Prosecution Insights
Last updated: October 02, 2026
Application No. 18/836,725

REFERENCE SIGNAL SLOT CONFIGURATION FOR SIDELINK COMMUNICATIONS

Non-Final OA §103
Filed
Aug 07, 2024
Priority
Apr 26, 2022 — GR 20220100346 +1 more
Examiner
SHAHEED, KHALID W
Art Unit
Tech Center
Assignee
Qualcomm Incorporated
OA Round
1 (Non-Final)
83%
Grant Probability
Favorable
1-2
OA Rounds
6m
Est. Remaining
98%
With Interview

Examiner Intelligence

Grants 83% — above average
83%
Career Allowance Rate
725 granted / 872 resolved
+23.1% vs TC avg
Moderate +15% lift
Without
With
+14.9%
Interview Lift
resolved cases with interview
Typical timeline
2y 7m
Avg Prosecution
26 currently pending
Career history
906
Total Applications
across all art units

Statute-Specific Performance

§101
6.7%
-33.3% vs TC avg
§103
53.6%
+13.6% vs TC avg
§102
27.8%
-12.2% vs TC avg
§112
9.2%
-30.8% vs TC avg
Black line = Tech Center average estimate • Based on career data from 872 resolved cases

Office Action

§103
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 . Priority Should applicant desire to obtain the benefit of foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d) prior to declaration of an interference, a certified English translation of the foreign application must be submitted in reply to this action. 37 CFR 41.154(b) and 41.202(e). Failure to provide a certified translation may result in no benefit being accorded for the non-English application. Applicant cannot rely upon the certified copy of the foreign priority application to overcome this rejection because a translation of said application has not been made of record in accordance with 37 CFR 1.55. When an English language translation of a non-English language foreign application is required, the translation must be that of the certified copy (of the foreign application as filed) submitted together with a statement that the translation of the certified copy is accurate. See MPEP §§ 215 and 216. 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) 34-36, 38-43, 45-46 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over by JP 2021534629 A in further view of KO (US 2023/0283434 A1). Regarding claims 34 & 41, JP 2021534629 A discloses a method for performing sidelink positioning at a user equipment (UE), an apparatus for preforming sidelink positioning, comprising: At least one memory (see processor and memory top of page 17); and At least oen processor coupled to the at least one memory (see processor and memory top of page 17), the at least on one processor configured to: receiving, at the UE, a resource block (see resource block middle of page 22) comprising a plurality of sidelink symbols in a slot (see page 23, third para “, the resources in the sidelinks are multiple symbols in time (eg, symbol pool), and many RBs available in frequency”), wherein the resource block comprises a plurality of slot portions (see bottom of page 23, “, the resources in the sidelinks are multiple symbols in time (eg, symbol pool), and many RBs available in frequency”), wherein a first slot portion of the plurality of slot (see first minislot, middle page 24) portions comprises a first sidelink symbol (see first two symbols, middle page 24) of the plurality of sidelink symbols with at least a first sidelink positioning reference signal (PRS) resource (see SL-PRS, first full para page 48) and a second sidelink symbol of the plurality of sidelink symbols (see first two symbols, middle page 24); and processing, by the UE, at least one resource in each slot portion of the plurality of slot portions of the slot (see bottom, page 53, “for more accurate use in time, measurements for SL-RSRP, SL-RSRQ, or SL-RSSI can also be configured via RRC or Sl-RRC, per symbol, per minislot, Or it may be based on a specific time unit, such as per slot.”). JP 2021534629 A does not specifically disclose however Ko discloses with at least a second sidelink PRS resource (see [0009] S-PRS and second sidelink signals include S-PRS); It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to combine the teachings of JP 2021534629 A with that of Ko. Doing so would conform to well-known techniques in the field of invention. Regarding method of claim 42 and apparatus of claim 35, Ko better discloses wherein the first sidelink PRS resource is a receive sidelink PRS resource, and the second sidelink PRS resource is a transmit sidelink PRS resource (see [0009]-[0010], discloses transmitting and/or receiving from different PRS resources); It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to combine the teachings of JP 2021534629 A with that of Ko. Doing so would conform to well-known techniques in the field of invention. Regarding method of claim 43 and apparatus of claim 36, Ko better discloses wherein the first sidelink PRS resource is a transmit sidelink PRS resource, and the second sidelink PRS resource is a receive sidelink PRS resource (see [0009]-[0010], discloses transmitting and/or receiving from different PRS resources); It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to combine the teachings of JP 2021534629 A with that of Ko. Doing so would conform to well-known techniques in the field of invention. Regarding method of claim 38 and apparatus of claim 45, JP 2021534629 A discloses method of claim 44, wherein the gain control resource is an automatic gain control (AGC) resource (see AGC, top of page 48); Regarding method of claim 39 and apparatus of claim 46, Ko better discloses, wherein the first slot portion of the plurality of slot portions further comprises a third sidelink symbol of the plurality of sidelink symbols with at least a gap comprising no data (see measurement gap, [0005]). Allowable Subject Matter Claims 37 and 44 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. Claim 1-33 are allowed. Conclusion Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to K. WILFORD SHAHEED whose telephone number is (469) 295-9175. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Friday 9 am-6pm; CST; ALT Friday. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. The examiner’s Supervisor, Jinsong Hu, can be reached at (571)272-3965, where attempts to reach the examiner are unsuccessful. Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PAIR. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only. For more information about the PAIR system, see http://pair-direct.uspto.gov. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative or access to the automated information system, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /KHALID W SHAHEED/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2643
Read full office action

Prosecution Timeline

Aug 07, 2024
Application Filed
Aug 21, 2026
Non-Final Rejection mailed — §103 (current)

Precedent Cases

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Study what changed to get past this examiner. Based on 5 most recent grants.

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Prosecution Projections

1-2
Expected OA Rounds
83%
Grant Probability
98%
With Interview (+14.9%)
2y 7m (~6m remaining)
Median Time to Grant
Low
PTA Risk
Based on 872 resolved cases by this examiner. Grant probability derived from career allowance rate.

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