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 .
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) 1-3, 6, 8-10, 13, 15-17 and 20 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ye (US 2021/0352723, provisional application 62733891 (“891”)) in view of Zhang et al. (US 2021/0235292, “Zhang”).
Examiner’s note: in what follows, references are drawn to Ye unless otherwise mentioned.
Ye comprises the following features:
With respect to independent claims:
Regarding claim 1, a method comprising:
activating, by a wireless device, a first uplink bandwidth part (BWP) of a cell ([0035 and Fig. 3] “The illustrated example includes a timeline 302 during which the UE 110 maintains an RRC connection with the base station 120 and a first BWP is designated as the active BWP.” See [891, 0025].);
based on a failure indication ([0035 and Fig. 3] “At some point on the timeline 302, the UE 110 obtains information (e.g., control data or user data) and initiates a first LBT procedure 304 on the first BWP to determine whether a channel associated with the first BWP is available for transmitting the information.” See [891, 0025]. Note that Ye does not specifically describe about “based on a failure indication”. This will be discussed in view of Zhang. .):
starting a timer ([0037] “In response to this switch, the UE 110 also initiates a second LBT procedure 310 based on a channel status of the second BWP. Initiation of the second LBT procedure 310 may include setting a second timer 312” See [891, 0027].); and
incrementing a counter by one ([0041] “The first LBT procedure 304 and the second LBT procedure 310 use their own unique counter, timer”, and [0056] “the UE 110 sets an LBT counter associated with the second LBT procedure 310 to a default value assigned by the base station 120” See [891, 0042].);
activating, based on switching the first uplink BWP to a second uplink BWP of the cell ([0037] “The UE 110 complies with the command and switches the active BWP to the second BWP.” See [891, 0027].), the second uplink BWP of the cell (See below [0037] for successful LBT on the second BWP. ); and
based on the activating the second uplink BWP of the cell ([0037] “If the second LBT procedure 310 is successful, the UE 110 transmits uplink information (control data or user data) on the second BWP at 316” See [891, 0027].):
stopping the timer ([0037] “the UE 110 can stop the second timer 312 because the uplink information was transmitted.” See [891, 0027].); and
setting the counter to zero (This will be discussed in view of Zhang.).
It is noted that while disclosing switching a BWP, Ye does not specifically teach about counting based on a failure indication. It, however, had been known in the art before the effective date of the instant application as shown by Zhang as follows;
based on a failure indication, incrementing by one ([Zhang, 0022] “After receiving the BFI, the MAC layer adds 1 to the value of a counter”), setting the counter to zero ([Zhang, 0022] “if no BFI is indicated, the counter of the MAC layer is reset to zero.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of instant application to modify Ye by using the features of Zhang in order to perform beam failure procedures in non-active time of a DRX such that “to provide a link evaluation method in user equipment (UE) that allows performance of link quality measurement to assist in beam failure detection while achieving energy saving in a DRX mode” [Zhang, 0008].
Regarding claim 8, it is a device claim corresponding to the method claim 1, except the limitations, “one or more processors; and memory storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors” (See Fig. 2 and [0028] “The UE 110 also includes at least one processor 212 and computer-readable storage media 214 (CRM 214).”, and is therefore rejected for the similar reasons set forth in the rejection of claim 1.
Regarding claim 15, it is a terminal claim corresponding to the method claim 1, except the limitations, “a non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions” (See Fig. 2 and [0028] “The device data 216 includes user data, multimedia data, beamforming codebooks, applications, and/or an operating system of the UE 110, which are executable by the processor 212 to enable user-plane communication, control-plane signaling, and user interaction with the UE 110.”), and is therefore rejected for the similar reasons set forth in the rejection of claim 1.
With respect to dependent claims:
Regarding claims 2, 9 and 16, the method of claim 1, the wireless device of claim 8 and the non-transitory CRM of claim 15, respectively, wherein the failure indication comprises a beam failure indication (See aforesaid [Zhang, 0022] “BFI”).
Regarding claims 3, 10 and 17, the method of claim 1, the wireless device of claim 8 and the non-transitory CRM of claim 15, respectively, further comprising: sending, prior to the activating the second uplink BWP of the cell and based on the failure indication, an uplink transmission via the first uplink BWP of the cell ([0035] “The first LBT procedure 304 includes activation of a first timer 306, which defines a duration of time for the UE 110 to complete the first LBT procedure. Typically, the UE 110 continues the first LBT procedure 304 until the first timer 306 expires or the information transmits in accordance with the LBT protocol.”).
Regarding claims 6, 13 and 20, the method of claim 1, the wireless device of claim 8 and the non-transitory CRM of claim 15, respectively, further comprising: switching, based on receiving a message indicating the second uplink BWP, the first uplink BWP to the second uplink BWP of the cell ([0036] “the base station sends a command to the UE 110 to change the active BWP to a different BWP”).
