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 .
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.
Claim(s) 1-3, 5-7, 11-13, and 15-17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Applicant’s submission of prior art, Li et al., EP 4319342 (hereinafter Li) in view of Applicant’s submission of prior art, M. Li et al., WO 2024/011615 (hereinafter M. Li).
Regarding claims 1 and 11, Li discloses a method performed by a wireless transmit and/or receive unit (WTRU), comprising: sending a capabilities message to a wireless network [paragraph 0177]; receiving, from the wireless network, configuration information for a localization or sensing task, wherein the configuration information comprises a reference signal (RS) reporting trigger [paragraphs 0177, 0185]; performing a first localization or sensing measurement of a first received RS based on the configuration information [paragraph 0115]; determining whether the RS reporting trigger is satisfied based on the first localization or sensing measurement [paragraph 0185]; reporting, based on the RS reporting trigger being satisfied, one or more preferred characteristics of a second RS based on the first localization or sensing measurement to the wireless network [paragraph 0185]; receiving, from the wireless network, an indication to perform a second localization or sensing measurement of a second received RS [paragraph 0197]; performing a second localization or sensing measurement of the second received RS [paragraph 0207]; and reporting, to the wireless network, the second localization or sensing measurement [paragraph 0207].
What Li does not specifically disclose is reporting an uncertainty value associated with the second localization or sensing measurement. However, M. Li teaches this limitation [paragraph 0127]. Before the effective filing of the invention, it would have obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify Li to include the teaching of M. Li. The motivation for this modification would have been to combine prior art elements according to known methods to yield predictable results.
Regarding claims 2 and 12, Li discloses wherein the second received RS comprises the one or more preferred characteristics [paragraphs 0205-0207].
Regarding claims 3 and 13, Li discloses wherein: the one or more preferred characteristics of the second RS is based on a first RS profile; and the second received RS comprises characteristic based on a second RS profile, wherein the second RS profile is similar to or different from the first RS profile [paragraphs 0181, 0185].
Regarding claims 5 and 15, the Examiner takes Official Notice that it is well known in the art for a capabilities message to comprise information indicative of at least one of a supported power profile for an RS or a supported frequency-hopping pattern for an RS. Before the effective filing of the invention, it would have obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify the combination of Li and M. Li to include this feature. The motivation for this modification would have been to combine prior art elements according to known methods to yield predictable results.
Regarding claims 6 and 16, Li discloses wherein the configuration information further comprises at least one of available resources for the first RS and the second RS, a power profile of the second RS, or a frequency-hopping pattern of the second RS [paragraph 0197].
Regarding claims 7 and 17, Li discloses wherein the RS reporting trigger comprises at least one of a Doppler range, a velocity range, an uncertainty threshold, a Mean Square Error threshold, or a signal quality threshold [paragraph 0205].
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4, 8-10, 14, and 18-20 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
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Vogedes et al., US Patent Application Publication Number 2024/0171340, disclose new radio positioning reference signal enhancements.
Alawieh et al., US Patent Application Publication Number 2024/0163908, disclose positioning for user equipment with limited capabilities.
Thomas et al., US Patent Application Publication Number 2025/0380298, disclose triggering sensing operations performed by a wireless communications system.
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/EAW/
June 1, 2026
/ERIKA A WASHINGTON/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2644
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