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.
DETAILED ACTION
This communication is in response to Application No. 18/578,206 filed on 10 January 2024. The response filed 2 July 2026 amends claim 1, 4-6, 8, 9, 12, 13, 16, and 25-27, cancels claims 17, 19-24, and 28-30, and presents arguments is hereby acknowledged. Claims 1-16, 18, and 25-27 are presented for examination.
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicants’ submission filed on 23 July 2026 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Independent Claims 1, 13, and 25
On pages 9-12 of the response filed 2 July 2026, Applicant addresses the 35 U.S.C. 103 rejection made on the 4 May 2026 Final Rejection. Applicant’s arguments, regarding the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 103, have been fully considered.
On pages 9-12, Applicant argues that the Tseng/InterDigital system fails to teach or suggest “wherein the message of the RACH procedure comprises a RACH message 3 or a RACH message A.” Applicant argues that section 3.2 of INTERDIGITAL and attempting SDT retransmission on RACH as described in TSENG fails to disclose the amended limitation. Examiner respectfully agrees and finds this argument persuasive. Although both Tseng and InterDigital of the Tseng/InterDigital system reference “TS38.331 3GPP Radio Resource Control (RRC) protocol specification,” none of the references explicitly disclose “wherein the message of the RACH procedure comprises a RACH message 3 or a RACH message A.” Therefore, Examiner finds this argument persuasive.
Dependent Claims 5 and 27
On pages 12-13 of the response filed 2 July 2026, Applicant addresses the 35 U.S.C. 103 rejection made on the 4 May 2026 Final Rejection.
Applicant argues that the Tseng/InterDigital system fails to teach or suggest “wherein the message of the RACH procedure does not include a request to resume the connection.” Applicant argues that section 3.2 of INTERDIGITAL and attempting SDT retransmission on RACH as described in TSENG fails to disclose the amended limitation. Examiner respectfully agrees and finds this argument persuasive. None of the Tseng/InterDigital system disclose the amended limitation/ Therefore, Examiner finds this argument persuasive.
Dependent Claims 2-12, 14-16, 18, 26, and 27
On pages 9-13 of the response filed 2 July 2026, Applicant addresses the 35 U.S.C. 103 rejection made on the 4 May 2026 Final Rejection. Applicant submits that these claims are allowable at least as depending from an allowable independent claim, and further in view of the amendments to the independent claims, and the comments provided above. As per the comments above, Examiner found the arguments persuasive. Further search has been conducted and a new reference is considered.
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.
Claims 1-16, 18, and 25-27 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US PGPUB 2023/0180223 A1 to Tseng et al, in view of NPL Small Data Transmission Failure and Cell Reselection (from 1/10/2024 IDS, hereafter InterDigital), and in view of US PGPUB 2021/0352466 A1 to Hu et al.
Regarding Claim 1, Tseng discloses a user equipment (UE) for wireless communication (FIG. 3, UE 202), comprising: one or more memories (FIG. 5, Memory 528); and one or more processors coupled to the one or more memories, the one or more memories comprising instructions executable by the one or more processors (FIG. 5, Processor 526) to cause the UE to: transmit an uplink message, via a configured grant, while the UE is in an inactive state (FIG. 2B, 0064, and 0147 provides for transmit an RRC resume request, via the UL configured grant during an RRC Inactive state), the uplink message including a request to resume a connection and uplink data (0061 and 0064 provides for the RRC resume request multiplexed with UL data); initiate a random access channel (RACH) procedure based at least in part on the configured grant being unsuitable for subsequent transmissions of the uplink data (0129, 0166-0167, and Table 3 provides for implementing random access procedure for re-establishment procedure based in part on the T319 timer expiry, an example of radio link failure detected in the RRC layer). Tseng doesn’t explicitly disclose transmit, via a message of the RACH procedure, at least a portion of the uplink data and a cell radio network temporary identifier (C-RNTI) of the UE, wherein the message of the RACH procedure comprises a RACH message 3 or a RACH message A. InterDigitial, in a similar field of endeavor, discloses transmit, via a message of the RACH procedure, at least a portion of the uplink data (Section 3.2 “UE actions upon SDT failure detection timer expiry” provides for UE attempts retransmission on RACH resource upon expiry of SDT failure detection timer based on proposals 5 and 6) and a cell radio network temporary identifier (C-RNTI) of the UE (Section 5 “References” provides for 3GPP TS 38.331 RRC Protocol specification disclosing message fields MAC-CE and C-RNTI). One of ordinary skill in the art before the effectively filed date of the claimed invention would have recognized the ability to utilize the teachings of InterDigital for RACH-based retransmission. The RACH-based retransmission of InterDigital, when implemented with the RRC inactive state of the Tseng system, will allow one of ordinary skill in the art to detect radio link failure in order to retransmit based on failure detection. Therefore, the examiner concludes it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to utilize the RACH-based retransmission of InterDigital with the RRC inactive state of the Tseng system for the desirable purpose of communicating after link failure detection. The Tseng/InterDigital system doesn’t explicitly disclose wherein the message of the RACH procedure comprises a RACH message 3 or a RACH message A. Hu, in a similar field of endeavor, discloses wherein the message of the RACH procedure comprises a RACH message 3 or a RACH message A (0046-0051 provides for enabling small data transmissions using 4-step RACH where Message A includes the reduced capability UE may support with C-RNTI). One of ordinary skill in the art before the effectively filed date of the claimed invention would have recognized the ability to utilize the teachings of Hu for RACH-based retransmission explicitly stating Message A. The Message A of Hu, when implemented with the RRC inactive state of the Tseng/InterDigital system, will allow one of ordinary skill in the art to update UE capability in order to enable small data transmissions. Therefore, the examiner concludes it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the application to utilize the Message A of Hu with the RRC inactive state of the Tseng/InterDigital system for the desirable purpose of enabling small data transmission using RACH procedure.
