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 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.
Introduction
Claims 1, 2, 4, and 6-15 are pending and have been examined in this Office Action. Claims 3 and 5 have been cancelled since the last Office Action.
Examiner’s Note
Examiner has cited particular paragraphs / columns and line numbers or figures in the references as applied to the claims below for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested from the applicant, in preparing the responses, to fully consider the references in their entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner. Applicant is reminded that the Examiner is entitled to give the broadest reasonable interpretation to the language of the claims. Furthermore, the Examiner is not limited to Applicants' definition which is not specifically set forth in the disclosure.
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, 2, 4, 6-10, and 13-15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over U.S. Patent Application Publication 2019/0286151 to Palanisamy in view of U.S. Patent Application Publication 2019/0383950 to Bagheri.
As per claim 1, Palanisamy discloses a movement control system, (Palanisamy; At least the abstract) comprising:
a first central processing unit (CPU) (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 26); and
a second central processing unit (CPU) (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 25), wherein
the second CPU is configured to:
receive sensor information from a plurality of sensors, wherein the sensor information is associated with a mobile device, the mobile device includes the plurality of sensors (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 27, 28, and 32; the vehicle CPU, i.e., second CPU, sends the sensor data to the server CPU, i.e., first CPU, thus the vehicle CPU must first obtain the data), and
the sensor information includes internal sensor information (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 27-29);
estimate a first position of the mobile device based on the internal sensor information (Palanisamy; At least 27 and 32); and
the first CPU is configured to:
recognize, at a specific time, a second position of the mobile device based on each of the sensor information and the estimated first position of the mobile device, (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 27 and 32)
Palanisamy discloses that the sensor data sent to the server CPU is real-time or near-term data, which would require timing information so that the server knows and understands the situation (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 30), but does not explicitly disclose:
allocate a time stamp to the sensor information (Bagheri; At least paragraph(s) 59),
receive, from the second CPU, the sensor information based on the allocation of the time stamp to the sensor information (Bagheri; At least paragraph(s) 59 and 61);
wherein the specific time corresponds to the allocated time stamp (Bagheri; At least paragraph(s) 61 and 62; a second position is determined based on the received vehicle location and sensor information at a time based on the time stamp, thus, the time of the second position is based, i.e., corresponds, to the time stamp); and
However, the above feature(s) are taught by Bagheri (Bagheri; At least as cited above). At the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have incorporated the teachings of Bagheri into the invention of Palanisamy with a reasonable expectation of success with the motivation of using a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way with predictable results. Generating a second position at the server CPU allows for improved and more accurate global positioning (Bagheri; At least paragraph(s) 61), which would result in improved and more accurate route generation for the vehicle.
Palanisamy further discloses generate route information based on the sensor information and the recognized second position of the mobile device (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 6 and 33-35), and
the second CPU is further configured to control a movement of the mobile device on a first movement route based on the route (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 4, 36, and 37).
As per claim 2, Palanisamy discloses wherein the first CPU is in a cloud server (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 6), and
the mobile device includes the second CPU (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 36 and 37).
As per claim 4, Palanisamy discloses wherein the second is further configured to: detect, based on the sensor information, at least one of an object on the first movement route of the object at a specific distance from the first movement route; and control, based on the internal sensor information and a distance between the object and the mobile device, at least one of an execution of an emergency braking control of the mobile device or a transmission of a re-plan instruction of the first movement route to the first CPU (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 4, 32, 34, and 35; The mobile device performs real-time trajectory control based on the locally sensed dynamic road scenario and sends position information to the first processing unit for re-planning or recover).
As per claim 6, Palanisamy discloses wherein the second CPU is further configured to re-estimate the first position of the mobile device at a current tie (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 35-37; the second processing unit uses the data received from the first processing unit to perform better trajectory calculations, as discussed in at least paragraph(s) 4 and 6),
Palanisamy does not explicitly disclose based on the recognized second position of the mobile device.
However, the above feature(s) are taught by Bagheri (Bagheri; At least paragraph(s) 61 and 62). At the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have incorporated the teachings of Bagheri into the invention of Palanisamy with a reasonable expectation of success with the motivation of using a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way with predictable results. Correcting the position of the road vehicle based on various data inputs results in a more accurate positioning, which would result in a more accurate and safer control.
