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 .
DETAILED ACTION
Information Disclosure Statement
1. The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 06/10/2024 has been considered by Examiner and made of record in the application file.
Claim Objections
2. Claim 11 recites “…the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more target cells…” in line 11. It is believed that applicant intended for the claim 1 to recite “…the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells…” and has been interpreted as such for the purposes of this examination. Clarification for this limitation is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC §103
3. 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.
4. Claims 1-2, 4-5, 8-9, 11-12, 15-16 and 18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over NOKIA et al. ("On the cell switch in LTM", 3GPP TSG-RAN WG2 Meeting #122, May 12, 2023, R2-2305909, Incheon, South Korea, 5pp., hereinafter “NOKIA”; provided by the Applicant’s IDS filed on 06/10/2024) in view of FUJITSU ("LTM procedure for different scenarios"’, 3GPP TSG-RAN WG2 Meeting #121-bis electronic, April 7, 2023, R2-2303008, 5pp, hereinafter “FUJITSU”; provided by the Applicant’s IDS filed on 06/10/2024).
Consider claim 1, NOKIA teaches a method for preparing a fallback configuration for one of a Radio Link Failure (RLF) or a handover (HO) failure of a User Equipment (UE), comprising: identifying one or more Layer 1 (L1)/Layer 2 (L2) Triggered Mobility (LTM) candidate cells for fallback (Section 2.3 Target Cell indication in MAC CE triggering LTM); predicting at least one of an HO failure or an RLF for one or more LTM target cells (Section 2.2 LTM Failure Handling); in response to predicting the at least one of the RLF or HO failure for the one or more LTM target cells, preparing at least one of a fallback LTM configuration or a fallback Conditional Handover (CHO) configuration for at least one of the one or more LTM target cells selected from one or more LTM candidate cells (Section 2.2 LTM Failure Handling).
NOKIA does not explicitly show that providing the UE with the at least one of the prepared fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more target cells; and sending control information to the UE to initiate a cell switch by the UE from a serving cell to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells based on the at least one of the prepared fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells.
In the same field of endeavor, FUJITSU teaches providing the UE with the at least one of the prepared fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more target cells (Section 2.4 Failure detection and recovery); and sending control information to the UE to initiate a cell switch by the UE from a serving cell to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells based on the at least one of the prepared fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells (Section 2.4 Failure detection and recovery).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made to use, providing the UE with the at least one of the prepared fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more target cells; and sending control information to the UE to initiate a cell switch by the UE from a serving cell to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells based on the at least one of the prepared fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells, as taught by FUJITSU, in order for the UE can trigger LTM execution to another LTM candidate cell in case of RLF or LTM failure.
Consider claim 2, NOKIA further teaches wherein the providing the UE with the prepared fallback LTM configuration includes providing the UE with the prepared fallback LTM configuration for autonomous execution of the cell switch by the UE in event of the at least one of the HO failure or the RLF, without sending any additional signaling (Section 2.2 LTM Failure Handling).
Consider claim 4, NOKIA further teaches wherein the identifying the one or more LTM candidate cells for fallback includes identifying which of configured LTM candidate cells of the UE are eligible to be configured for fallback (Section 2.2 LTM Failure Handling).
Consider claim 5, NOKIA further teaches wherein the preparing the at least one fallback LTM configuration for the at least one of the one or more target cells includes preparing the at least one fallback LTM configuration with full resource reservation at the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells, and wherein the preparing the fallback CHO configuration includes adding at least a fallback CHO criteria to an LTM configuration (Section 2.2 LTM Failure Handling).
Consider claim 8, the previous rejections of claim 1 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 8.
Consider claim 9, the previous rejections of claim 2 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 9.
Consider claim 11, the previous rejections of claim 4 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 11.
Consider claim 12, the previous rejections of claim 5 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 12.
Consider claim 15, the previous rejections of claim 1 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 15.
Consider claim 16, the previous rejections of claim 2 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 16.
Consider claim 18, the previous rejections of claim 5 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 18.
5. Claims 3, 10 and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over NOKIA in view of FUJITSU and further in view of SAMSUNG ("RRC issues on the LTM", 3GPP TSG-RAN WG2 Meeting #121, February 17, 2023, Athens, Greece, 8pp, hereinafter “SAMSUNG”; provided by the Applicant’s IDS filed on 06/10/2024).
