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 .
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments, starting on 3/19/26, have been fully considered.
Applicant's arguments, on page 11, with respect to the objection to the specification are not persuasive. While an amendment to the title has been submitted, it is for the exact same title as before.
Applicant’s arguments, starting on page 11, with respect to the 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 rejections have fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Lekutai (US 20210112550 A1).
Specification
The title of the invention is not descriptive. A new title is required that is clearly indicative of the invention to which the claims are directed.
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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claim(s) 1, 3-7, 18, and 21-22 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gaal (US 20210321416 A1) in view of Lekutai (US 20210112550 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Gaal discloses:
“A wireless base station comprising: at least one memory configured to store instructions; and at least one processor configured to execute the instructions to” ([para 0096]: “The device 905 may include components for bi-directional voice and data communications including components for transmitting and receiving communications, including a communications manager 910, a network communications manager 915, a transceiver 920, an antenna 925, memory 930, a processor 940, and an inter-station communications manager 945.”)
“detect occurrence of interference at the wireless base station, execute interference analysis that is based on a result of detection by the at least one processor and includes estimation of consecutiveness of the interference, and” ([para 0107]: “At 1010, the base station may identify a first TDD configuration that is different than the baseline TDD configuration for communications with the at least one UE.” ; [para 0061]: “In some cases, the first operator 205 and the second operator 210 may operate using frequency bands of a set of frequency bands, in which transmissions of one frequency band may cause interference with transmissions of another frequency band. For example, if downlink transmission 225-a is transmitted concurrently with uplink transmission 230-b, interference may result in degradation of each of the transmitted signals.” The examiner notes that “consecutiveness” is not a term of art nor is it defined in the specification and is thus being interpreted broadly according to the normal definition.)
“execute, according to a result of the analysis by the at least one processor, wireless resource control for reducing influence of the interference, wherein” ([para 0108]: “At 1015, the base station may select an interference mitigation procedure based on the identified first TDD configuration. The operations of 1015 may be performed according to the methods described herein. In some examples, aspects of the operations of 1015 may be performed by an interference mitigation manager as described with reference to FIGS. 6 through 9.”)
“the consecutiveness includes at least one of temporal consecutiveness and spatial consecutiveness.” ([para 0066]: “FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a baseline TDD configuration and a different TDD configuration 400 that supports asymmetric TDD coexistence techniques in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.”)
“the interference analysis includes estimating the consecutiveness of the interference for each time division duplex (TDD) time slot of the wireless base station…” ([¶ 0068]: “In some cases, additional interference that results from the downlink slot 450 may be mitigated through one or more interference mitigation procedures that may be performed by base stations or UEs of the operator using the identified TDD configuration 410. In some cases, interference mitigation may be applied to all of the downlink slots 465 of the identified TDD configuration 410…”)
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “based on a transmission direction of signals indicated in the TDD time slot of the wireless base station and a transmission direction of signals indicated in a TDD time slot of another wireless base station when estimating the consecutiveness of the interference.”
However, Lekutai discloses the missing feature “based on a transmission direction of signals indicated in the TDD time slot of the wireless base station and a transmission direction of signals indicated in a TDD time slot of another wireless base station when estimating the consecutiveness of the interference.” ([¶ [0107]: “At operation 804, the process can include receiving backhaul transmission information associated with the backhaul transceiver, the backhaul transmission information comprising a first transmission direction.”; [¶ 0109]: “At operation 808, the process can include receiving transmission information associated with the base station, the transmission information comprising a second transmission direction.”; [¶ 0110]: “In some examples, the operation 810 can include determining distance(s) and/or angle(s) between the base station(s), UE(s), transceiver(s), and the like. In some examples, the operation 810 can include accessing distance thresholds, angle thresholds, and/or interference models to determine expected or predicted levels of interference based on the geometry of the environment.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Lekutai, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to utilize geometry-based interference mitigation as disclosed by Lekutai. The motivation for doing so is that it decreases interference, thus improving performance. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Lekutai to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Regarding claim 2, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal further discloses “the analysis by the at least one processor is prediction based on a result of estimation of the consecutiveness, and includes prediction of whether execution of the wireless resource control is necessary, and, when it is predicted that execution of the wireless resource control is necessary, the at least one processor executes the wireless resource control.” ([para 0068]: “In some cases, additional interference that results from the downlink slot 450 may be mitigated through one or more interference mitigation procedures that may be performed by base stations or UEs of the operator using the identified TDD configuration 410.”; [para 0071]: “For example, an uplink transmission of a UE of a first operator may not significantly interfere with a downlink transmission of a base station of a second operator, as the downlink transmission may be transmitted at a higher power and be more readily received at an associated UE of the second operator. Accordingly, in some cases, interference mitigation may not be performed in cases where DL slots of the baseline TDD configuration 505 are reconfigured to be UL slots.”)