As per claim 7, Palanisamy discloses wherein the second CPU is further configured to control the movement of the mobile device based on each of the route information and the re-estimated first position of the mobile device at the current time (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 35-37; the second processing unit uses the data received from the first processing unit to perform better trajectory calculations, as discussed in at least paragraph(s) 4 and 6).
As per claim 8, Palanisamy discloses wherein the first CPU is further configured to perform an object recognition process based on the sensor information, and the object recognition process includes at least one of a lighting color recognition of a traffic light, a road sign recognition, a white line recognition, a moving object recognition, or an action prediction of a moving object (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 28-30).
As per claim 9, Palanisamy discloses wherein the first CPU is further configured to generate the route information based on the recognized second position of the mobile device and the object recognition process (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 28-30, in view of Bagheri as discussed above).
As per claim 10, Palanisamy discloses wherein the first CPU is further configured to generate, at a time the mobile device is on the first movement route, a second movement route that is connected to the first movement route (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 34 and 35).
As per claims 13-15, Palanisamy discloses the method, movement control device, information processing device associated with claim 1. Therefore, claims 13-15 are rejected using the same citations and reasoning as applied to claim 1.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
Claim(s) 11 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Palanisamy, in view of Bagheri as applied to claim 10, and in further view of U.S. Patent Application Publication 2023/0406332 to Hasegawa et al.
As per claim 11, Palanisamy does not explicitly disclose wherein the second CPU is further configured to control, based on a delay in the generation of the second movement route, the mobile device to one of stop on the first movement route or stop at a specific distance from the first movement route.
However, the above feature(s) are taught by Hasegawa (Hasegawa; At least paragraph(s) 73 and 109). At the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have incorporated the teachings of Hasegawa into the invention of Palanisamy with a reasonable expectation of success with the motivation of using a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way with predictable results. Stopping the vehicle when calculated routes are not received would provide a safer operation of the autonomous vehicle and reduce likelihood of costly collisions.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
Claim(s) 12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Palanisamy, in view of Bagheri as applied to claim 1, and in further view of Hasegawa.
As per claim 12, Palanisamy discloses a first CPU and a second CPU (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 4), but does not explicitly disclose wherein the mobile device includes each of the first CPU and the second CPU.
However, the above feature(s) are taught by Hasegawa (Hasegawa; At least paragraph(s) 30 and 39). At the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have incorporated the teachings of Hasegawa into the invention of Palanisamy with a reasonable expectation of success with the motivation of simple substitution of one known element for another to obtain predictable results. Changing the location of a computer would be within the skill of and obvious to one in the art, and does not significantly alter the invention.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see page 11, filed 01/20/2026, with respect to claim interpretations and 35 U.S.C. 112 rejections have been fully considered and are persuasive. The claim interpretations and 35 U.S.C. 112 rejections have been withdrawn.
Applicant's arguments, see pages 12-16, filed 01/20/2026, with respect to the 35 U.S.C. 102 rejection, and dependent claims thereon, have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. With respect to Applicant's arguments that Palanisamy, in view of Bagheri, does not disclose “recognizes, at a specific time, a second position of the mobile device based on each of the sensor information and the estimated first position of the mobile device, wherein the specific time corresponds to the allocated time stamp”, the Examiner respectfully disagrees. Palanisamy discloses the first CPU obtaining an initial position and sensor data, and determining a fused position estimate, which is at a time (Palanisamy; At least paragraph(s) 32). Bagheri teaches sending the information to the first CPU with time stamps and determining an updated position based on combined data (Bagheri; At least paragraph(s) 61 and 62). Combining Bagheri into Palanisamy leads to a second position at a time based on combined data including a time stamp. Therefore, the second position at the time is based on the time stamp, i.e., it corresponds to the time stamp.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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 DAVID P MERLINO whose telephone number is (571)272-8362. The examiner can normally be reached M-Th 5:30am-3:00pm F 5:30-9:00 am ET.
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/David P. Merlino/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3665