DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
2. 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. 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.
Status of Claims
1. The following is a non-final office action in response to the applicant’s submission received 07/18/2024.
2. Claims 1 – 20 are currently pending and have been examined.
Foreign Priority/Domestic benefit
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d). The certified copy has been filed in parent Application: KR-10-2023-0095628, which was filed on July 21, 2023.
There is no claim to domestic priority according to the application data sheet and filing receipt.
Oath/Declaration
1. The applicant’s oath/declaration filed on 07/18/2024 has been reviewed by the examiner and is found to conform to the requirements prescribed in 37 C.F.R. 1.63.
Information Disclosure Statement
1. The information disclosure statement filed on 07/18/2024 and 11/13/2024 are in compliance with the provision of 37 CFR 1.97, 1.98 and MPEP § 609. It has been placed in the application file and the information referred to therein has been considered as to the merits.
Drawings
1. The applicant’s drawings submitted on 07/18/2024 are acceptable for examination purposes.
Claim objection(s)
1. Regarding the independent claims, the acronym “ID” should be written in expanded form at least once at the first instance of its appearance in each claim set. Appropriate correction is required.
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 – 4, 7 – 9, 11 – 14 and 17 – 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kim et al. (US 2024/0147328 A1) in view of Palle Venkata et al. (US 2024/0340733 A1).
Regarding claim 1, Kim discloses: A method by a base station in a wireless communication system (see figure 36 – 37, the base station is labelled 3641 and 3741 respectively), the method comprising:
transmitting, to a user equipment (UE), a L1/L2 triggered mobility (LTM) medium access control (MAC) control element (CE) [see ¶ 0563: “…The wireless device may receive a medium access control (MAC) control element (CE) indicating to switch the primary cell to a cell of the one or more candidate cells…” and “…The MAC CE indicating to switch the primary cell to the cell may comprise a MAC CE indicating the cell. The MAC CE may indicate a timing advance (TA) associated with the cell. The LTM may comprise a special cell (SpCell) switch procedure that the base station triggers, via the MAC CE, based on a layer 1 (L1) measurements…”. See also ¶ 0440 - ¶ 0441],
wherein the LTM MAC CE includes at least one of candidate target configuration ID for the LTM [ ¶ 0563: “…The MAC CE indicating to switch the primary cell to the cell may comprise a MAC CE indicating the cell. The MAC CE may indicate a timing advance (TA) associated with the cell. The LTM may comprise a special cell (SpCell) switch procedure that the base station triggers, via the MAC CE, based on a layer 1 (L1) measurements…”; See also ¶ 0440 - ¶ 0441: “… For example, the L1/L2 signaling may comprise an MAC CE that the wireless device receives…The L1/L2 signaling may comprise an indication indicating one of the one or more configurations for LTM that are configured and/or indicated by the one or more messages (e.g., RRC message and/or SIB) that the wireless device receives. For example, the indication indicating a first configuration of the one or more configurations for LTM. The indication may comprise an identifier of the first configuration. For example, the indication may be a configuration ID of the first configuration. The indication may comprise an identifier of a target cell respective to the first configuration. The wireless device may perform and/or execute, in response to receiving the L1/L2 signaling, the LTM (e.g., cell switch) to the target cell using configuration parameters of the first configuration. The configuration ID is interpreted in view of ¶ 0087 of this application submitted on 7/18/2024 as the candidate cell configuration ID of the target cell.], or timing advance command indicating a TA value. [¶0563: “…The MAC CE may indicate a timing advance (TA) associated with the cell. The LTM may comprise a special cell (SpCell) switch procedure that the base station triggers, via the MAC CE, based on a layer 1 (L1) measurements…”. See also ¶ 0482,¶ 488]
Kim discloses most of claim 1 imitations except: receiving, from a gNB-DU (distributed unit), a message related to timing advance (TA) information; However, in the same field of endeavor, Pella Venkata discloses the above missing feature, see ¶ 101 in view of figure 10: “…Because the target LTM cell 1014 and the source LTM cell 1012 are LTM associated by being provided by the same gNB-DU 1010, the TA information (e.g., the TA value) can be sent in a random access response (RAR) 1030 by the gNB-DU via the source LTM cell 1012 instead of the target LTM cell 1014.”, see also ¶ 0100.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Kim’s system in view of Pella Venkata. The motivation for making the above modification would have been to establish a second connection by use of the TA information for the second cell [¶ 0168 of Pella Venkata].
Claims 7, 11 and 17 recites similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 1. Such elements as the controller and transceiver pertaining to both the base station and UE are seen in figure 15A in view of 15B (¶ 0205) of Kim.
