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 .
Election/Restrictions
Applicants’ election with traverse of claims 6, 7, and 15-18 in the reply filed on 07/10/2026 is acknowledged. The traversal is on the ground(s) that groups I and II represent a single inventive concept using multi-perspective claiming, with Group I directed to the user plane function (UPF) and Group II directed to the policy control function (PCF).These two groups are implementations of the same unified technical solution for establish direct interaction between the PCF and the UPF. This is found persuasive. The requirement for Restriction/Election filed 05/18/2026 is withdrawn. Claims 1-7 and 10-18 are pending.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-7 and 10-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to abstract idea without significantly more.
The claims (claims 1 and 6) recite the limitations acquiring an identity of a policy control function (PCF) network element, establishing an association session with the PCF network element, reporting user plane usage information to the PCF network element, and receiving a user plane policy fed back based on the user plane usage information from the PCF network element” and “receiving an association session establishment request initiated by a user plane function (UPF) network element and establishing an association session with the UPF network element, receiving user plane usage information reported by the PCF network element, and delivering a user plane policy fed back based on the user plane usage information to the PCF network element”. These limitations, as drafted, is a simple process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the human mind, then it falls within the "Mental Process" grouping of abstract ideas, Accordingly, the claim recites an abstract idea. This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particular, the claims 10 and 17 only recites one additional element – an electronic device comprising a processor to perform the user plane policy authorization.
In the claims, the acquiring, receiving, reporting, delivering steps are recited at a high-level of generality such that it amounts no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component. Accordingly, this additional element does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. The claim is directed to an abstract idea.
The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. As discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional element of using a processing of acquiring , reporting, receiving, and delivering steps amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component. Mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic computer component cannot provide an inventive concept. The claim is not patent eligible.
Claims 2-5, 7, and 10-18 are dependent to rejected claims 1 and 6, respectively; therefore, claims 2-5, 7, and 10-18 are rejected with the same reasons set forth to claims 1 and 6.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-7 and 10-18 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C.101 set forth in this Office action.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Hu et al. (US 2020/0045770) discloses a SMF sends an identity to PCF then sends the service policy to UPF.
Qiao et al. (US 2021/0297536) discloses a UPF node, and a PCF node interact to perform a session establishment for a UE.
Sun et al. (US 2023/0164591) discloses the SMF sends an identifier of a UPF to the PCF.
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/TIMOTHY X PHAM/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3648
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