DETAILED ACTION
Claims status
In response to the application filed on 05/12/2026, claims 9-15 have been withdrawn from consideration and thus, claims 1-8 and 16-20 are currently pending for the examination. The present application, filed on or after March 1wl16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
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.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 05/12/2026 has been placed in the application file, and the information referred therein has been considered as to the merits.
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.
Claims 1 and 16 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by NAM et al. (US 2022/0338035 A1).
Regarding claim 1; Nam teaches a user equipment (UE), comprising: at least one memory; and at least one processor coupled with the at least one memory and configured to cause the UE to:
receive a configuration from a network for user equipment (UE)-specific search space (USS) sets and common search space (CSS) sets (See Fig. 7: At 708, the base station 704 may transmit to the UE 702 (i.e., receiving at the UE), and the UE 702 may receive from the base station 704, a configuration of PDCCH search space sets for the UE 702 based on the UE capability for PDCCH monitoring. At 710, the UE 702 may configure, based on the UE capability for PDCCH monitoring, first MOs of a USS set to align with second MOs of a CSS set. The first MOs of the USS set may be adjusted dynamically to be in same slots as the second MOs of the CSS set, or to be within a predefined range of the second MOs of the CSS set. ¶ [0069-0070]); and
receive control information associated with the CSS sets in the USS sets in response to the CSS sets (See Fig. 7: At 716, the base station 704 may transmit to the UE 702, and the UE 702 may receive from the base station 704, a plurality of PDCCHs during PDCCH MOs. The PDCCH MOs may correspond to first MOs of a USS set or second MOs of a CSS set. The first MOs of the USS set may be aligned with the second MOs of the CSS set. ¶ [0074]) being configured outside of monitoring occasions of the UE (See Fig. 6: the offset intervals next to the Monitoring Occasions (Mos) are considered as the outside of the MOs associated with the USS and CSS sets. See ¶ [0067]) and the USS sets are configured within physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring occasions of the UE (See Fig. 6: MOs of a USS set for a UE may be changed dynamically to be in the same slots as the MOs of the CSS set, or be at least within a certain range of the MOs of the CSS set. The MOs of a USS set may be determined based on the periodicity and the offset configuration (e.g., in the SS set configuration) to support multi-slot based PDCCH monitoring. See ¶ [0067]).
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Regarding claim 16: Nam teaches a method performed by a user equipment (UE), comprising:
receiving a configuration from a network for user equipment (UE)-specific search space (USS) sets and common search space (CSS) sets (See Fig. 7: At 708, the base station 704 may transmit to the UE 702 (i.e., receiving at the UE), and the UE 702 may receive from the base station 704, a configuration of PDCCH search space sets for the UE 702 based on the UE capability for PDCCH monitoring. At 710, the UE 702 may configure, based on the UE capability for PDCCH monitoring, first MOs of a USS set to align with second MOs of a CSS set. The first MOs of the USS set may be adjusted dynamically to be in same slots as the second MOs of the CSS set, or to be within a predefined range of the second MOs of the CSS set. ¶ [0069-0070]); and
receiving control information associated with the CSS sets in the USS sets in response to the CSS sets (See Fig. 7: At 716, the base station 704 may transmit to the UE 702, and the UE 702 may receive from the base station 704, a plurality of PDCCHs during PDCCH MOs. The PDCCH MOs may correspond to first MOs of a USS set or second MOs of a CSS set. The first MOs of the USS set may be aligned with the second MOs of the CSS set. ¶ [0074]) being configured outside of monitoring occasions of the UE (See Fig. 6: the offset intervals next to the Monitoring Occasions (Mos) are considered as the outside of the MOs associated with the USS and CSS sets. See ¶ [0067]) and the USS sets are configured within physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) monitoring occasions of the UE (See Fig. 6: MOs of a USS set for a UE may be changed dynamically to be in the same slots as the MOs of the CSS set, or be at least within a certain range of the MOs of the CSS set. The MOs of a USS set may be determined based on the periodicity and the offset configuration (e.g., in the SS set configuration) to support multi-slot based PDCCH monitoring. See ¶ [0067]).
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 set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied 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.
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over NAM et al. (US 2022/0338035 A1) in view of REN et al. (US 2024/0007900 A1).
Regarding claim 8; Nam teaches the UE wherein the at least one processor is configured to cause the UE to expect to determine monitoring of CSS within the PDCCH monitoring occasion (Nam-¶ [0069-0070]).
Nam doesn’t explicitly describe a method to prioritize using a USS budget.
However, Ren from the same or similar fields of endeavor further discloses the method to prioritize using a USS budget (Ren-the DCI sizes prioritization rule may be based on the priority of the search space set to which the PDCCH candidate with the DCI message belongs. In these cases, DCI sizes associated with PDCCH candidates in the lowest priority search space set may be dropped until the DCI sizes budget of the UE is reached, or until a number lower than the DCI sizes budget of the UE is reached. ¶ [0102] and ¶ [0103]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made to provide the method to prioritize using a USS budget as taught by Ren to have incorporated in the system of Nam, so that it would provide that a DCI size associated with a fallback DCI format may be dropped (e.g., dropped from the prioritized set of DCI sizes, or dropped from being used in blind decoding) before a DCI size associated with a non-fallback DCI format. In aspects, this rule may provide a benefit as non-fallback DCI may include useful and/or necessary information for control in downlink and uplink communications. Ren-¶ [0099].
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-7 and 17-20 are objected to as being dependent upon the rejected base claims but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
YU et al. (US 2022/00787289 A1).
Contact Information
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/SAI AUNG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2416
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