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 .
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 allowance or after an Office action under Ex Parte Quayle, 25 USPQ 74, 453 O.G. 213 (Comm'r Pat. 1935). 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, prosecution in this application has been reopened pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 04/28/2026 has been entered.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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.
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.
Claims 1-7, 9-16, and 18-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Babaei (US 2024/0147478 A1) hereinafter “Babaei”, in view of Li et al. (US 2025/0267655 A1) hereinafter “Li”.
Regarding claim 1:
Babaei discloses a wireless device (e.g., Fig. 15, 1502) comprising: one or more processors (Fig. 15, 1524); and memory (Fig. 15, 1512) storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the wireless device to:
receive at least one configured grant (CG) configuration indicating: one or more first parameters indicating a plurality of CGs (e.g., [0164], “a wireless device may be provided/configured with a plurality of PUSCH transmission occasions in a configured grant period … the plurality of PUSCH transmission occasions may be associated with a plurality of configured grant configuration,” [0169], “a configuration parameter indicating the value of N … a configuration parameter and/or DCI indicating the number of PUSCH transmission occasion(s) within the CG period”); and determine an amount of data available for transmission via one or more first CGs of the plurality of CGs (e.g., [0149], “video frame size and the number of PUSCHs needed to transmit the video frame,” and [0165]-[0166]); and transmit the UCI via a second CG of the plurality of CGs, wherein the UCI indicates whether uplink resources of the one or more first CGs are going to be used or unused for uplink transmissions (e.g., [0149], “If there are one or more unused PUSCHs, the UE may indicate the unused CG PUSCHs to the gNB via UCI or MAC CE, for example in the first CG PUSCH occasion,” and [0165]-[0166]); and transmitting the UCI is based on the amount of data (e.g., [0149], [0166]).
Babaei is silent regarding a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs; transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value.
Li teaches a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs; transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value (e.g., [0070], “As the access node may provide configuration information 611 which may cause the UE to return a dynamic indication 621, the access node may control whether or not the UE performs any reporting of unused CG resources.”)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the system of Babaei based on Li to include the feature of a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs, and transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value, in order to achieve more configuration flexibility for uplink resource utilization.
Regarding claim 2:
Babaei further discloses the wireless device of claim 1, wherein the data, of the amount of data, comprises data from one or more logical channels associated with the CG configuration (e.g., [0166]).
Regarding claim 3:
Babaei further discloses the wireless device of claim 1, wherein the instructions further cause the wireless device to determine that the data, of the amount of data, is available for transmission via one or more uplink grants that are not indicated by the CG configuration (e.g., [0161], [0165]).
Regarding claim 4:
Babaei further discloses the wireless device of claim 3, wherein the one or more uplink grants indicate one or more physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) resources (e.g., [0161], [0165]).
Regarding claim 5:
Babaei further discloses the wireless device of claim 1, wherein the one or more first CGs occur after: the second CG; or the amount of data is determined (e.g., [0149], Fig. 17).
Regarding claim 6:
Babaei further discloses the wireless device of claim 1, wherein the instructions further cause the wireless device to transmit one or more portions of the data, of the amount of data, via the one or more first CGs in response to the UCI indicating the one or more first CG are going to be used (e.g., [0165], [0166], Fig. 17).
Regarding claim 7:
Babaei further discloses the wireless device of claim 1, wherein the instructions further cause the wireless device to not transmit one or more portions of the data, of the amount of data, via the one or more first CG in response to the UCI indicating the one or more first CG are going to be unused (e.g., [0165], [0166], Fig. 18).
Regarding claim 9:
Babaei further discloses the wireless device of claim 1, wherein the UCI is transmitted on a physical uplink shared channel (PUSCH) (e.g., [0149], [0166]).
Regarding claim 10:
Babaei further discloses the wireless device of claim 1, wherein the data, of the amount of data, comprises data for transmission on one or more transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs (e.g., [0149], [0165], [0166]).
Regarding claim 11:
Babaei discloses a base station (e.g., Fig. 15, 1542) comprising: one or more processors (Fig. 15, 1564); and memory (Fig. 15, 1552) storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the base station to: transmit, to a wireless device, at least one configured grant (CG) configuration indicating: one or more first parameters indicating a plurality of CGs; and receive the UCI via a second CG of the plurality of CGs, wherein the UCI indicates whether uplink resources of one or more first CGs, of the plurality of CGs, are going to be used or unused for uplink transmissions based on an amount of data available for transmission by the wireless device via the one or more first CGs (See rejection of claim 1 regarding similar features).
Babaei is silent regarding a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs; transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value.
Li teaches a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs; transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value (e.g., [0070], “As the access node may provide configuration information 611 which may cause the UE to return a dynamic indication 621, the access node may control whether or not the UE performs any reporting of unused CG resources.”)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the system of Babaei based on Li to include the feature of a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs, and transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value, in order to achieve more configuration flexibility for uplink resource utilization.
Regarding claims 12-16, and 19:
See rejections of claims 2-4 and 6-10 regarding similar features.
Regarding claim 20:
Babaei discloses a non-transitory computer-readable medium (e.g., Fig. 15, 1512, [0122]) comprising instructions that, when executed by one or more processors of a wireless device (Fig. 15, 1502), cause the wireless device to: receive at least one configured grant (CG) configuration indicating: one or more first parameters indicating a plurality of CGs; determine an amount of data available for transmission via one or more first CGs of the plurality of CGs; transmit the UCI via a second CG of the plurality of CGs, wherein the UCI indicates whether uplink resources of the one or more first CGs are going to be used or unused for uplink transmissions; and transmitting the UCI is based on the amount of data (See rejection of claim 1 regarding similar features).
Babaei is silent regarding a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs; transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value.
Li teaches a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs; transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value (e.g., [0070], “As the access node may provide configuration information 611 which may cause the UE to return a dynamic indication 621, the access node may control whether or not the UE performs any reporting of unused CG resources.”)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the system of Babaei based on Li to include the feature of a configuration parameter, comprising a value, indicating transmission of uplink control information (UCI) is enabled, wherein the UCI indicates unused transmission occasions associated with the plurality of CGs, and transmitting the UCI is based on the configuration parameter comprising the value, in order to achieve more configuration flexibility for uplink resource utilization.
Conclusion
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/BO HUI A ZHU/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2465
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