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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 9/26/24 and 7/30/25 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 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)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1, 2, 4-12, and 22-29 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by US 2025/0212099 by Pattan et al. (Pattan).
With respect to claim 1, Pattan teaches a method performed by a first network function implementing a Binding Server (BS), comprising:
- receiving , from a second network function implementing an Edge Enabler Server (EES) within an Edge Data Network (EDN) , a request message including information related to an application in a User Equipment (UE) and a UE group which hosts the same application as the UE, and information related to a predetermined Edge Application Server (EAS) for the application of the UE ; (Paragraph 58-61, 67, Fig. 1 and 2 – EES receives discovery request including UE group and UE application information and at least one predetermined common EAS, discovery request is forwarded to EES’ binding server function in the form of a Edge Application servers determiner function (225)). and
- determining a binding EAS to be used for the UE or the UE group based on the request message; and (Paragraph 58-61, 67, Fig. 1 and 2 – Edge Application servers determiner 225 determines a plurality of EAS based on the received grouping information)
- transmitting, to the second network function, a response message, wherein the response message explicitly or implicitly indicates the binding EAS. (Paragraph 58-61, 67, Fig. 1 and 2 – Edge Application servers determiner 225 determines a plurality of EAS based on the received grouping information and returns the response via EES to the EEC/UE )
With respect to claim 2, Pattan teaches the method according to claim 1, determining a binding EAS to be used for the UE or the UE group further comprising at least one of:- creating a binding EAS or determining a binding EAS as the predetermined EAS, in response to determining that there is no existing binding EAS, - replacing the existing binding EAS with a binding EAS, in response to determining that there is the existing binding EAS and the binding EAS has better performance than the existing binding EAS. (Paragraph 38-42 – EAS selection (binding) is performed such that latency is reduced for all or a specific application client)
With respect to claim 4, Pattan teaches the method (500) according to claim 3, wherein the binding EAS is the same as the predetermined EAS, and the response message indicates that the predetermined EAS is used as the binding EAS. (Paragraph 58-61, 67, Fig. 1 and 2 – Edge Application servers determiner 225 determines a plurality of EAS based on the received grouping information which includes a EAS that is in common to the group)
With respect to claim 5, Pattan teaches the method according to claim 3, wherein the binding EAS is different from the predetermined EAS, and the response message indicates the binding EAS and a fourth network function implementing EES associated with the binding EAS. (Paragraph 58-61, 67, 71, Fig. 3a-3b – Edge Application servers determiner 225 determines a plurality of EAS based on the received grouping information which includes a EAS that is in common to the group. EAS announcer acts for announcing the selected in-common EAS both in a condition of already selected and not already selected))
With respect to claim 6, Pattan teaches the method according to claim 1, further comprising:- transmitting, to a third network function implementing an EES which are serving at least one UE in the UE group, a notification message, wherein the notification message indicates the binding EAS and a fourth network function implementing EES associated with the binding EAS. (Paragraph 58-61, 67, 71, Fig. 3a-3b – Edge Application servers determiner 225 determines a plurality of EAS based on the received grouping information which includes a EAS that is in common to the group. EAS announcer acts for announcing the selected in-common EAS both in a condition of already selected and not already selected))
With respect to claim 7, Pattan teaches the method (500) according to claim 2, wherein the binding EAS (122) has better average latency performance than the existing binding EAS (122). (Paragraph 38-42 – EAS selection (binding) is performed such that latency is reduced for all or a specific application client)
With respect to claim 8, Pattan teaches the method (500) according to claim 1,wherein the request message further includes at least one of a fourth parameter indicating identity of the UE(101), and a fifth parameter indicating information regarding the EDN (102). (Paragraph 17-18, 86 – group information, e.g. same ACIDs within the same EDN)
With respect to claim 9, Pattan teaches the method according to claim 1,wherein the request message is a group binding request message; wherein the response message is a group binding response message; and/or wherein the notification message is a group binding notification message. (Paragraph 58-61, 67 – purpose of the EAS selection is for finding a common EAS for a group)
With respect to claim 10, Pattan teaches the method according to claim 1,wherein the first network function is located inside the EDN or outside the EDN. (Paragraph 8 Fig. 1)
With respect to claim 11, Pattan teaches the method according to claim 8, further comprising:- storing, in the first network function, the first parameter, the second parameter, the third parameter, the fourth parameter, the fifth parameter, and information regarding the second network function. (Fig. 2 – EES has memory 221 for storage)
With respect to claim 12, Pattan teaches the method (500) according to any one of claims 1-11 claim 1,wherein the UE group includes two or more UEs (101) cooperating with each other to support a same function. (Paragraph 9 – a real time communication session)
With respect to claim 22, Pattan teaches a method performed by a functional component implementing an enabler function in a User Equipment (UE), comprising:- receiving, from a second network function implementing an Edge Enabler Server (EES), a first message, wherein the first message explicitly or implicitly indicates a binding Edge Application Server (EAS) to be used for a UE group including the UE. (Paragraph 58-61, 67, Fig. 1 and 2 – UE triggers a discovery request and receives a response from the EES. The response includes a plurality of EAS based on the received grouping information of the discovery request)
Claims 23-29 are similar in scope to claims 1, 2, and 4-12 and are rejected based on the same rationale.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DAVID R LAZARO whose telephone number is (571)272-3986. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8-4:30.
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/DAVID R LAZARO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2455
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