Note to applicant:
The reference of Nokia (R2-2308888, “Further details on TA Acquisition and Maintenance in LTM”, Incheon, South Korea, 22nd -26th of May 2023) discloses the transmitting step of claim 1, see the third page, figure x, step 6. The description of step 6 is explained on the 4th page. The reference of Nokia when combined with the secondary reference of Pella Venkata used in claim 1 rejection above would render the independent claims to be obvious.
Claim 2, Kim in view of Pella Venkata discloses: The method of claim 1, wherein the timing advance command is used for the UE to skip a random access procedure for the LTM. [It should be noted here art is not necessary for claim 2, since claim 2 depends on claim 1, and due to the “or” statement in the last line of claim 1, if the examiner choose to examine the option “...wherein the LTM MAC CE includes at least one of candidate target configuration ID for the LTM…”, then the timing advance command limitation become optional in claim 2 and is not given patentable weight. However, the reason Kim (latter part of ¶ 0484) used MACCE signaling of the TA value is to skip RACH procedure].
[In addition, see document R2-2301150, provided via the applicant’s IDS section 2.2 on the 4th page first sentence]
Claims 8, 12 and 18 recites similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 2.
Claim 3, Kim in view of Pella Venkata discloses: The method of claim 1, wherein a length of the timing advance command is 12 bits. [It should be noted here art is not necessary for this claim, since claim 3 depends on claim 1, and due to the “or” statement in the last line of claim 1, if the examiner choose to examine the option “...wherein the LTM MAC CE includes at least one of candidate target configuration ID for the LTM…” (see claim 1 rejection), then the timing advance command limitation become optional in claim 3 as well and is not given patentable weight.]
[To account for limitation of claim 3, see document R2-2306924, provided via the applicant’s IDS section 6.3.1.4a on the 165th page, where the size of the field can be 12 bits]
Claims 9, 13 and 19 recites similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 3.
Claim 4, Pella Venkata further discloses: The method of claim 1, further comprising: transmitting, to the gNB-DU, a configuration request message for requesting random access channel (RACH) configuration; and receiving, from gNB-DU, a configuration response message. [Kim ¶ 0101: “… As part of establishing this connection, the UE 1004 can send a random access channel (RACH) message 1020 via the target LTM cell 1014….”, that is, the UE will send a request via the base station to the gNB-DU of figure 10 for TA acquisition which is interpreted as a configuration request . “…the TA information (e.g., the TA value) can be sent in a random access response (RAR) 1030 by the gNB-DU via the source LTM cell 1012 instead of the target LTM cell 1014.”. That is, the UE will receive a response (RAR) from the gNB-DU].
[In addition, see document R3-232824, provided via the applicant’s IDS, proposal 2 above section 2.2 on the second page]
Claim 14 recites similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 4.
Claim(s) 5, 10, 15 and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kim et al. (US 2024/0147328 A1) in view of Palle Venkata et al. (US 2024/0340733 A1) and Wang et al. (WO 2024/210047 A1).
Claim 5, Kim in view of Palle Venkata discloses: The method of claim 1 (see rejected claim 1).
Kim in view of Palle Venkata does not disclose: transmitting, to the UE, a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) order including an index for at least one LTM candidate cell; and receiving a valid TA value from the at least one LTM candidate cell.
However, In the same field of endeavor Wang discloses the above missing feature see ¶ 0210.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Kim’s system in view of Pella Venkata and Wang. The motivation for making the above modification would have been to support RACH-less LTM [¶ 210 of Wang].
Claims 10, 15 and 20 recites similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 5.
Claim(s) 6 and 16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kim et al. (US 2024/0147328 A1) in view of Palle Venkata et al. (US 2024/0340733 A1) and Gursu et al. (US 12, 439, 306).
Claim 6, Kim in view of Palle Venkata discloses: The method of claim 1 (see rejected claim 1).
Kim in view of Palle Venkata does not disclose: receiving, from the UE, an L1 measurement value; and determining whether to change a beam of the UE and whether to perform handover, based on the L1 measurement value.
However, In the same field of endeavor Gursu discloses the above missing feature see column 8, step 3 and step 10. Also see figure 2: the serving DU controlling cell 1 and cell 2 receives a L1 report at step 3. In step 10 a switch to beam A of cell 2 occurs.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Kim’s system in view of Pella Venkata and Gursu. The motivation for making the above modification would have been for beam level handover [see column 1 lines 19 – 20 of Gursu].
Claim 16 recites similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 6.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MAHARISHI V KHIRODHAR whose telephone number is (571)270-7909. The examiner can normally be reached 6:00 AM - 3:00 PM.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Nawaz M Asad can be reached at 571-272-3988. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
MAHARISHI V. KHIRODHAR
Examiner
Art Unit 2463
/MAHARISHI V KHIRODHAR/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2463
Prosecution Insights