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 .
Specification
The title of the invention is not descriptive. A new title is required that is clearly indicative of the invention to which the claims are directed.
The purported benefit of “fast” communication does not appear to be claimed. The claims are directed to a receiver requesting a number of cycles that make up an FSK bit.
It is unclear if the claims are directed to any “FSK” communication. The last limitation of each of the independent claims only broadly recite that the transmission/reception is “based on the FSK” – there is no clearly indication in the claims that the method/apparatus is actually using FSK communication.
Claim Objections
Claims 21 and 29 are objected to because the preambles each recite “a method for transmitting wireless power” or “a method for receiving wireless power” – the body of each claim, however, is directed to communication only. There is no wireless power transmission or reception.
Claim 28 is objected to because it is unclear how the converter and communicator/controller are “related to” to the transmitter. The claim does not recite how the components are interconnected to form an operable transmitter. Also, the claim omits any antenna/coil to actually wirelessly transmit power. A transmitter should include a converter (inverter, driver, etc.) connected to a transmission coil – not just components “related to” power transmission.
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 21-35 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
Claim 21 recites a method for “receiving [] a specific request (SRQ) data pack)”, and “transmitting [] a data packet”. The transferring of information is the abstract idea of a mental process (“including an observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion”). MPEP §2106.04.
A “method which can be performed mentally, or are the equivalent of human mental work, are unpatentable abstract ideas…” MPEP §2164.04(a)(2)(III). “Examples of mental processes include observations, evaluations, judgments and opinions.” Id. Requesting something (and then getting it) is an abstract idea of a mental process.
“Nor do the courts distinguish between claims that recite the mental process performed by humans and claims that recite mental processes performed on a computer.” Id. That the method is performed electronically does not change the analysis that the evaluation is an abstract idea.
Dependent claims 22-27 do not add significantly more. Claims 22-23 recite additional requests (which are abstract ideas). Claims 24-27 describe the format of the reply. What the information looks like does not add significantly more to the abstract idea analysis.
Independent claim 28 recites an abstract idea for the same reasons as claim 21. This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the claims refer to a generic “converter” and “communicator/controller”. There is no recitation in the claim that the functionality (receivers, transmits) is carried out by these generic structural components. The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception.
Claims 29-35 recite method steps that are directed to an abstract idea, without significantly more, as discussed above in the rejections of claims 21-27. The only difference being that the claims are directed to a receiver instead of a transmitter. This does not affect the analysis.
None of the claims recite any structure that adds significantly more to the abstract idea analysis. The claims are directed to a generic transmitter and receiver that interact with each other to request and respond with information. The exchange of information, without significantly more, is an abstract idea and is ineligible subject matter.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 21-23 and 28-31 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Park (US 2021/0044152).
With respect to claim 21, Park discloses a method (fig 17-18; par 201, 228-237) for transferring wireless power to a wireless power receiver in a wireless power transfer system, the method performed by a wireless power transmitter and comprising:
receiving, from the wireless power receiver in a negotiation phase, a specific request (SRQ) data packet for frequency shift keying (FSK) (S1710; par 231, 233).
wherein the SRQ data packet includes information for a number of cycles that make up an FSK bit (par 201); and
transmitting, to the wireless power receiver in a power transfer phase, a data packet based on the FSK (par 235).
Park discloses a method by which a receiver sends an SRQ to request a specific number of cycles that make up an FSK bit and the transmitter/receiver then communicate using that FSK configuration. The Park SRQ comes in a negotiation phase, as illustrated in figure 17.
With respect to claim 22, Park discloses the wireless power transmitter transmits an extended capabilities (XCAP) packet to the wireless power receiver in a negotiation phase (par 229).
With respect to claim 23, Park discloses the wireless power transmitter transmits a capabilities (CAP) packet to the wireless power receiver in a negotiation phase (par 229).
Claims 22-23 are mutually exclusive as they separately depend from claim 21. It is therefore permissible to interpret the same Park disclosure as satisfying two different limitations. In claim 22, “extended” is undefined – it has no basis for comparison for what to consider as unextended. Thus, for whatever amount of data is in the Park packet, it is both “CAP” and “XCAP”. Furthermore, there is no use for this data packet – the claim only mentions the transmission of a packet without describing why it is sent, the information contained within it, or any reaction it causes.
With respect to claim 28, Park discloses the wireless power transmitter, as discussed above in the art rejection of claim 1. Park further discloses the structure of the transmitter (fig 4), comprising: a converter (100) related to transferring wireless power to a wireless power receiver; and a communicator/controller (220) related to controlling the transfer of the wireless power.
With respect to claims 29-31, Park discloses the method, as discussed above in the art rejection of claims 21-23, respectively. The only difference is that the claims are written from the point of view of the receiver – Park discloses both sides of the communication interaction and anticipates the receiver method claims for the same reasons as it does the transmitter methods.
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.
Claims 23-27 and 32-35 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park in view of AbuKhalaf (US 2020/0403455).
With respect to claim 24, Park discloses the data packet includes a header and a message (see fig 15), but does not expressly disclose a checksum. AbuKhalaf discloses packets are known to have all three features, including a checksum (see fig 3A; par 49). Park and AbuKhalaf are analogous to the claimed invention because they are from the same field of endeavor, namely wireless power transmission systems with wireless communication of packets between transmitter/receiver. At the time of the earliest priority date of the application, it would have been obvious to one skilled in the art to modify Park (or to consider that it already has) to include a checksum. The motivation for doing so would have been to detect errors in communication, as is the well known feature of a checksum.
With respect to claim 25, Park discloses the header implicitly provides a size of the message contained in the data packet (see fig 15, “0x31”).
With respect to claim 26, Park does not expressly disclose a maximum size of the data packet of the wireless power transmitter is 27. At the time of the earliest priority date of the application, it would have been obvious to one skilled in the art to configure Park to have its data packet limited to 27. Generally making messages larger/smaller is an obvious modification. MPEP §2144.04(IV)(A).
With respect to claim 27, giving the Park packet a new name, “ADT”, is an obvious modification that does not affect the reference or the combination with AbuKhalaf. As discussed above, the claims simply recite the electrical properties of the packet – there is no indication in the claim of why it is created, what information it contains, or what reaction it is intended to elicit from the receiver. Simply assigning naming types to the packets that already exist does not overcome the prior art.
With respect to claims 32-35, Park and AbuKhalaf combine to teach the recited limitations, and the references are analogous, as discussed above in the art rejections of claims 24-27, respectively.
Conclusion
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/ADI AMRANY/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2836