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 § 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) 1, 2, 7-9, 15, 16, and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kim US 20240373300 in view of Wu US 20200337108.
Regarding claim 1, 8, 15, Kim teaches a base station distribution unit comprising:
one or more processors ([0012]); and
memory ([0012]) storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the base station
distribution unit (BS-DU) to:
receive, from a wireless device, a random access (RA) preamble based on an RA configuration associated with at least one network slice (the first terminal may transmit a first random access preamble corresponding to the first slice group ID including a network slice used by the first terminal among the at least one slice group ID to the DU, [0020]); and
send, to a base station central unit (BS-CU), a first message comprising:
an indication of the at least one network slice (obtaining, by the CU, a first slice group identifier (ID) of a first terminal and slice mapping related information from a distributed unit (DU) (obtaining, by the CU, a first slice group identifier (ID) of a first terminal and slice mapping related information from a distributed unit (DU), abstract).
Although Kim teaches the base station DU sending an indication of the at least one network slice to the base station CU, the reference is silent on the message being sent via a radio resource control (RRC) request message.
Wu teaches the base station DU sending information to the base station CU via a radio resource control (RRC) request message ( In some, implementations, the gNB-CU 121 receives the RRC request message from the UE 110 via the gNB-DU 122, [0084]).
Therefore it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to modify the system of Kim by the base station DU sending information to the base station CU via a radio resource control (RRC) request message, as shown by Wu. This modification would benefit the system by informing the CU of the first
random access preamble corresponding to the first slice group ID including a network slice used by the first terminal.
Regarding claims 2, 9, 16, the indication of the at least one network slice comprises at least one of:
a field, parameter; or
an information element (IE) (a first slice group identifier (ID) of a first terminal, [0020]). Examiner corresponds applicant’s IE with the first slice group identifier (ID) of a first terminal of the reference.
Regarding claim 7, 20, the instructions further cause the BS-DU to determine the at least one network slice based on at least one of:
the RA preamble received from the wireless device being associated with the at least one network slice ( the first terminal may transmit a first random access preamble
corresponding to the first slice group ID including a network slice used by the first terminal among the at least one slice group ID to the DU, and the DU may recognize the first slice group ID based on the first random access preamble, [0020]);
the RA configuration associated with the receiving of the RA preamble being associated with the at least one network slice; or
a resource associated with receiving of the RRC request message from the wireless device being associated with the at least one network slice.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-6, 10-14, and 17-19 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 RONALD B ABELSON whose telephone number is (571)272-3165. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:00-4:30.
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/RONALD B ABELSON/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2476
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