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 .
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.
Claim 20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matier. The claim(s) does/do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter, the claims recite an embodiment of the applicant's invention directed towards a computer readable storage medium storing a program. It is noted, however, the recitation of the medium in the specification is not exclusory with respect to non-statutory medium types as no specific and limiting definition of “the medium” is provided. Thus, under the broadest reasonable interpretation, the full claim scope of "computer readable medium” would include non- statutory mediums such as carrier waves. As per the recent USPTO notice signed by director David Kappos on 1/26/2010: “The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) is obliged to give claims their broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with the specification during proceedings before the USPTO. See In re Zletz, 893 F.2d 319(Fed. Cir. 1989) (during patent examination the pending claims must be interpreted as broadly as their term reasonably allow). The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim drawn to a computer readable medium (also called machine readable medium and other such variations) typically covers forms of non-transitory tangible media and transitory propagating signals per se in view of the ordinary and customary meaning of computer readable media, particularly when the specification is silent. See MPEP 2111.01. When the broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim covers a signal per se, the claim must be rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 as covering non-statutory subject matter. See In re Nuijten, 500 F.3d 1346, 1356-57 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (transitory embodiments are not directed to statutory subject matter) and Interim Examination instructions for Evaluating Subject Matter Eligibility Under 35 U.S.C.j101, Aug. 24, 2009; p.2.”
For example, according to applicant's publication, paragraph [0258], a readable medium in which the program is recorded may be provided. At least, in this paragraph, the publication does not state whether the readable medium is non-transitory or a signal, etc.
The scope of “computer readable storage medium’ therefore includes signal- based mediums. A signal dees not fall within one of the four statutory categories of invention (i.e., process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter) because it is an ephemeral, transient signal and thus is non-statutory. Since the scope of “the medium” includes these non-statutory instances, claim 20 is directed to non-statutory subject matter.
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) 1-2, 4, 11, 18 and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miao et al., U.S. Publication No. 2018/0220308 (Miao 308’) in view of Luo et al. (Luo), 2015/0280873.
Regarding Claims 1, 18 and 20, Miao 308’ discloses an electronic device for a
base station in a non-terrestrial network, comprising:
processing circuitry configured to
determine to enable uplink transmission for a user equipment (UE) in a serving cell provided by the base station (i.e., a UE may be in communication with a macro-cell eNB and with multiple small-cell Aps as shown in figure 5);
at least based on geographic location of the UE (as described in paragraph
[0087]), coverage range and movement information of the serving cell, and coverage range and movement information of neighbor cells (as shown in figure 5 and described in paragraph [0074]), select at least one cooperating cell from the neighbor cells (i.e., the UE 102 may receive, from the eNB 104, one or more pencil cell configuration messages. In some embodiments, the messages may indicate a candidate pencil cell selected, by the eNB 104, for exchanging of data messages with the UE 102.; see paragraph [0076]), and determine a cooperation period for the uplink transmission (as shown in figure 5 and described in paragraph [0074]); and
receive uplink transmission of the UE by cooperation of the serving cell and the
at least one cooperating cell within the cooperation period (i.e., for exchanging of data messages with the UE 102 as described in paragraphs [0075]-[0077]).
Miao 308’ fails to disclose uplink coordinated multiple points transmission.
Luo discloses uplink coordinated multiple points transmission (see abstract).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Luo’s invention with Miao 308’s invention for effectively improving overall cell performance and cell edge user performance (see paragraph [0003] of Luo).
Regarding Claim 2, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as described above. Miao 308’ further discloses wherein the base station further provides the at least one cooperating cell (see paragraph [0076]).
Regarding Claim 4, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as described above. Miao 308’ further discloses wherein selecting the at least one cooperating cell comprises: acquiring measurement of signal quality of an uplink signal of the UE by each of the neighbor cells; evaluating a potential coverage time of each of the neighbor cells over the UE; and at least based on the measurement of signal quality and the potential coverage time of each of the neighbor cells, selecting the at least one cooperating cell (see paragraph [0100]).
Regarding Claim 11, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as
described above. Miao 308’ further discloses wherein the coverage range and movement information of the serving cell or the neighbor cell are based on geographic location, ephemeris, beam direction and antenna radiation pattern of the serving cell or the neighbor cell (see paragraphs [0053]-[0054] and figure 5).
