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 .
The amendment filed on 03/16/2026 has been entered. Applicant amended claims 1-9, and 12-16 in the amendment. Claim 10 and 17 are cancelled. Claims 21-22 are newly added.
Claims 1-9, 11-16, and 18-22 remain pending.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-9, 11-16, and 18-22 filed on 03/16/2026 have been considered but they are deemed to be moot in view of new grounds of rejection.
Further, applicant argued Englehart fails to disclose “receiving, from an authorized data consumer, a data access request message comprising a request for management data”.
In response to applicant’s argument, Englehart discloses receiving, from an authorized data consumer, a data access request message comprising a request for management data (Col. 5, lines 27-34: the SMF 108 may receive a request for resource usage 202 from a UE (i.e., the UE 104 in FIG. 1); the request for resource usage may be related to various service types provided through the 5G network including but not limited to, voice service, short messaging service (SMS), multimedia messaging service (MMS), video service, data service, etc.; & Col. 3, lines 59-62: the SMF 108 may communicate with a charging function (CHF) 112 in the charging system 106 to determine whether the user account has sufficient balance for the requested service). Therefore, the applicant’s argument is not persuasive.
Applicant argued Englehart fails to disclose receiving, from a data consumer, a data management access request message comprising a request for management data, determining whether the data consumer is authorized to access management data, and transmitting, to the data consumer, a data management access response message indicating success.
In response to applicant’s argument, Englehart discloses receive, from a data consumer, a data management access request message comprising a request for management data (Col. 2, lines 32-35: receiving, from the UE, a request to grant additional data units; & Col. 5, lines 27-34: the SMF 108 may receive a request for resource usage 202 from a UE (i.e., the UE 104 in FIG. 1); the request for resource usage may be related to various service types provided through the 5G network including but not limited to, voice service, short messaging service (SMS), multimedia messaging service (MMS), video service, data service, etc.); determine whether the data consumer is authorized to access management data (Col. 3, lines 59-62: the SMF 108 may communicate with a charging function (CHF) 112 in the charging system 106 to determine whether the user account has sufficient balance for the requested service). Nugent discloses transmit, to the data consumer, a data management access response message indicating success ([0062]: the agent receives the manifest at a step 622 and reconciles the cloud’s manifest with the agent’s its own manifest to create a master manifest at a step 624; manifest corresponds to a data management access response message indicating success). Therefore, the applicant’s argument is not persuasive.
Claim Objections
Claim 7 is objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 7, line 2, delete “may”;
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 6 recites the limitation “the accessed data” in line 5. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Regarding claim 9, claim limitation recites “the management data” in line 9, which renders the claim vague and indefinite. It is unclear whether “the management data” is referring to “management data” in claim 9, line 6, or to “management data” in claim 9, line 7, or to a different/distinct management data.
All dependent claims are rejected as having the same deficiencies as the claims they depend from.
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) 1-8 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Engelhart (US 11,985,573 B1), in view of Pragada et al. (US 2016/0205580 A1), hereinafter Pragada.
Regarding claim 1, Engelhart discloses
An apparatus comprising a management services (“MnS”) reporting entity (SMF 108, FIG. 1), the apparatus comprising:
at least one memory (Col. 4, lines 48-61: the elements of the charging system 106, i.e., the SMF 108, the CTF 110, the CHF 112, the CGF 114, and the CDF 116 may be implemented on one or more computing devices and/or data centers); and
at least one processor (Col. 4, lines 48-61: multiprocessor systems, microprocessor-based systems) coupled with the at least one memory and configured to cause the MnS reporting entity to:
receive, from an authorized data consumer (UE 104, FIG. 1), a data access request message comprising a request for management data (Col. 5, lines 27-34: the SMF 108 may receive a request for resource usage 202 from a UE (i.e., the UE 104 in FIG. 1); the request for resource usage may be related to various service types provided through the 5G network including but not limited to, voice service, short messaging service (SMS), multimedia messaging service (MMS), video service, data service, etc.; & Col. 3, lines 59-62: the SMF 108 may communicate with a charging function (CHF) 112 in the charging system 106 to determine whether the user account has sufficient balance for the requested service);
provide the authorized data consumer with access to requested management data (Col. 5, lines 41-45: upon receiving the request for resource usage 202, the SMF 108 may establish a session to deliver the content and/or service requested by the user); and
transmit, to a charging entity (CHF 112, FIG. 1), an event notification for the request for management data (Col. 5, lines 48-52: the SMF 108 may send a charging data request 206 to CHF 112; the charging data request 206 includes the charging data generated with respect to the request for resource usage), the event notification indicating one more of:
an amount of management data for which access was provided (Col. 5, lines 50-52: the charging data request 206 includes the charging data generated with respect to the request for resource usage; & Col. 6, lines 5-8: the request for resource usage 202 may indicate that the UE 104 requests five 1GB data units); and
a type of management data for which access was provided.