Regarding Claim 2, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 1, wherein the configured grant is unsuitable for the subsequent transmissions of the uplink data based at least in part on one or more of: a timing alignment value being invalid, a change in reference signal received power, failure to detect a qualified synchronization signal block before the subsequent transmissions of the uplink data, timing of a subsequent transmission occasion of the configured grant, a periodicity of transmission occasions of the configured grant, a latency requirement of the subsequent transmissions of the uplink data, a size of transmission occasions of the configured grant, an expected size of the subsequent transmissions of the uplink data, or a failure to receive a network response to the uplink message (Tseng, 0129, and Table 3 provides for T319 expiry is detection of radio link failure).
Regarding Claim 3, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 1, wherein the RACH procedure comprises: a 2-step RACH procedure, a 4-step RACH procedure (Tseng, FIG. 2B and 0061 provides for 4-step RA), a small data transfer (SDT) RACH procedure, or a non-SDT RACH procedure.
Regarding Claim 4, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 1, wherein the message of the RACH procedure comprises a medium access control (MAC) control element (MAC CE) that includes a buffer status report (Tseng, 0075 provides for Buffer Status Report).
Regarding Claim 5, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 1, wherein the message of the RACH procedure does not include a request to resume the connection (Hu, 0045 provides for Message A may include a Physical Random Access Channel (PRACH) preamble and a PUSCH transmission). Same motivation as claim 1.
Regarding Claim 6, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 1, wherein the one or more memories further comprise instructions executable by the one or more processors to cause the UE to: receive a random-access response (Tseng, FIG. 2B and 0064 provides for receiving MSG 2); and stop a timing alignment timer for the configured grant or restarting the timing alignment timer for the configured grant (Tseng, 0193 and Table 4 provides for the UE stops the timer).
Regarding Claim 7, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 6, wherein a resource associated with the configured grant is valid based at least in part on restarting the timing alignment timer for the configured grant (Tseng, 0164-0165 provides for the TA is valid based on resetting a counter).
Regarding Claim 8, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 1, wherein the one or more memories further comprise instructions executable by the one or more processors to cause the UE to: select a RACH-based small data transfer (SDT) procedure as the RACH procedure (Tseng, 0073 provides for using a RACH-based mechanism for SDT in an RRC-Inactive state) based at least in part on one or more of: whether a size of the uplink data satisfies an SDT volume threshold (Tseng, 0126 and 0174-0178 provides for the MAX_RA.sub.Inactive is maxRetxThreshold or the maximum number of retrnamissions), or whether a signal strength parameter satisfies an SDT signal strength threshold.
Regarding Claim 9, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 8, wherein the instructions, executable to cause the UE to initiate the RACH procedure, are executable to cause the UE to: use an uplink carrier configured for the configured grant (Tseng, 0081 provides for UL configured grant), or perform uplink carrier selection.
Regarding Claim 10, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 8, wherein the instructions, executable to cause the UE to initiate the RACH procedure, are executable to cause the UE to: use a RACH occasion or a physical RACH resource associated with the RACH- based SDT procedure (Tseng, 0073 provides for a RACH-based mechanism to implement small data transmission).
Regarding Claim 11, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 1, wherein the configured grant is unsuitable for the subsequent transmissions of the uplink data based at least in part on failure of the uplink message as determined based at least in part on one or more of: an indication that the uplink message was not successfully received by a base station, a failure to receive a network response to the uplink message before expiration of a response timer (Tseng, 0129 and Table 3 provides for on the T319 timer expiry, an example of radio link failure detected in the RRC layer), or satisfaction of a threshold number of failures of uplink messages using the configured grant.
Regarding Claim 12, the Tseng/InterDigital/Hu system discloses the UE of claim 11, wherein the message of the RACH procedure comprises a request to resume the connection based at least in part on the failure of the uplink message (Tseng, 0061 provides for UE 202 may transmit an RRC resume request).
Regarding Claim 13, similar rejection where the UE of claim 1 teaches the method of claim 13.
Regarding Claim 14, similar rejection where the UE of claim 2 teaches the method of claim 14.
Regarding Claim 15, similar rejection where the UE of claim 3 teaches the method of claim 15.
Regarding Claim 16, similar rejection where the UE of claim 4 teaches the method of claim 16.
Regarding Claim 18, similar rejection where the UE of claim 6 teaches the method of claim 18.
Regarding Claim 25, similar rejection where the UE of claim 1 teaches the non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 25.
Regarding Claim 26, similar rejection where the UE of claim 4 teaches the non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 26.
Regarding Claim 27, similar rejection where the UE of claim 5 teaches the non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 27.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
US PGPUB 2023/0106194 A1 to Rudolf et al discloses 3GPP TS 38.331 protocol for early indication for initial access.
US PGPUB 2022/0022259 A1 to Atungsiri et al discloses an optional RRC suspend signaled in message 4.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SCHQUITA GOODWIN whose telephone number is (571)272-5477. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9am - 5pm EST.
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/SCHQUITA D GOODWIN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2459
Prosecution Insights