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 .
This office action is in response to communications filed on 5/04/2026.
Claims 1, 6-7, 12 and 17-18 are pending and presented for examination.
Claims 2-5, 8-11, 13-16 and 19-22 are cancelled.
Priority
Applicant’s claim for the benefit of a prior-filed application under 35 U.S.C. 119(e) or under 35 U.S.C. 120, 121, 365(c), or 386(c) is acknowledged.
The present application filed on 4/8/2025 is national stage entry of PCT application filed on 10/10/2022, which claims priority from provisional application filed on 10/08/2021.
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 5/4/2026 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to pending claim(s) have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Additionally, the following interpretations should be noted:
First, applicant original specification recites:
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In view of the specification above, one can determine that protocol stack 508 and protocol stack 510 of the terminal/WTRU 102 are exchanging messages via SDAC 502 component/layer. Specifically, SDAC receives from a first protocol layer of a radio access technology protocol stack (e.g. 508) of the WTRU 102, a first request for data, measurements and/or analytics information. The data, measurements and/or analytics information may be associated with one or more second protocol layers of the RAT protocol stack (e.g. 510) of the WTRU 102. The WTRU may collect the data, measurement and/or analytics information from the one or more second protocol layers of the RAT protocol stack (e.g. 510). The WTRU 102 may provide to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack (e.g. 508) the requested data, measurements and/or analytics information associated with the first request.
As such, the combination of protocol stack 508 (Wifi) AND protocol stack 510 (5G) is construed to be a hybrid RAT protocol stack of the WTRU or simply RAT protocol stack as in the claims. Neither specification nor claims limits or restricts the RAT as in the claim to a non-hybrid RAT protocol stack or a single RAT technology suite.
Hahn, similarly, discloses a hybrid RAT protocol suite comprising non-3gpp communication stack (e.g. wifi) AND 3gpp communication stack (e.g. 4g/5g) and communications between the two stacks is via the multi-RAT interworking control layer, similar to SDAC layer of applicant’s fig. 6.
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Furthermore, fig. 9-10 shows the communications between layers of 3gpp protocol stack and non-3gpp protocol stack. The communications include the 3GPP RRC layer of the terminal transmitting an interworking request message in order to secure a resource for the data to be transmitted in advance. The multi-RAT interworking control layer may receive the request from 3gpp RRC layer and transmit to RRC layer of non-3gpp protocol stack or non-3gpp RRC layer. The non-3gpp layer measures or collects the resource data from the access point. The non-3gpp layer then generates the interworking response message including the resource data allocation [e.g. time-frequency resource information] and transmits the response to the multi-RAT interworking control layer. The interworking control layer receives the response and transmits it to the 3gpp RRC layer of the terminal, See [0129-135].
Based on the broadest reasonable interpretation of the term “measurement or analytics information”, allocated amount of resource or allocated resource data can be categorized as measurement information (i.e. size, length or amount of something) or analytics (i.e. information resulting from analysis of data or statistics) because, e.g. time-frequency information logically or technically resulted from some analysis of network data such as traffic and available bandwidth and it conveys the amount of time and frequency information.
As such, Hahn teaches receiving from a first protocol layer of RAT a first request for measurement or analytics information associated with one or more second protocol layer of the RAT of the WTRU. See detailed claim mappings below.
Furthermore, LAIR teaches the process of providing to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU an indication that the measurement and/or analytics information associated with the first request is stored with the ADRF entity ([0092, 0096]: providing a pointer or reference where the measurement is stored, fig. 13).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1, 6-7, 12 and 17-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claims 1 and 12 recites the limitation “the collected data” in the “collecting” limitation. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. It is unclear whether the term is referring to the measurements and/or analytics data that was collected in the previous step or is referring to some other data, thereby enabling the scope of the claim unascertainable.
Claims 6-7 and 17-18 are dependent upon claim 1 and 12 and as such, are rejected due to their dependency on claims 1 and 12.
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 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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claim(s) 1, 6-7, 12 and 17-18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hahn (US 2019/0230485 A1) in view of Ore (US 2008/0014957 A1) and further in view of LAIR (US 2022/0263724 A1).