Regarding claim 3, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal further discloses “the at least one processor estimates the consecutiveness for each predetermined unit, and the predetermined unit is constituted of at least one of a frequency resource and a TDD slot number.” ([para 0063]: “In this example, a semi-synchronous TDD slot allocation may include a first set of fixed DL slots 305 (e.g., slots 305-a, 305-b, and 305-c), a second set of flexible slots 310 (e.g., slots 310-a, 310-b, and 310-c), and a third set of UL slots 315 (e.g., slots 315-a, and 315-b).”)
Regarding claim 4, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal further discloses “the at least one processor estimates at least one of the spatial consecutiveness, and the temporal consecutiveness.” ([para 0066]: “FIG. 4 illustrates an example of a baseline TDD configuration and a different TDD configuration 400 that supports asymmetric TDD coexistence techniques in accordance with aspects of the present disclosure.”)
Regarding claim 5-6, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Claims 5-6 narrow the scope of “spatial consecutiveness” which is an alternative limitation in the parent claim, and thus are still taught by Gaal for the reasons as cited in relation to the parent claim.
Regarding claim 7, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal further discloses “the wireless resource control includes load distribution control among the wireless base stations.” ([para 0108]: “In some cases, the interference mitigation procedure includes one or more of active antenna system (AAS) beamforming of downlink transmission beams, reducing transmit power or power spectral density of downlink transmissions, pulse shaping of downlink transmissions, predistortion filtering, or any combinations thereof.”)
Regarding claim 18, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal further discloses “the at least one processor executes control of outputting information indicating a result of the interference analysis and information indicating a content of the wireless resource control that is to be executed or has been executed by the at least one processor.” ([para 0083]: “The TDD configuration component 725 may identify a first TDD configuration that is different than the baseline TDD configuration for communications with the at least one UE.”)
Claims 21 and 22 are substantially similar to claim 1 and are rejected for similar reasons.
Claim(s) 8-9 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gaal (US 20210321416 A1) in view of Lekutai (US 20210112550 A1) and further in view of Schefczik (US 20200260427 A1).
Regarding claim 8, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the load distribution control includes at least one of control of executing handover, control of executing carrier aggregation, control of executing dual connectivity, and control of allocating a network slice.”
However, Schefczik discloses the missing feature “the load distribution control includes at least one of control of executing handover, control of executing carrier aggregation, control of executing dual connectivity, and control of allocating a network slice.” ([para 0042]: “One point in the usage of multiple control loops is also the interactions between different control loops and available for each network slice for different types and for multi-tenant scenarios: outer loop interactions 306 resource between RAN orchestrator and BBSC for deployment for various micro-services, and interaction between network slices, mid loop interactions 310 between BBSC and TTI (Transmission Time Interval) based Overload Control to enable resource pool load balancing and inner loop interactions 312 between TTI based Overload Control and vBBUs to clip resource usage bursts within a given configuration.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Schefczik, to modify the load distribution as disclosed by Gaal, to be allocating network slices as disclosed by by Schefczik. The motivation for doing so is that it increases flexibility. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Schefczik to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Regarding claim 9, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the at least one processor, based on a result of the interference analysis, updates accommodation information indicating an accommodable terminal number or an accommodable traffic volume in the wireless base station, and the at least one processor uses the accommodation information for the load distribution control.”
