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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on August 29, 2024 and March 06, 2025 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
Drawings
The drawings were received on March 11, 2024. These drawings are acceptable.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1, and 16-17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Wang et al. (hereinafter “Wang”, US 2024/0348377)
Regarding claims 1, 16, and 17, Wang discloses a method for determining semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) physical downlink shared channel (PDSCH), performed by a terminal (i.e., UE 600 as shown in Fig. 6), a terminal, and a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium, wherein the computer-readable storage medium stores computer instructions for causing a computer (i.e., a program 632 stored on the memory 634, and executed by the processor 628 as shown in Fig. 6) to implement:
determining SPS PDSCHs activated by a base station in a slot, wherein the SPS PDSCHs include a first SPS PDSCH set of SPS PDSCHs for carrying unicast service and/or a second SPS PDSCH set of SPS PDSCHs for carrying broadcast/multicast service (i.e., receiving from a BS a first configuration for unicast configuration for unicast SPS PDSCH as described in Abstract); and
determining, based on type of services carried by the activated SPS PDSCHs (i.e., determining whether UE is scheduled with unicast PDSCH service or multicast service as described in paragraph 0161) and a PDSCH reception capability supported by the terminal, SPS PDSCHs for transmitting or receiving data (i.e., determining FDM muticast/unicast PDSCH capability as described in paragraph 0161),
wherein the PDSCH reception capability supported by the terminal includes a capability of a supported frequency division multiplexing (FDM) multiplexing mode determined by the terminal (i.e., FDM muticast/unicast PDSCH capability as described in paragraph 0161).
With further regard to claim 16, Wang further discloses a memory (i.e., memory 634 as shown in Fig. 6), a processor (i.e., processor 628 as shown in Fig. 6), and a computer program that is stored on the memory and executable on the processor (i.e., a program 632 stored on the memory 634, and executed by the processor 628 as shown in Fig. 6).
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) 2, 9, 18, and 22 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang in view of Zhang et al. (hereinafter “Zhang”, US 2024/0349266).
Regarding claims 2 and 18, Wang discloses all limitations recited within claims as described above, but does not expressly disclose features of these claims.
In a similar endeavor, Zhang discloses methods, devices, and computer readable medium for communication. Zhang also discloses wherein the capability of the supported FDM multiplexing mode comprises: a capability to support determining, in SPS PDSCHs of the activated SPS PDSCHs that have an FDM relationship, a type of service carried by an SPS PDSCH for transmitting or receiving data, and the quantity of SPS PDSCHs corresponding to each type (i.e., for multiple frequency division multiplex (FDM) based, SPS/CG configuration can cross multiple CCs as described in paragraph 0056, and there is a SPS PDSCH occasion 420-1 for the first TB on CC#0 and SPS PDSCH occasion 420-2 for the second TB on CC#1 as shown in Fig. 4B, and as described in paragraph 0057).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skilled in the art to modify the teachings of the cited references, and arrive at the present invention.
The motivation/suggestion for doing so would have been to optimize the use of SPS PDSCHs in 5G networks.
Regarding claims 9 and 22, Wang and Zhang disclose all limitations recited within claims as described above. Zhang also discloses wherein the capability of the supported FDM multiplexing mode specifically comprises:
a capability to: support determining, in the SPS PDSCHs of the activated SPS PDSCHs that have the FDM relationship, one SPS PDSCH for carrying unicast service and at most (n−1) SPS PDSCHs for carrying broadcast/multicast service as the SPS PDSCHs for transmitting or receiving data, or support determining, in the SPS PDSCHs of the activated SPS PDSCHs that have the FDM relationship, at most n SPS PDSCHs for carrying broadcast/multicast service as the SPS PDSCHs for transmitting or receiving data (i.e., for multiple frequency division multiplex (FDM) based, SPS/CG configuration can cross multiple CCs as described in paragraph 0056, and there is a SPS PDSCH occasion 420-1 for the first TB on CC#0 and SPS PDSCH occasion 420-2 for the second TB on CC#1 as shown in Fig. 4B, and as described in paragraph 0057. Also see Figs. 3, 4A-4B and its descriptions),
wherein n is a supported maximum multiplexing quantity determined by the terminal in a set of SPS PDSCHs overlapping in time domain and/or frequency domain (i.e., for multiple frequency division multiplex (FDM) based, SPS/CG configuration can cross multiple CCs as described in paragraph 0056, and there is a SPS PDSCH occasion 420-1 for the first TB on CC#0 and SPS PDSCH occasion 420-2 for the second TB on CC#1 as shown in Fig. 4B, and as described in paragraph 0057).
Claim(s) 10 and 23 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Wang in view of Zhang, and further in view of Hwang et al. (hereinafter “Hwang”, US 10,932,245).
Regarding claim 10, Wang and Zhang disclose all limitations recited within claims as described above, but do not expressly disclose features of these claims.
In a similar endeavor, Hwang discloses reception of multiple PDSCHs simultaneously. Hwang also discloses wherein the determining, based on type of services carried by the activated SPS PDSCHs and a PDSCH reception capability supported by the terminal, SPS PDSCHs for transmitting or receiving data comprises:
determining priorities of the activated SPS PDSCHs (i.e., UE determining one unicast PDSCH and another unicast PDSCH and deciding not to decode the unicast PDSCH with a lower priority as described in col. 13, lines 4-25); and
determining, based on a high-to-low order of the priorities of the activated SPS PDSCHs, the types of the services carried by the activated SPS PDSCHs and the PDSCH reception capability supported by the terminal, the SPS PDSCHs for transmitting or receiving data (i.e., UE determining one unicast PDSCH and another unicast PDSCH and deciding not to decode the unicast PDSCH with a lower priority as described in col. 13, lines 4-25).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skilled in the art to modify the teachings of the cited references, and arrive at the present invention.
The motivation/suggestion for doing so would have been to optimize the capability of the UE.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-8, 11-12, and 19-21 are 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.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to WAYNE CAI whose telephone number is (571)272-7798. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Thursday, 7:00 AM-5:00 PM.
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/Wayne H Cai/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2644