As per claim 1, Hahn discloses a method implemented by a wireless transmit/receive unit (WTRU) [Fig. 7: Terminal with multiple RATs, [0093]], the method comprising:
receiving, from a first protocol layer of a radio access technology (RAT) protocol stack of the WTRU by a stack data analytics coordinator (SDAC) entity executing on the WRTRU [fig. 7: 3GPP RRC layer, fig. 9: S904: 3GPP RRC Layer of the terminal sending interworking request to Multi-RAT interworking control layer which is receiving the request), a first request for measurement and/or analytics information associated with one or more second protocol layers of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU, wherein the first protocol layer is different from the one or more second protocol layers ([0093, 112-113], 115-117]: The Multi-RAT interworking control layer receives the interworking request message from the 3GPP RRC layer. The request message is for requesting measurement or analytics associated (related) with non 3gpp RRC layer or data associated with/from the non-3gpp access point in order to perform V2X communication);
collecting, by the SDAC entity, the measurement and/or analytics information from the one or more second protocol layers of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU (fig. 9: S905-S909), [0115-0117]: the measurements or analytics is collected by sending the internetworking request to the non-3gpp L1-L3 layer which further sends resource request message to the non 3g-pp access point and receives the resource data. Note: The resource request message includes measurements or amount of resources allocated in non-3gpp network);
providing, to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU, the response associated with the first request (fig. 9: S910: interworking response with the resource data is provided to the RRC layer of 3gpp stack, [0117-0118]).
Note: Based on broadest reasonable interpretation of the term “measurements or analytics”, the terms may cover any form (e.g. size, length or amount) data related to networks such as resources, allocation data, network data, etc. and any form of data that resulted from analysis of data. The term “and/or” covers both “and” or “or” in alternative form.
However, Hahn does not teach storing the collected data, measurement and/or analytics with an analytics data repository function (ADRF) entity executing on the WTRU and providing to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU by the SDAC entity an indication that the measurement and/or analytics information associated with the first request is stored with the ADRF entity.
Ore, from the same field of endeavor, discloses performing inter-RAT measurements and storing the collected data, measurement and/or analytics with an analytics data repository function (ADRF) entity executing on the WTRU [fig. 1 item #6, fig. 4 step#42 and 44, [0023]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Hahn in view of Ore in order to collect and store measurement data and/or analytics information with the ADRF entity on the WTRU.
One of ordinary skilled in the art would have been motivated in order to report the measurements to the network or the device, when necessary, e.g. during reestablishment of connection or during switching of network or during handover.
However, Hahn-Ore does not teach providing to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU by the SDAC entity an indication that the measurement and/or analytics information associated with the first request is stored with the ADRF entity.
LAIR, from the same field of endeavor, teaches the process of providing to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU an indication that the measurement and/or analytics information associated with the first request is stored with the ADRF entity ([0092, 0096]: providing a pointer or reference where the measurement is stored, fig. 13).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Hahn-Ore in view of LAIR in order to provide to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack which requested the measurement or analytics information an indication such as a reference or pointer where the measurement and/or analytics information is stored.
One of ordinary skilled in the art would have been motivated because it would have enabled efficient sharing of collected data or analytics data by allowing efficient storage and distribution of and access to the collected data or analytics data (LAIR: [0039-0040]).
As per claim 6, Hahn-Ore-LAIR discloses the method of claim 1, wherein the first protocol layer and the one or more second protocol layers are of the same RAT protocol stack of the WTRU (Hahn: [fig. 9, [0115-0118], fig. 7-8: First Terminal with multi-RAT protocol stack or hybrid RAT, i.e. same RAT with two different RATs integrated via multi-RAT interworking control layer).
As per claim 7, Hahn discloses the method of claim 1, wherein the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU (fig. 7: Terminal with multiple RAT stack) is a cellular protocol stack which includes a radio resource control (RRC) layer (fig. 7 RRC), a service data protocol (L2 layer), a service data application protocol (SDAP) layer (Multi-RAT Interworking Control layer), a packet data convergence protocol (PDCP) layer (fig. 7 - PDCP Layer), a radio link control (RLC) layer (fig. 7 RLC layer), a medium access control (MAC) layer, and/or a physical (PHY) layer (fig. 7) ((fig. 7-8: Terminal with multiple RATs, [0092-0093], [0097]: Multiple RAT protocol stack with 3gpp protocol stack and non-3gpp protocol stack).
