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 .
Examiner would like to bring to attention that the claim language of this instant application is very similar to co-pending U.S. application # 18/843,744 from the same assignee.
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 31-46 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Soldati (US 2024/0196252) in view of Lundardi (US 2023/0403606).
Regarding claims 31 and 39, Soldati describes a method of a first Radio Access Network (RAN) node/first RAN node, comprising:
[a memory; and a processor coupled with the memory, wherein the memory is configured to:] (fig. 19, first [RAN] node comprising memory 1950 & processor 1902 for executing stored computer program 1950 to perform its method)
receiving a first message from a second RAN node, wherein the first message includes a first information element, and wherein the first information element indicates a type of object on which the first RAN node performs a prediction (fig. 4 #420 & para. 61-62, current [RAN] node obtains (receives) from second [RAN] node a record of resource status information that describes usage of RAN resources of (ie. controlled by) second [RAN] node for a future time period (prediction));
performing the prediction to generate predicted information, wherein the predicted information includes usage of Physical Resource Blocks (PRBs) per Synchronization Signal Block (SSB) for traffic in Downlink and Uplink (fig. 4 #430 & para. 62, predicting, based on the obtained record, the usage of RAN resources of (ie. controlled by) second [RAN] node for a future time period (prediction), the record of resource status comprising transmission power for [physical] resource blocks, & the predicted radio resource status is per-SSB areas usage of DL and/or UL PRB.
Soldati describes sending to a third [RAN] node the predicted resource status information (fig. 4 #450 & para. 62), but fails to further describe:
sending a second message to the second RAN node, wherein the second message includes the predicted information.
Lundardi also describes RAN1 obtaining/receiving resource usage information (first message) from RAN2 for predicting RAN2 resources usage (abstract & fig. 21 #2102 & 2104), further describing:
sending a second message to the second RAN node, wherein the second message includes the predicted information (fig. 21 #2106& 317 in view of para. 137, RAN1 sends its RAN2 resources usage prediction (second message) back to RAN2).
It would have been obvious to one with ordinary skill in the art before the effective date of the claimed invention to specify that the first [RAN] node in Soldati to send a second message to the second [RAN] node as in Lundardi.
The motivation for combining the teachings is that this enables RAN2 to mirror its behavior to that of RAN1 (Lundardi, para. 137).
Regarding claims 32 and 40, Soldati and Lundardi combined describe:
wherein the first message includes a second information element, and wherein the second information element indicates a point in time to which the prediction applies (Lundardi para. 132, predicted resource status information generated with future values at t+1, t+2 as part of the sequence load information).
Regarding claims 33 and 41, Soldati and Lundardi combined describe:
wherein the predicted information is related to a predicted number of active User Equipments (UEs) (para. 93-95, resource status metric for prediction comprises number of active wireless devices served by the second [RAN] node).
Regarding claims 34 and 42, Soldati and Lundardi combined describe:
wherein the predicted information includes SSB Area Downlink (DL) Guaranteed Bitrate (GBR) Physical Resource Block (PRB) usage, SSB Area Uplink (UL) GBR PRB usage, SSB Area DL non-GBR PRB usage, SSB Area UL non-GBR PRB usage, SSB Area DL Total PRB usage, and SSB Area UL Total PRB usage (para. 190 predicted resource status includes per-SDB areas usage of DL and UL PRB (in total for GBR and for non-GBR) and per SSB areas usage of DL and UL scheduling PDCCH CCE).
Regarding claims 35 and 43, Soldati and Lundardi combined describe:
wherein the first information element is a Report Characteristics (Soldati para. 187, record of resource status information comprises predicted QoS characteristics).
Regarding claims 36 and 44, Soldati and Lundardi combined describe:
wherein the predicted information is a Radio Resource Status (Soldati para. 190, record of resource status information comprises predicted radio resource characteristics).
Regarding claims 37 and 45, Soldati and Lundardi combined describe:
wherein the second information element is a Prediction Time (Lundardi para. 103, predicted resource status information comprises time window for which the prediction is considered valid).
Regarding claims 38 and 46, Soldati and Lundardi combined describe:
wherein the first RAN node is a Next Generation RAN (NG-RAN) node, wherein the second RAN node is an NG-RAN node, wherein the first message is an Xn message, and wherein the second message is an Xn message (para. 3- 4, current 5G RAN (NG-RAN) architecture, comprising gNBs, wherein the gNBs interconnected and communicated through the Xn interface (i.e., Xn messages)).
Claims 39-46 are method for UE and UE comprising memory & processor coupled with memory to interact with first RAN node with above describes method steps respectively. Since Soldati and Lundardi each describe UEs interacting with first [RAN] node (Soldati para. 16) and already describe all the first [RAN] node steps in claim 31, Claims 47-48 are rejected under the same rationale.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure: Kwan (US 2017/0026888) and (US 9,432,901) each describing centralized radio access point load prediction in network environment (title), Kitaji (US 2013/0230014) describing resource status including load request & reply being passed between eNB1, eNB2 and eNB3 (fig. 3), Kashiwase (US 2015/0208420) describing neighbor base station information is transmitted from the neighbor base station; and a controller that changes a carrier configuration of at least one carrier among the plurality of carriers based on the neighbor base station information (abstract), Garvaglia (US 2012/0087298) describing load balancing resource status report with relay node + donor & target base station (fig. 6), same assignee Filin (US 2025/0184822) describing transmit the “first message” to another RAN node. The first message includes information related to the prediction value for the “load parameter” of the cell (abstract), and same assignee Chen wo2024034476, RAN1 sending to RAN2 input data for training a model for load balancing, with predictions (abstract).
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WARNER WONG
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2469
/WARNER WONG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2469
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