However, Schefczik discloses the missing “the at least one processor, based on a result of the interference analysis, updates accommodation information indicating an accommodable terminal number or an accommodable traffic volume in the wireless base station, and the at least one processor uses the accommodation information for the load distribution control.” ([para 0053]: “Existing solutions implement a fixed arrangement of processing functions regardless of the load and the service requirements. In existing solutions the radio access network has to be equipped for the maximum traffic expected. Thereby the composition of functions is fixed between the radio access and the network cloud resources and in case of an overload not much can be done to remedy the situation. The proposed solution has many advantages over the existing solutions.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Schefczik, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to be based on accommodable traffic as disclosed by Schefczik. The motivation for doing so is that it increases flexibility. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Schefczik to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Claim(s) 10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gaal (US 20210321416 A1) in view of Lekutai (US 20210112550 A1) and further in view of Furuichi (US 20180255497 A1).
Regarding claim 10, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the at least one processor predicts movement of a wireless terminal in a wireless communication system, wherein the at least one processor executes the load distribution control based on a result of prediction of movement of the wireless terminal.”
However, Furuichi discloses the missing “the at least one processor predicts movement of a wireless terminal in a wireless communication system, wherein the at least one processor executes the load distribution control based on a result of prediction of movement of the wireless terminal.” ([para 0034]: “In the case where it is predicted that the out-of-range mobile station apparatus will arrive at the handover region, the beam forming function section 141 estimates a predicted arrival location which exists within the handover region and at which the out-of-range mobile station apparatus is predicted to arrive, based on the movement information, and obtains a setting value set associated with the predicted arrival location from the profile database 130.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Furuichi, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to be based on predicted mobility as disclosed by Furuichi. The motivation for doing so is that it increases flexibility. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Furuichi to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Claim(s) 11-12 and 14-17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gaal (US 20210321416 A1) in view of Lekutai (US 20210112550 A1) and further in view of Tsui (US 20220279535 A1).
Regarding claim 11, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the at least one processor extracts a feature value based on a reception level of a received signal at a base station antenna of the wireless base station and detects occurrence of the interference by using the feature value, and a statistical value of the reception level in a fixed period is used as the feature value.”
However, Tsui discloses the missing “the at least one processor extracts a feature value based on a reception level of a received signal at a base station antenna of the wireless base station and detects occurrence of the interference by using the feature value, and a statistical value of the reception level in a fixed period is used as the feature value.” ([para 0097]: “In exemplary embodiments, the system 162a (e.g., the vDUs 166a and/or the vCUs 174a) may (e.g., using one or more AI-based algorithms or the like) be capable of monitoring for or detecting external sources and performing action(s) to mitigate interference to and/or from such external sources. For example, as shown in FIG. 4C, there may generally be external radiating/noise sources (e.g., fixed interferers) located in or near a cell, such as Earth stations (whose locations may be known), repeaters (whose locations may or may not be known), and/or the like, that might affect UL and/or DL performance or that might be affected by out-of-band emissions of the DL. In various embodiments, the system 162a may be configured to monitor for or detect level(s) of interference (e.g., in the UL) from such an external source, and perform one or more mitigative actions. In some embodiments, the system 162a may utilize available geolocation information (if available) regarding an external noise source and/or UL-received signal (e.g., post pilot removal) covariance measurements to determine adjustments for various antenna elements 202 of an aggregation of modular antenna arrays 200.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Tsui, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to utilize an AI/ML model as disclosed by Tsui. The motivation for doing so is that it increases accuracy. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Tsui to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Regarding claim 12, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the at least one processor extracts a feature value based on a reception level of a received signal at a base station antenna of the wireless base station and detects occurrence of the interference by using the feature value, and the reception level of a reference signal transmitted by an adjacent other wireless base station is used as the feature value.”