Engelhart does not explicitly disclose
receive, from a management access entity, a data access configuration comprising a type of management data accessible by external agents and an access reporting configuration.
transmit, to a charging entity, an event notification for the request for management data in accordance with the access reporting configuration.
However, Pragada discloses
receive, from a management access entity, a data access configuration comprising a type of management data accessible by external agents and an access reporting configuration (Claim 1: receiving, by the WTRU, an RRCConnectionReconfiguration message, the RRCConnectionReconfiguration message including a measurement configuration that includes: at least one WLAN measurement object on which the WTRU is to perform measurement, and at least one measurement reporting configuration including at least one indication that measurement reporting is to be at least one of periodic and event-triggered);
transmit, to a charging entity, an event notification for the request for management data in accordance with the access reporting configuration (Claim 1: providing a measurement report based on the at least one measurement reporting configuration).
It would have been obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate feature of Pragada to Engelhart and Nugent, because Engelhart disclose receive request for service delivery (Engelhart: abstract) and Pragada further suggests receive measurement reporting configuration and provide measurement report based on the measurement reporting configuration (Claim 1).
One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to utilize the teachings of Pragada in Engelhart system in order to ensure standardized and accurate data collection and optimize network performance.
Regarding claim 2, Engelhart and Pragada disclose the apparatus as described in claim 1. Engelhart and Pragada further disclose
receive, from a second entity, a data access configuration indicating a type of data accessible by external agents and an access reporting configuration (Pragada: Claim 1: receiving, by the WTRU, an RRCConnectionReconfiguration message, the RRCConnectionReconfiguration message including a measurement configuration that includes: at least one WLAN measurement object on which the WTRU is to perform measurement, and at least one measurement reporting configuration including at least one indication that measurement reporting is to be at least one of periodic and event-triggered). Therefore, the limitations of claim 2 are rejected in the analysis of claim 1 above, and the claim is rejected on that basis.
Regarding claim 3, Engelhart and Pragada disclose the apparatus as described in claim 1. Engelhart further discloses
to provide the authorized data consumer with access to the requested management data, the at least one processor is configured to cause the MnS reporting entity to:
transmit the requested management data to the authorized data consumer (Col. 5, lines 41-47: upon receiving the request for resource usage 202, the SMF 108 may establish a session to deliver the content and/or service requested by the user; once the number of data units are granted to the user, the content/service delivery 204 is performed within the session); or
provide an address corresponding to the requested management data to the authorized data consumer.
Regarding claim 4, Engelhart and Pragada disclose the apparatus as described in claim 1. Engelhart further discloses
the charging entity comprises a charging function (“CHF”), and wherein to transmit the event notification, the at least one processor is configured to cause the MnS reporting entity to transmit a charging data request to the CHF (Col. 5, lines 48-52: the SMF 108 may send a charging data request 206 to CHF 112; the charging data request 206 includes the charging data generated with respect to the request for resource usage).
Regarding claim 5, Engelhart and Pragada disclose the apparatus as described in claim 1. Engelhart further discloses
the charging entity comprises a charging enablement function (“CEF”), and wherein to transmit the event notification, the at least one processor is configured to cause the MnS entity to transmit a data consumption report to the CEF (Col. 4, lines 14-17: the SMF 108 may report the usages of the one or more data units previously granted to the user in a charging data request to CHF 112).
Regarding claim 6, Engelhart and Pragada disclose the apparatus as described in claim 1. Engelhart further discloses
the event notification comprises information relating to data that was accessed, the information comprising:
an age of the data that was accessed;
an owner of the data that was accessed;
an indication of whether the accessed data was of a special type;
an indication of whether user data was accessed;
a set of users related to the data that was accessed;
a geographical area related to the data that was accessed;
an indication of what other data the authorized data consumer has access to;
an indication of an identity of the authorized data consumer (Col. 6, lines 11-14: the charging data request 206 may comprise other information related to the UE time zone, tariff time, public land mobile network (PLMN) code, radio access technology (RAT) type, rating group, etc.);
or a combination thereof.
