections is configured with a first voltage and/or a first current (Section III-C), and a second unit charging section of the m unit charging sections, after the first unit charging section, is configured with a second voltage higher than the first voltage and a second current higher than the first current (Section III-C). Regarding claim 6, Jha teaches the at least one processor is configured to: identify at least one charging pattern that satisfies an equivalent circuit model among charging patterns for charging the battery (Section III-D), and store the at least one identified charging pattern in the memory (Section III-D). Regarding claim 7, Jha teaches the equivalent circuit model reflects a configured function and initial resistance based on the charging patterns for charging the batter, and the at least one processor is configured to, when charging the battery based on the at least one charging pattern, calculate a maximum and/or high capacity of the battery at a time of exceeding a configured number of cycles and store at least one charging pattern in the memory in a case that the calculated maximum and/or high capacity of the battery exceeds a failure capacity ratio of the battery (Section III-C). Regarding claim 8, Jha teaches the data related to the charging of the battery includes at least one of: an average current (Section III-C), an average voltage (Section III-C), an average temperature, or a capacity loss history in an operation of charging the battery. Regarding claims 13 and 20, Jha teaches the at least one processor is configured to: identify whether life expectancy of the battery is improved based on the second charging pattern (Section III-C), divide a unit charging voltage supplying the charging voltage to the battery, to provide a divided unit charging voltage, in a case that the life expectancy of the battery is not improved (Section III-C), and supply the charging current based on the divided unit charging voltage (Section III-C).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 9-12 and 18-19 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.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MATTHEW MIKELS whose telephone number is (571)270-5470. The examiner can normally be reached Monday to Thursday 7:30 AM ET - 5:00 PM ET, Friday 7:30 AM ET - 9:30 AM ET, the Examiner is on central time.3
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/MATTHEW MIKELS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2876
1 See 892 form for the full citation. A copy of this reference is attached to this Office Action.
2 In addition to the cited portions, please see also the associated figures.
3 The Examiner can also be reached at matthew.mikels@uspto.gov.
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