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 .
Election/Restrictions
Examiner notes that applicant has elected Group I (claims 1-9 and 15-20) without traverse therefore Group II claims (10-14) have been withdrawn from consideration and the requirement has been made final.
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) 1-4, 7-9, and 15-18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ying et al. (2020/0084613) hereinafter “Ying” and Talebi Fard et al. (2020/0314701).
As to claim 1, Ying discloses A method, comprising:
receiving, by a first mobility management function (New AMF), a registration request message (S201 / S303) sent by an access network device (RAN), wherein the registration request message requests to register a tag (UE) in a core network, (see Figs 2-3 [0115]-[0116], [0127]-0132]);
wherein the second mobility management function stores context information of the tag (see [0004]-[0006]);
and
obtaining, by the first mobility management function, the context information (S305) of the tag from the second mobility management function (old AMF), (see [0133]-[0136].
Ying suggests in [0134] the new AMF could contact the UDSF however fails to recite obtaining, by the first mobility management function, identification information of a second mobility management function from a unified data management function based on the registration request message.
In an analogous art, Talebi Fard discloses wherein the identity of a serving AMF may be registered in a UDM. See [0038]. Before the effective filing date of the instant invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify the method of Ying with the suggestion of Talebi Fard and thereby obtaining, by the first mobility management function, identification information of a second mobility management function from a unified data management function based on the registration request message for an alternative when the old AMF is unknown and the UDSF is unavailable or unable to help.
As to claim 2, The combination of Ying and Talebi Fard provides for the method according to claim 1, Ying is silent to yet Talebi Fard discloses
wherein the registration request message comprises identification information of the tag (UE), the identification information of the tag comprises a subscription concealed identifier of the tag (SUCI), and a part of the subscription concealed identifier of the tag is plaintext information (SUPI); and
the obtaining, by the first mobility management function, the context information of the tag from the second mobility management function comprises:
obtaining, by the first mobility management function from the second mobility management function, the context information that is of the tag and that is indicated by the plaintext information (SUPI or SUCI), see [0085].
Before the effective filing date of the instant invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify the method of Ying wherein the registration request message comprises identification information of the tag (UE), the identification information of the tag comprises a subscription concealed identifier of the tag (SUCI), and a part of the subscription concealed identifier of the tag is plaintext information (SUPI); and the obtaining, by the first mobility management function, the context information of the tag from the second mobility management function comprises: obtaining, by the first mobility management function from the second mobility management function, the context information that is of the tag and that is indicated by the plaintext information, as taught by Talebi Fard for the purpose of utilizing known identification parameters according to system requirements.
As to claim 3, The combination of Ying and Talebi Fard provides for the method according to claim 2, wherein the plaintext (SUPI) information comprises one or more of an electronic product code of the tag, a unique identifier of the tag, a permanent identifier of the tag, an external identifier of the tag, or a temporary identifier of the tag (MSIN).
As to claim 4, The combination of Ying and Talebi Fard provides for the method according to claim 2, wherein the obtaining, by the first mobility management function, identification information of a second mobility management function from a unified data management function (inherently) comprises:
sending, by the first mobility management function, a query message to the unified data management function, wherein the query message comprises the identification information of the tag; and
receiving, by the first mobility management function, permanent identification information of the tag and the identification information of the second mobility management function from the unified data management function; and
the obtaining, by the first mobility management function, the context information of the tag from the second mobility management function (inherently) comprises: obtaining, by the first mobility management function, the context information of the tag from the second mobility management function based on the permanent identification information of the tag and the identification information of the second mobility management function.
As to claim 7, The combination of Ying and Talebi Fard provides for the method according to claim 1, is silent to yet the examiner takes official notice that it was known for network entities to take on roles in different systems such that before the effective filing date of the instant invention it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify the method wherein the second mobility management function is the same as the first mobility management function for the purpose of optimizing the utilization of resources.
As to claim 8, The combination of Ying and Talebi Fard provides for the method according to claim 1, Ying discloses wherein the method further comprises: sending, (S309) by the first mobility management function, the context information of the tag to the access network device, (see [0138]-[0143]).
As to claim 9, The combination of Ying and Talebi Fard provides for the method according to claim 1, wherein before the obtaining, by the first mobility management function, identification information of a second mobility management function from a unified data management function based on the registration request message, the method further comprises:
determining, by the first mobility management function, that the first mobility management function does not store the context information of the tag. See Ying S202 / [0117]-[0118], [0132].
As to claims 15-18, The combination of Ying and Talebi Fard provides for an apparatus comprising (Ying Fig 10) a transceiver (1010), at least one processor (1020), and at least one memory (1030) coupled to the at least one processor, wherein the at least one memory stores programming instructions for execution by the at least one processor to cause the apparatus to perform operations as applied above to claims 1-4, respectively. See Ying [0241].
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 5-6 and 19-20 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
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Chandramouli et al. (2023/0073757) provide for a method of receiving a registration request including a GUTI with 5GS-TMSI in plain text [0070]-[0075] and obtains UE context directly form the UDSF [0133].
Faccin et al. (2019/0124561) provide for the AMF receiving a registration request and obtain UE subscription information from the UDM [0100].
You et al. (2023/0370992) provide for the use of Nudm_SDM_Get message from the AMF to UDM to request UEs subscription data, [0081]-[0083].
Stojanovski et al. (2021/0168751) provide for the AMF obtains UE context directly form the UDSF [0065]-[0067].
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to LESTER KINCAID whose telephone number is (571)272-7922. The examiner can normally be reached M-Th: 7-5.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Yuwen Pan can be reached at 571-272-7855. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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LESTER G. KINCAID
Primary Patent Examiner
Art Unit 2649
/LESTER G KINCAID/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2649
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