Claim(s) 3 and 5 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miao 308’ and Luo in view of Hessler et al. (Hessler), U.S. Publication No. 2015/0270877.
Regarding Claim 3, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as
described above. Miao 308’ and Luo fail to disclose wherein the at least one cooperating cell is provided by a different base station than the base station, and
wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to notify selection information of each cooperating cell and information on the cooperation period to respective base station. Hessler discloses wherein the at least one cooperating cell is provided by a different base station than the base station, and wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to notify selection information of each cooperating cell and information on the cooperation period to respective base station (see paragraph [0176]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Hessler’s invention with Miao 308’s and Luo’s invention to improve coverage, support high data rates, improve cell-edge throughput and/or to increase system throughput (see paragraph [0002] of Hessler).
Regarding Claim 5, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as
described above. Miao 308’ and Luo fail to disclose wherein selecting the at least one cooperating cell comprises: instructing each of the neighbor cells to measure signal quality of an uplink signal of the UE and acquiring respective measurements; evaluating a potential coverage time of each of the neighbor cells over the UE; evaluating a connection time between the base station and a base station of each of the neighbor cells; and at least based on the measurement of signal quality, the potential coverage time and the connection time of each of the neighbor cells, selecting the at least one cooperating cell. Hessler discloses one cooperating cell comprises: instructing each of the neighbor cells to measure signal quality of an uplink signal of the UE and acquiring respective measurements; evaluating a potential coverage time of each of the neighbor cells over the UE; evaluating a connection time between the base station and a base station of each of the neighbor cells; and at least based on the measurement of signal quality, the potential coverage time and the connection time of each of the neighbor cells, selecting the at least one cooperating cell (see paragraph [0176]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Hessler’s invention with Miao 308’s and Luo’s invention to improve coverage, support high data rates, improve cell-edge throughput and/or to increase system throughput (see paragraph [0002] of Hessler).
Claim(s) 6-7 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miao 308’ and Luo in view of Miao et al., U.S. Publication No. 2019/0081751 (Miao 751’).
Regarding Claim 6, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as
described above. Miao 308’ and Luo fail to disclose wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: determine a scanning beam range for the UE; indicate the scanning beam range to the UE; acquire measurements of signal quality of an uplink signal transmitted by the UE with each of transmission beams in the scanning beam range by the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell; based on the measurements of signal quality, determine a transmission beam of the UE for the uplink coordinated multiple points transmission. Miao 751’ discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: determine a scanning beam range for the UE; indicate the scanning beam range to the UE; acquire measurements of signal quality of an uplink signal transmitted by the UE with each of transmission beams in the scanning beam range by the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell; based on the measurements of signal quality, determine a transmission beam of the UE for the uplink coordinated multiple points transmission (see paragraphs [0024], [0026] and [0029]-[0030]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Miao 751’s invention with Miao 308’s and Luo’s invention for link reliability improvement and energy consumption (see paragraph [0020] of Miao 751’).
Regarding Claim 7, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as
described above. Miao 308’ and Luo fail to disclose wherein indicating the scanning beam range to the UE comprises: indicating a subset of a preconfigured set of transmission beams as the scanning beam range to the UE via downlink control information (DCI). Miao 751’ discloses wherein indicating the scanning beam range to the UE comprises: indicating a subset of a preconfigured set of transmission beams as the scanning beam range to the UE via downlink control information (DCI) (see paragraph [0024]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Miao 751’s invention with Miao 308’s and Luo’s invention for link reliability improvement and energy consumption (see paragraph [0020] of Miao 751’).
Claim(s) 8 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miao 308’ and Luo in view of Leng et al. (Leng), U.S. Publication No. 2023/0030645 in further view of Morita, U.S. Publication No. 2014/0362801.