Regarding claim 7, Engelhart and Pragada disclose the apparatus as described in claim 1. Engelhart further discloses
the event notification additionally indicates that accessed data was processed and may additionally indicate an amount of raw data collected for processing (Col. 5, lines 48-52: the SMF 108 may send a charging data request 206 to CHF 112; the charging data request 206 includes the charging data generated with respect to the request for resource usage).
Regarding claim 8, the limitations of claims 8 are rejected in the analysis of claim 1 above and this claim is rejected on that basis.
Claim(s) 9, 11-16, and 18-22 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Engelhart in view of Nugent (US 2010/0061250 A1), and further in view of Ohno et al. (US 2005/0021908 A1), hereinafter Ohno.
Regarding claim 9, Engelhart discloses
A management apparatus (SMF 108, FIG. 1) comprising:
at least one memory (Col. 4, lines 48-61: the elements of the charging system 106, i.e., the SMF 108, the CTF 110, the CHF 112, the CGF 114, and the CDF 116 may be implemented on one or more computing devices and/or data centers); and
at least one processor (Col. 4, lines 48-61: multiprocessor systems, microprocessor-based systems) coupled with the at least one memory and configured to cause the management apparatus to:
receive, from a data consumer, a data management access request message comprising a request for management data (Col. 2, lines 32-35: receiving, from the UE, a request to grant additional data units; & Col. 5, lines 27-34: the SMF 108 may receive a request for resource usage 202 from a UE (i.e., the UE 104 in FIG. 1); the request for resource usage may be related to various service types provided through the 5G network including but not limited to, voice service, short messaging service (SMS), multimedia messaging service (MMS), video service, data service, etc.);
determine whether the data consumer is authorized to access management data (Col. 3, lines 59-62: the SMF 108 may communicate with a charging function (CHF) 112 in the charging system 106 to determine whether the user account has sufficient balance for the requested service);
send response in response to determining that the data consumer is authorized to access the management data (Col. 4, lines 2-5: when the CDR indicates that the user account has sufficient balance for the requested service, the CHF 112 may send a charging data response to CHF 112 to approve the service delivery);
transmit, to a charging entity CHF 112, FIG. 1), an event notification for the request for management data, ( (Col. 5, lines 48-52: the SMF 108 may send a charging data request 206 to CHF 112; the charging data request 206 includes the charging data generated with respect to the request for resource usage), the event notification indicating one or more of:
an amount of management data provided (Col. 5, lines 50-52: the charging data request 206 includes the charging data generated with respect to the request for resource usage; & Col. 6, lines 5-8: the request for resource usage 202 may indicate that the UE 104 requests five 1GB data units); and
a type of management data provided.
Engelhart does not explicitly disclose
create a data access configuration, the data access configuration comprising a type of management data accessible by external agents and an access reporting configuration;
transmit, to the data consumer, a data management access response message indicating success.
However, Nugent discloses
determine whether the data consumer is authorized to access management data ([0062]: the user’s credentials would be accepted);
create a data access configuration comprising a type of management data accessible by external agents and an access reporting configuration ([0009]: configurations can be created that allow for service provider selection based on user-selectable parameters such as cost, availability, performance and service level agreement terms; & the system employes measurement, aggregation, reporting and decision support of system usage and costing, to automate the construction, operation and ongoing management of software based cloud);
transmit, to the data consumer, a data management access response message indicating success ([0062]: the agent receives the manifest at a step 622 and reconciles the cloud’s manifest with the agent’s its own manifest to create a master manifest at a step 624; manifest corresponds to a data management access response message indicating success).
It would have been obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate feature of Nugent to Engelhart, because Engelhart discloses receive request for service delivery (abstract) and Nugent further suggests create configuration associated with service provider ([0009]).
One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to utilize the teachings of Nugent in Engelhart system in order to provide personalization control.
Engelhart and Nugent do not explicitly disclose
transmit the data access configuration to a management services (MnS) data producing entity.