However, Tsui discloses the missing “the at least one processor extracts a feature value based on a reception level of a received signal at a base station antenna of the wireless base station and detects occurrence of the interference by using the feature value, and the reception level of a reference signal transmitted by an adjacent other wireless base station is used as the feature value.” ([para 0097]: “In exemplary embodiments, the system 162a (e.g., the vDUs 166a and/or the vCUs 174a) may (e.g., using one or more AI-based algorithms or the like) be capable of monitoring for or detecting external sources and performing action(s) to mitigate interference to and/or from such external sources.” ; [para 0153]: “As described above in connection with various embodiments, such as those relating to FIG. 4A, a coherence block (or coherence bandwidth and coherence time) can be used to determine the number of orthogonal SRS/pilot sequences that may be used by a cell and/or various neighboring cells.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Tsui, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to utilize an AI/ML model as disclosed by Tsui. The motivation for doing so is that it increases accuracy. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Tsui to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Regarding claim 14, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal further discloses “the wireless base station includes a radio wave sensor, and…” ([para 0079]: “The device 705 may include a receiver 710, a communications manager 715, and a transmitter 735. The device 705 may also include a processor. Each of these components may be in communication with one another (e.g., via one or more buses).”)
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the at least one processor extracts a feature value based on a reception level of a received signal at the radio wave sensor, and detects occurrence of the interference by using the feature value.”
However, Tsui discloses the missing “the at least one processor extracts a feature value based on a reception level of a received signal at the radio wave sensor, and detects occurrence of the interference by using the feature value.” ([para 0097]: “In exemplary embodiments, the system 162a (e.g., the vDUs 166a and/or the vCUs 174a) may (e.g., using one or more AI-based algorithms or the like) be capable of monitoring for or detecting external sources and performing action(s) to mitigate interference to and/or from such external sources. For example, as shown in FIG. 4C, there may generally be external radiating/noise sources (e.g., fixed interferers) located in or near a cell, such as Earth stations (whose locations may be known), repeaters (whose locations may or may not be known), and/or the like, that might affect UL and/or DL performance or that might be affected by out-of-band emissions of the DL. In various embodiments, the system 162a may be configured to monitor for or detect level(s) of interference (e.g., in the UL) from such an external source, and perform one or more mitigative actions. In some embodiments, the system 162a may utilize available geolocation information (if available) regarding an external noise source and/or UL-received signal (e.g., post pilot removal) covariance measurements to determine adjustments for various antenna elements 202 of an aggregation of modular antenna arrays 200.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Tsui, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to utilize an AI/ML model as disclosed by Tsui. The motivation for doing so is that it increases accuracy. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Tsui to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Regarding claim 15, Gaal in view of Lekutai in view of Tsui discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the at least one processor inputs the feature value to a trained model and thereby detects occurrence of the interference, and the trained model is generated by machine learning using the feature value in a past.”
However, Tsui discloses the missing “the at least one processor inputs the feature value to a trained model and thereby detects occurrence of the interference, and the trained model is generated by machine learning using the feature value in a past.” ([para 0097]: “In exemplary embodiments, the system 162a (e.g., the vDUs 166a and/or the vCUs 174a) may (e.g., using one or more AI-based algorithms or the like) be capable of monitoring for or detecting external sources and performing action(s) to mitigate interference to and/or from such external sources. For example, as shown in FIG. 4C, there may generally be external radiating/noise sources (e.g., fixed interferers) located in or near a cell, such as Earth stations (whose locations may be known), repeaters (whose locations may or may not be known), and/or the like, that might affect UL and/or DL performance or that might be affected by out-of-band emissions of the DL. In various embodiments, the system 162a may be configured to monitor for or detect level(s) of interference (e.g., in the UL) from such an external source, and perform one or more mitigative actions. In some embodiments, the system 162a may utilize available geolocation information (if available) regarding an external noise source and/or UL-received signal (e.g., post pilot removal) covariance measurements to determine adjustments for various antenna elements 202 of an aggregation of modular antenna arrays 200.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Tsui, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to utilize an AI/ML model as disclosed by Tsui. The motivation for doing so is that it increases accuracy. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Tsui to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Regarding claim 16, Gaal in view of Lekutai in view of Tsui discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal further discloses “the at least one processor determines presence or absence of the interference for each TDD slot number.” ([para 0063]: “In this example, a semi-synchronous TDD slot allocation may include a first set of fixed DL slots 305 (e.g., slots 305-a, 305-b, and 305-c), a second set of flexible slots 310 (e.g., slots 310-a, 310-b, and 310-c), and a third set of UL slots 315 (e.g., slots 315-a, and 315-b).”)