Regarding Claim 8, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as
described above. Miao 308’ and Luo fail to disclose wherein the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell are provided by different satellites, and wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: cause the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell to measure a time advance (TA) for the UE; based on measurements of the TA, calculate a reception delay for each cooperating cell relative to the serving cell; and receive the uplink transmission of the UE by the at least one cooperating cell based on respective reception delay. Leng discloses wherein the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell are provided by different satellites (see paragraph [0034]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Leng’s invention with Miao 308’s and Luo’s invention for improving radio interface efficiency, coverage, and quality of service (see paragraph [0003] of Leng). Miao 308’, Luo and Leng fail to disclose wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: cause the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell to measure a time advance (TA) for the UE; based on measurements of the TA, calculate a reception delay for each cooperating cell relative to the serving cell; and receive the uplink transmission of the UE by the at least one cooperating cell based on respective reception delay. Morita discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: cause the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell to measure a time advance (TA) for the UE; based on measurements of the TA, calculate a reception delay for each cooperating cell relative to the serving cell; and receive the uplink transmission of the UE by the at least one cooperating cell based on respective reception delay (see paragraph [0017]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Morita’s invention with Miao 308’s, Luo’s and Leng’s invention for properly allocating resources.
Claim(s) 9 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miao 308’, Luo and Hessler in view of Leng in further view of Morita.
Regarding Claim 9, Miao 308’, Luo and Hessler disclose the electronic device as described above. Miao 308’, Luo and Hessler fail to disclose wherein the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell are provided by different satellites, and wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: cause the serving cell to measure a time advance (TA) for the UE; and send a measurement of the TA to respective base station corresponding to the at least one cooperating cell. Leng discloses wherein the serving cell and the at least one cooperating cell are provided by different satellites (see paragraphs [0034] and [0079]-[0080]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Leng’s invention with Miao 308’s, Luo’s and Hessler’s invention for improving radio interface efficiency, coverage, and quality of service (see paragraph [0003] of Leng). Miao 308’, Luo, Hessler and Leng fail to disclose wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: cause the serving cell to measure a time advance (TA) for the UE; and send a measurement of the TA to respective base station corresponding to the at least one cooperating cell. Morita discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: cause the serving cell to measure a time advance (TA) for the UE; and send a measurement of the TA to respective base station corresponding to the at least one cooperating cell (see paragraph [0017]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Morita’s invention with Miao 308’s, Luo’s, Hessler’s and Leng’s invention for properly allocating resources.
Claim(s) 10 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Miao 308’ and Luo in view of Leng.
Regarding Claim 10, Miao 308’ and Luo disclose the electronic device as
described above. Miao 308’ and Luo fail to disclose wherein the processing
circuitry is further configured to instruct the UE to report its current geographic location,
beam direction and antenna radiation pattern, in response to determining to enable the uplink coordinated multiple points transmission for the UE. Leng discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to instruct the UE to report its current geographic location, beam direction and antenna radiation pattern, in response to determining to enable the uplink coordinated multiple points transmission for the UE (see paragraph [0027], [0029]-[0031] and [0079]-[0080]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Leng’s invention with Miao 308’s and Luo’s invention for improving radio interface efficiency, coverage, and quality of service (see paragraph [0003] of Leng).
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.
Claim(s) 12, 14 and 19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Hessler.
Regarding Claims 12 and 19, Hessler discloses an electronic device for a base
station in a non-terrestrial network (NTN), comprising:
processing circuitry configured to
receive, from another base station, selection information (in other words,
the measurement result obtainer 110 is configured to obtain, for each of a number of candidate access points, at least one uplink measurement result. ; see paragraph [0176]) of a cooperating cell and information on a cooperation period for uplink coordinated multiple points transmission for a user equipment (UE) (i.e., The access point selector 150 is configured to select which one of the at least two different sets of access points to use for COMP uplink reception based on the uplink quality measure and the measure representative of the number of transmission opportunities available to the user over the given period of time.; see paragraph [0176]); and
in response to the selection information, receive uplink transmission of the UE
within the cooperating period by cooperation of the cooperating cell and a serving cell of the UE (in other words, select which one of the at least two different sets of access points to use for COMP uplink reception; see paragraph [0176] and figures 10A & 10B).
Regarding Claim 14, Hessler discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: measure, by its cell, signal quality of an uplink signal of the UE; and send measurement of the signal quality to the another base station, for the another base station to select the cooperating cell (see paragraph [0093]).
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) 13 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hessler in view of Leng.
Regarding Claim 13, Hessler discloses the electronic device as described
above. Hessler fails to disclose wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to send geographic location, ephemeris, beam direction and antenna radiation pattern of its satellite to the another base station. Leng discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to send geographic location, ephemeris, beam direction and antenna radiation pattern of its satellite to the another base station (see paragraphs [0079]-[0080]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Leng’s invention with Hessler’s invention for improving radio interface efficiency, coverage, and quality of service (see paragraph [0003] of Leng).