However, Ohno discloses
transmit the data access configuration to a management services (MnS) data producing entity ([0070]: the host agents 21, 31 of the host computers 20, 30 that have received the notifications from the management server 10 generate the respective configuration setting files 23, 33 based on the instruction contents (S8, S9) and transmit a report that the configuration setting file 23, 33 have been generated to the management server 10 via the communication network CN1 (S10, S11)).
It would have been obvious to a person with ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to incorporate feature of Ohno to Engelhart and Nugent, because Engelhart and Nugent disclose receive request for service delivery (Engelhart: abstract) and Ohno further suggests transmit configuration ([0070]).
One of ordinary skill in the art would be motivated to utilize the teachings of Ohno in Engelhart and Nugent system in order to improve consistency and reliability.
Regarding claim 11, Engelhart, Nugent, and Ohno disclose the management apparatus as described in claim 9. Engelhart, Nugent, and Ohno further disclose
to derive the data access configuration from one or more of: a Service level agreement (“SLA”), a Service level specification (“SLS”), a Service Profile, a Network Slice profile, a Generic network Slice Templates (“GST”), or a network slice template (“NEST”) (Nugent: [0009]: configurations can be created that allow for service provider selection based on user-selectable parameters such as cost, availability, performance and service level agreement terms). Therefore, the limitations of claim 11 are rejected in the analysis of claim 9 above, and the claim is rejected on that basis.
Regarding claim 12, Engelhart, Nugent, and Ohno disclose the management apparatus as described in claim 9. Engelhart further discloses
the charging entity comprises a charging function (“CHF”), and wherein to transmit the event notification, the at least one processor is configured to cause the management apparatus to transmit a charging data request to the CHF (Col. 5, lines 48-52: the SMF 108 may send a charging data request 206 to CHF 112; the charging data request 206 includes the charging data generated with respect to the request for resource usage).
Regarding claim 13, Engelhart, Nugent, and Ohno disclose the management apparatus as described in claim 9. Engelhart further discloses
the charging entity comprises a charging enablement function (“CEF”), and wherein to transmit the event notification, the at least one processor is configured to cause the management apparatus to transmit a notification of the data access configuration and corresponding charging information to the CEF (Col. 4, lines 14-17: the SMF 108 may report the usages of the one or more data units previously granted to the user in a charging data request to CHF 112).
Regarding claim 14, Engelhart, Nugent, and Ohno disclose the management apparatus as described in claim 9. Engelhart further discloses
the event notification comprises information relating to data that was accessed, the information comprising:
an age of the data that was accessed;
an owner of the data that was accessed;
an indication of whether the data that was accessed was of a special type;
an indication of whether user data was accessed (Col. 6, lines 11-14: the charging data request 206 may comprise other information related to the UE time zone, tariff time, public land mobile network (PLMN) code, radio access technology (RAT) type, rating group, etc.);
or a combination thereof.
Regarding claim 15, Engelhart, Nugent, and Ohno disclose the management apparatus as described in claim 9. Engelhart further discloses
the event notification additionally indicates that accessed data was processed and may additionally indicate an amount of raw data collected for processing (Col. 5, lines 48-52: the SMF 108 may send a charging data request 206 to CHF 112; the charging data request 206 includes the charging data generated with respect to the request for resource usage).
Regarding claim 16, the limitations of claim 16 are rejected in the analysis of claim 9 above and this claim is rejected on that basis.
Regarding claims 18-20, the limitations of claims 18-20 are rejected in the analysis of claims 11-13 respectively and these claims are rejected on that basis.
Regarding claims 21-22, the limitations of claims 21-22 are rejected in the analysis of claims 14-15 respectively and these claims are rejected on that basis.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Engelhart (US 10,531,515 B1). The SMF records the amount of data used during the outage and reports it when able to again communicate with the CHF; the SMF periodically queries the CHF to both report data usage and to request additional data for data session.
Tong et al. (US 11,006,253 B1). Send a service data usage report to the account management and billing system, and the account management and billing system can charge the UE for service data usage.
Kweon (US 2023/0247537 A1). Transmit a usage report message for sponsored data to a charging function (CHF).
Singleton, IV et al. (US 11,750,527 B2). In response to receiving a client-device request, manager issues a request to the authentication server to identify all resources the user is authorized to access.
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to KAYLEE J HUANG whose telephone number is (571)272-0080. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 9AM-5PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Joon H Hwang can be reached at 571-272-4036. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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Kaylee Huang
06/23/2026
/KAYLEE J HUANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2447
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