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 .
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.
Claims 1-10 and 15-20 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 15, recite the limitation "the speaker" in line 8. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Examiner’s Note
Examiner has cited particular 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 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.
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)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 11-12 and 21-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Kilmkov et al. (US 11,410,684).
As to claim 1, Kilmkov teaches method (Figs.2, 5C) for tone/voice conversion, comprising: acquiring source audio data 214 and a tone/voice feature of a target speaker (target speech model 222); and acquiring a tone feature (source linguistic unit data 402) of the source audio data by a tone extraction network in a pre-trained tone conversion model (216) (Pars.26-35 or Col.4, line 50-Co.7, line 25); acquiring (Fig.4) a semantic feature (vocal characteristic data or aggregated source feature data 412 corresponding to the linguistic units of the source audio data 214) based on the tone feature 402 and a linear spectrum corresponding to the source audio data by a tone removal network in the tone conversion model, wherein the semantic feature is a feature in the source audio data (412) that is not related to a tone of a speaker(target speaker) but is related to semantic information(vocal characteristics) (Pars.15, 21-22; Col.3, lines 30-65); and acquiring synthesized audio data (290, 508) based on the semantic feature (412, 542) and the tone feature of the target speaker (222) by a vocoder (504) in the tone conversion model (Fig.1-5; Pars.68-76; Col.15, line 41-Col.17, line 50).
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As to claim 12, Kilmkov teaches acquiring the tone feature of the target speaker comprises acquiring a tone feature of the audio data by the tone extraction network in the tone conversion model in response to determining that the information of the target speaker is audio data (target speech data) (Pars.33-35, 41, 73-75; Col.6, line 60- Col.7, line 44).
Regarding claims 21-22, the corresponding program and electronic device performing the method of claim 11, are analogous therefore rejected as being anticipated by Kilmkov for the foregoing reasons.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-10 and 15-20 would be allowable if rewritten or amended to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DANIEL DEMELASH ABEBE whose telephone number is (571)272-7615. The examiner can normally be reached monday-friday 7-4.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Daniel Washburn can be reached at 571-272-5551. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/DANIEL ABEBE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2657
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