Claim(s) 4, 11 and 18 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ye (US 2021/0352723, provisional application 62733891 (“891”)) in view of Zhang et al. (US 2021/0235292, “Zhang”) and further in view of Yu et al. (US 2018/0227899, “Yu”) and Yang et al. (US 2021/0135927, “Yang”).
Examiner’s note: in what follows, references are drawn to Ye unless otherwise mentioned.
Regarding claims 4, 11 and 18, it is noted that while disclosing switching a BWP, Ye does not specifically teach about transmitting a BFRQ transmission. It, however, had been known in the art before the effective date of the instant application as shown by Yu and Yang as follows;
the method of claim 1, the wireless device of claim 8 and the non-transitory CRM of claim 15, respectively, further comprising: sending, based on the failure indication, a beam failure recovery request transmission ([Yu, 0026] “In a first step of beam failure detection, UE 102 detects a beam failure condition …. In a third step of beam failure recovery request (BFRQ) transmission, UE 102 transmits a BFRQ message to BS 101) for a beam failure recovery procedure of a downlink BWP of a second cell ([Yang, 0112] “receiving, within a target time window based on the QCL information of the CORESET-BFR on the second cell or the second BWP, the beam failure recovery request response information carried on a dedicated physical downlink control channel (Physical Downlink Control Channel, PDCCH) in the CORESET-BFR.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of instant application to modify Ye by using the features of Yu and Yang in order to effectively utilize resources for BFR procedures such that “to resolve a problem that a CORESET-BFR cannot be flexibly configured in a multi-carrier system.” [Yang, 0005] and “a four-step beam failure recovery procedure is proposed.” [Yu, 0007].
Claim(s) 5, 12 and 19 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ye (US 2021/0352723, provisional application 62733891 (“891”)) in view of Zhang et al. (US 2021/0235292, “Zhang”) and further in view of Pang et al. (US 11,979,914, “Pang”).
Examiner’s note: in what follows, references are drawn to Ye unless otherwise mentioned.
Regarding claims 5, 12 and 19, it is noted that while disclosing switching a BWP, Ye does not specifically teach about a BWP inactivity timer. It, however, had been known in the art before the effective date of the instant application as shown by Pang as follows;
the method of claim 1, the wireless device of claim 8 and the non-transitory CRM of claim 15, respectively, further comprising: switching, based on a BWP inactivity timer associated with the cell, the first uplink BWP to the second uplink BWP of the cell ([Pang, Col. 14] “UL-specific scheduling DCI is used to switch a UL active BWP; in the TDD scenario, one piece of scheduling DCI is used to switch from an active BWP pair to another active BWP pair. (2) Dedicated timer, for example, a bandwidth part inactivity timer (BWP inactivity timer):”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of instant application to modify Ye by using the features of Pang in order to effectively use a BWP in an RA procedure for an UE such that “when the UE needs to perform a random access procedure, performing, by the UE, the random access procedure on an initial BWP if the first BWP does not meet a condition for performing a random access procedure” [Pang, Col. 1].
Claim(s) 7, 14 and 21 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ye (US 2021/0352723, provisional application 62733891 (“891”)) in view of Zhang et al. (US 2021/0235292, “Zhang”) and further in view of Xiong et al. (US 2022/0376769, “Xiong”) and Yuan et al. (US 2023/0199889, “Yuan”).
Examiner’s note: in what follows, references are drawn to Ye unless otherwise mentioned.
Regarding claims 7, 14 and 21, it is noted that while disclosing switching a BWP, Ye does not specifically teach about a BFRQ counter and a prohibit timer. It, however, had been known in the art before the effective date of the instant application as shown by Xiong and Yuan as follows;
the method of claim 1, the wireless device of claim 8 and the non-transitory CRM of claim 15, respectively, wherein the counter comprises a beam failure recovery request transmission counter ([Xiong, 0150] “the value of a counter for the beam failure recovery request signal will be increased by 1, and the value of the counter for the beam failure recovery request signal should be less than or equal to the maximum permissible number of transmissions of the beam failure recovery request signal.”), and wherein the timer comprises a prohibit timer ([Yuan, 0069] “the prohibit timer indicates the timings in which the BFR-PUCCH cannot be transmitted and the maximum number of transmission indicate the allowed maximum number of the BFR-PUCCH retransmissions for one beam failure event.”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of instant application to modify Ye by using the features of Yu and Yang in order to support BFR procedures in multicell environments such that “determining at least one of whether there is a candidate downlink transmission beam(s) and candidate downlink transmission beam information, if the UE detects that there is a beam failure” [Xiong, 0016] and “a method for processing a beam failure at a terminal device, wherein the terminal device is serviced in a primary cell and a secondary cell on separate beams, and the secondary cell operates in a self-scheduling mode.” [Yuan, 0007].
Conclusion
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/HARRY H KIM/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2411