Consider claim 3, NOKIA and FUJITSU in combination fail to teach wherein the preparing the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells includes obtaining the fallback CHO configuration from a target Distributed Unit (DU), wherein the obtaining the fallback CHO configuration includes receiving from the target DU a delta for converting the fallback LTM configuration to the fallback CHO configuration or receiving the fallback CHO configuration from the target DU.
However, SAMSUNG teaches wherein the preparing the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells includes obtaining the fallback CHO configuration from a target Distributed Unit (DU), wherein the obtaining the fallback CHO configuration includes receiving from the target DU a delta for converting the fallback LTM configuration to the fallback CHO configuration or receiving the fallback CHO configuration from the target DU (Section 2.4 Delta configuration for the LTM).
Therefore, it is obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to incorporate the disclosing of SAMSUNG into view of NOKIA and FUJITSU, in order to provide to the target candidate cells in order to get the reference cell configuration.
Consider claim 10, the previous rejections of claim 3 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 10.
Consider claim 17, the previous rejections of claim 3 apply mutatis mutandis to corresponding claim 17.
Allowable Subject Matter
6. Claims 6-7, 13-14 and 19-20 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.
Consider claim 6, the prior arts made of record, alone or in combination, fail to clearly teach or fairly suggest wherein the identifying the one or more LTM candidate cells includes receiving a periodic resource status update from one or more gNB-Distributed Units (DUs), that includes HO failure data for the one or more LTM candidate cells, and accumulating the HO failure data for the one or more LTM candidate cells of the one or more gNB-DUs over a period of time; and wherein the preparing the at least one of the fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells includes determining whether handover to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells is susceptible to the HO failure based on the HO failure data, in response to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells being susceptible to LTM cell switch HO failure, determining neighbor candidate cells of the at least one target the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells, and preparing the at least one fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the neighbor candidate cells, in combination with other limitations, as specified in the independent claim 1’ and further limitations of their respective dependent claim 7.
Consider claim 13, the prior arts made of record, alone or in combination, fail to clearly teach or fairly suggest wherein the processor is configured to :receive a periodic resource status update from one or more gNB-Distributed Units (DUs) that includes HO failure data for the one or more LTM candidate cells, and accumulate the HO failure data for the one or more LTM candidate cells of the one or more gNB-DUs over a period of time; and prepare the at least one of the fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells by determining whether handover to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells is susceptible to the HO failure based on the HO failure data, in response to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells being susceptible to LTM cell switch HO failure, determining neighbor candidate cells of the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells, and preparing the at least one fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the neighbor candidate cells, in combination with other limitations, as specified in the independent claim 8, and further limitations of their respective dependent claim 14.
Consider claim 19, the prior arts made of record, alone or in combination, fail to clearly teach or fairly suggest wherein the identifying the one or more LTM candidate cells includes receiving a periodic resource status update from one or more gNB-Distributed Units (DUs) that includes HO failure data for the one or more LTM candidate cells, and accumulating the HO failure data for the one or more LTM candidate cells of the one or more gNB-DUs over a period of time; and wherein the preparing the at least one of the fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells includes determining whether handover to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells is susceptible to the HO failure based on the HO failure data, in response to the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells being susceptible to LTM cell switch HO failure, determining neighbor candidate cells of the at least one of the one or more LTM target cells, and preparing the at least one fallback LTM configuration or the fallback CHO configuration for the neighbor candidate cells, in combination with other limitations, as specified in the independent claim 15, and further limitations of their respective dependent claim 20.
Conclusion
7. Any response to this action should be mailed to:
Mail Stop_________ (Explanation, e.g., Amendment or After-final, etc.)
Commissioner for Patents
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, VA 22313-1450
Facsimile responses should be faxed to:
(571) 273-8300
Hand-delivered responses should be brought to:
Customer Service Window
Randolph Building
401 Dulany Street
Alexandria, VA 22313
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Tuan H. Nguyen whose telephone number is (571) 272-8329. The examiner can normally be reached on 8:00Am - 5:00Pm.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Pan Yuwen can be reached on (571) 272-7855. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571) 273-8300.
Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR.
Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. For more information about the PAIR system, see http://pair-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free).
/TUAN H NGUYEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2649