As per claim 12, Hahn discloses A wireless transmit/receive unit (fig. 7: Terminal with multiple RATs) comprising:
a processor, a transceiver and a memory (fig. 3: every device or node includes processor, memory and transceiver) which are configured to:
execute a stack data analytics coordinator (SDAC) entity (fig. 7-8: Mulit-RAT Interworking Control layer);
receiving, from a first protocol layer of a radio access technology (RAT) protocol stack of the WTRU by the SDAC entity [fig. 7: RRC layer, fig. 9: S904: 3GPP RRC Layer sending interworking request to Multi-RAT interworking control layer), a first request for measurement and/or analytics information associated with one or more second protocol layers of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU, wherein the first protocol layer is different from the one or more second protocol layers ([0093, 112-113], 115-117]: The Multi-RAT interworking control layer receives the interworking request message from the 3GPP RRC layer. The request message is for requesting data or measurement from the non-3gpp access point in order to perform V2X communication);
collecting, by the SDAC, the measurement and/or analytics information from the one or more second protocol layers of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU (fig. 9: S905-S909), [0115-0117]: measurements is collected by sending the interworking request to the non-3gpp L1-L3 layer, which further sends resource request message to the access point, and receiving response with data. Note: The resource allocation message includes data or measurements or resources allocated in non-3gpp network); and
providing, to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU by the SDAC entity, the response associated with the first request (fig. 9: S910: interworking response with data is provided to the RRC layer of 3gpp stack, [0117-0118]).
However, Hahn does not teach an analytics data repository function (ADRF) entity storing the collected data, measurement and/or analytics and providing to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU by the SDAC entity an indication that the measurement and/or analytics information associated with the first request is stored with the ADRF entity.
Ore, from the same field of endeavor, discloses performing inter-RAT measurements and storing the collected data, measurement and/or analytics with an analytics data repository function (ADRF) entity executing on the WTRU ([fig. 1 item #6, fig. 4 step#42 and 44, [0023]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Hahn in view of Ore in order to collect and store measurement data and/or analytics information with the ADRF entity on the WTRU.
One of ordinary skilled in the art would have been motivated in order to report the measurements to the network or the device when needed.
However, Hahn-Ore does not teach providing to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU by the SDAC entity an indication that the measurement and/or analytics information associated with the first request is stored with the ADRF entity.
LAIR, from the same field of endeavor, teaches the process of providing to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack of the WTRU an indication that the measurement and/or analytics information associated with the first request is stored with the ADRF entity ([0092, 0096]: providing a pointer or reference where the measurement is stored, fig. 13).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Hahn-Ore in view of LAIR in order to provide to the first protocol layer of the RAT protocol stack which requested the measurement or analytics information an indication such as a reference or pointer where the measurement and/or analytics information is stored.
One of ordinary skilled in the art would have been motivated because it would have enabled efficient sharing of collected data or analytics data by allowing efficient storage and distribution of and access to the collected data or analytics data (LAIR: [0039-0040]).
As per claims 17-18, they do not teach or further define over the limitations in claims 6-7. Therefore, claims 17-18 are rejected for the same reasons as set forth in claims 6-7.
Pertinent Prior Arts
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Taaghol, US 8,547,932 B2: Handover Architecture for non-integrated radio access technologies [Highly Relevant prior art which discloses inter-layer communications of RAT protocol stack. See fig. 1-2].
Lo et al., US 2023/0239333 A1: Metrics Collection and Reporting in 5G
Matolia et al., US 2023/0403677 A1: Data Analytics for Multi-Access Edge Computing
Sirotkin, US 9,344,939 B2: Controlling Radio Access RAT communication managers
Amanat, WO 2018/127622 A1: Performance Indicator for Interworking RATs
Stephenne, US 11,438,915 B2: SDMA Carrier Sharing
Conclusion
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 KAMAL B DIVECHA whose telephone number is (571)272-5863. The examiner can normally be reached IFP Normal Hours M-F: 8am-4.30pm EST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, COLLEEN FAUZ can be reached at 5712721667. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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KAMAL B. DIVECHA
Primary Patent Examiner
Art Unit 2453
/KAMAL B DIVECHA/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2453
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