Regarding claim 17, Gaal in view of Lekutai in view of Tsui discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the at least one processor determines presence or absence of the interference for each beam in beam control using a plurality of antenna elements.”
However, Tsui discloses the missing “the at least one processor determines presence or absence of the interference for each beam in beam control using a plurality of antenna elements.” ([para 0097]: “In exemplary embodiments, the system 162a (e.g., the vDUs 166a and/or the vCUs 174a) may (e.g., using one or more AI-based algorithms or the like) be capable of monitoring for or detecting external sources and performing action(s) to mitigate interference to and/or from such external sources… In one or more embodiments, adjustments for the various antenna elements 202 may include precoding or the like for null patterns (e.g., quiescent nulls) and/or changes in beam directions, such that DL transmissions (which may, for example, include parallel transmissions in Mu-MIMO mode) may be steered away from (or avoid) the external noise source(s) and/or may null out-of-band emissions that might otherwise interfere with the external entity or entities.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Tsui, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to utilize an AI/ML model as disclosed by Tsui. The motivation for doing so is that it increases accuracy. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Tsui to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Claim(s) 13 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Gaal (US 20210321416 A1) in view of Lekutai (US 20210112550 A1), Tsui (US 20220279535 A1), and further in view of Furuichi (US 20180255497 A1).
Regarding claim 13, Gaal in view of Lekutai discloses all the features of the parent claim.
Gaal does not explicitly disclose “the at least one processor estimates a position of other wireless terminals in a wireless communication system, wherein the at least one processor extracts a feature value based on the position of the other wireless terminals and a reception level of a received signal at the other wireless terminals, and detects occurrence of the interference by using the feature value.”
However, Tsui discloses the missing “the at least one processor estimates a … of other wireless terminals in a wireless communication system, wherein the at least one processor extracts a feature value based on the … of the other wireless terminals and a reception level of a received signal at the other wireless terminals, and detects occurrence of the interference by using the feature value.” ([para 0097]: “In exemplary embodiments, the system 162a (e.g., the vDUs 166a and/or the vCUs 174a) may (e.g., using one or more AI-based algorithms or the like) be capable of monitoring for or detecting external sources and performing action(s) to mitigate interference to and/or from such external sources. For example, as shown in FIG. 4C, there may generally be external radiating/noise sources (e.g., fixed interferers) located in or near a cell, such as Earth stations (whose locations may be known), repeaters (whose locations may or may not be known), and/or the like, that might affect UL and/or DL performance or that might be affected by out-of-band emissions of the DL. In various embodiments, the system 162a may be configured to monitor for or detect level(s) of interference (e.g., in the UL) from such an external source, and perform one or more mitigative actions. In some embodiments, the system 162a may utilize available geolocation information (if available) regarding an external noise source and/or UL-received signal (e.g., post pilot removal) covariance measurements to determine adjustments for various antenna elements 202 of an aggregation of modular antenna arrays 200.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal and Tsui, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to utilize an AI/ML model as disclosed by Tsui. The motivation for doing so is that it increases accuracy. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Tsui to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Gaal in view of Tsui does not explicitly disclose utilizing “position.”
However, Furuichi discloses utilizing “position.” ([para 0034]: “In the case where it is predicted that the out-of-range mobile station apparatus will arrive at the handover region, the beam forming function section 141 estimates a predicted arrival location which exists within the handover region and at which the out-of-range mobile station apparatus is predicted to arrive, based on the movement information, and obtains a setting value set associated with the predicted arrival location from the profile database 130.”)
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the invention, having the teachings of Gaal, Tsui, and Furuichi, to modify the technique as disclosed by Gaal, to be based on predicted mobility as disclosed by Furuichi. The motivation for doing so is that it increases flexibility. Therefore, it would have been obvious to combine Gaal with Tsui and Furuichi to obtain the invention as specified in the instant claim.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SAAD KHAWAR whose telephone number is (571)272-7948. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 9:00am - 5:00pm.
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, Charles Jiang can be reached at (571)-270-7191. 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.
/SAAD KHAWAR/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2412
Prosecution Insights