Claim(s) 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hessler in view of Miao 751’.
Regarding Claim 15, Hessler discloses the electronic device as described
above. Hessler fails to disclose wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to:
measure, by the cooperating cell, signal quality of an uplink signal transmitted by the UE with each of transmission beams in a scanning beam range; and send measurements of the signal quality to the another base station, for the another base station to determine a transmission beam for the uplink coordinated multiple points transmission of the UE. Miao 751’ discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to:
measure, by the cooperating cell, signal quality of an uplink signal transmitted by the UE with each of transmission beams in a scanning beam range; and send measurements of the signal quality to the another base station, for the another base station to determine a transmission beam for the uplink coordinated multiple points transmission of the UE (see paragraphs [0024], [0026] and [0029]-[0030]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Miao 751’s invention with Hessler’s invention for link reliability improvement and energy consumption (see paragraph [0020] of Miao 751’).
Claim(s) 16 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hessler in view of Morita.
Regarding Claim 16, Hessler discloses the electronic device as described
above. Hessler fails to disclose wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: measure, by the cooperating cell, a time advance (TA) for the UE; and acquire, from the another base station, a TA for the UE measured by the serving cell; calculate a reception delay for the cooperating cell relative to the serving cell based on measurements of the TA for the UE; and receive, by the cooperating cell, the uplink transmission of the UE based on the determined reception delay. Morita discloses wherein the processing circuitry is further configured to: measure, by the cooperating cell, a time advance (TA) for the UE; and acquire, from the another base station, a TA for the UE measured by the serving cell; calculate a reception delay for the cooperating cell relative to the serving cell based on measurements of the TA for the UE; and receive, by the cooperating cell, the uplink transmission of the UE based on the determined reception delay (see paragraph [0017]). It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to consider Morita’s invention with Hessler’s invention for properly allocating resources.
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.
Claim(s) 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Miao 751’.
Regarding Claim 17, Miao 751’ discloses an electronic device for a user
equipment (UE), comprising:
processing circuitry configured to
receive, from a serving cell, information on a scanning beam range for the UE (in
other words, when the network entity detects a change in a dominant periodic SRS process, the network entity may trigger an aperiodic SRS process for the new strongest periodic SRS process in order to acquire a beam refinement… These techniques enable the network to maintain up-to-date information on uplink reception points with preferred uplink Tx-Rx beams for the UE, and can indicate a proper set of Tx beams for PUSCH; see paragraph [0024]);
transmit an uplink signal with each of transmission beams in the scanning beam range (i.e., the UE may be configured to transmit multiple periodic SRSs… Upon receiving the above signaled UE SRS capability, a serving network entity (e.g., an eNB) comprising one or more cooperative access points (APs) can configure multiple periodic SRS processes for the UE. With this configuration, the UE transmits several SRS processes periodically, and each SRS process is transmitted towards different uplink beam sector direction.; see paragraphs [0024] and [0026]);
receive, from the serving cell, indication information for an optimal transmission
beam of the UE for uplink coordinated multiple points transmission, wherein the optimal transmission beam is determined based on signal quality of the uplink signal transmitted by the UE measured by the serving cell and at least one cooperating cell (i.e., the eNB can determine the strongest receive SRS instance corresponding to the refined sub-beam direction within the beam sector associated with a periodic SRS process of all the involved APs. ; see paragraphs [0029] and [0030]); and
perform uplink transmission with the optimal transmission beam (i.e., the UE transmits the uplink packet to the eNB in the preferred beam direction; see paragraph [0030]).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Roessel et al., U.S. Publication No. 2014/0248888 discloses method and
apparatuses for configuring a communication channel
Marupaduga, U.S. Patent No. 10,404,330 discloses coordinated multipoint set
size based on quality of service
Mochizuki et al., U.S. Publication No. 2015/0036658 discloses mobile
communication system
Tao et al., U.S. Publication No. 2013/0223272 discloses method for establishing
comp cooperating set in coordinated multi-point communication
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SHANTELL LAKETA HEIBER whose telephone number is (571)272-0886. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F from 9am to 5pm.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Anthony Addy, can be reached at telephone number 571-272-7795. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/SHANTELL L HEIBER/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2645
September 16, 2026
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