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 .
Response to Amendment
Received 05/07/2026
Claim(s) 1, 2, 4, 5, and 11-18 is/are pending.
Claim(s) 1, 2, 4, 5, and 11-18 has/have been amended.
Claim(s) 3 and 6-10 has/have been cancelled.
The 35 USC § 101 rejection to claim(s) 15-18 have been maintained in view of the amendments received on 05/07/2026.
The 35 U.S.C § 102(a)(2) rejection to claim(s) 1, 11, and 15 have been fully considered in view of the amendments received on 05/07/2026 and are fully addressed in the prior art rejection below.
The 35 U.S.C § 103 rejection to claim(s) 2, 4-5, 12-14, and 16-18 have been fully considered in view of the amendments received on 05/07/2026 and are fully addressed in the prior art rejection below.
Response to Arguments
Received 05/07/2026
Regarding independent claim(s) 1, 11, and 15:
Applicant’s arguments (Remarks, Page 5: ¶ 4 to Page 7: ¶ 2), filed 05/07/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1, 11, and 15 under 35 U.S.C § 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn, necessitated by Applicant's amendments. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Chalfin et al. (US PGPUB No. 20180239992 A1).
Regarding dependent claim(s) 2, 4-5, 12-14, and 16-18:
Applicant’s arguments (Remarks, Page 7: ¶ 4-6), filed 05/07/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 2, 4-5, 12-14, and 16-18 under 35 U.S.C § 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive due the dependency upon claims 1, 11, and 15 respectively. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn, necessitated by Applicant's amendments. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of the prior art as mentioned above.
Applicant's arguments filed 05/07/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive; as expressed below.
Regarding 35 U.S.C. § 101:
Applicant argues (Remarks, Page 5, ¶ 2-3), that “Claims 15-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. §101 because the claimed invention is directed to a non-statutory subject matter.
Claims 15-18 have been amended, without prejudice. Accordingly, for at least the reasons set forth above, Applicant respectfully requests the withdrawal of the rejection of claims 15-18.”
The Examiner disagrees. Wherein, although claim 15 has been amended, said amendments fails to limit the computer-readable medium (CRM) to a storage device and/or to a non-transitory CRM. Moreover, a medium is broad and may correspond to a signal per se. (MPEP; "... the BRI of machine readable media can encompass non-statutory transitory forms of signal transmission, such as a propagating electrical or electromagnetic signal per se. See In re Nuijten, 500 F.3d 1346, 84 USPQ2d 1495 (Fed. Cir. 2007). When the BRI encompasses transitory forms of signal transmission, a rejection under 35 U.S.C. 101 as failing to claim statutory subject matter would be appropriate. Thus, a claim to a computer readable medium that can be a compact disc or a carrier wave covers a non-statutory embodiment and therefore should be rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 as being directed to non-statutory subject matter. See, e.g., Mentor Graphics v. EVE-USA, Inc., 851 F.3d at 1294-95, 112 USPQ2d at 1134 (claims to a ‘machine-readable medium’ were non-statutory, because their scope encompassed both statutory random-access memory and non-statutory carrier waves)" [2106.03]).
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).
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 15-18 are non-statutory under the most recent interpretation of the Interim Guidelines regarding 35 U.S.C.101 because:
the computer readable medium claimed is not positively disclosed in the specification as a statutory only embodiment. However, the specification, at ¶ 0297 (other ¶ 0033, ¶ 0276, ¶ 0296), defines or exemplifies the computer-readable storage medium in an open-ended and non-limiting manner such as “… computer-readable media may be downloaded as a computer program product, wherein the program may be transferred from a remote computer (e.g., a server) to a requesting computer (e.g., a client) by way of data signals provided in a carrier wave or other propagation medium via a communication link (e.g., a bus, a modem, or a network connection)”. 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. § 101, Aug. 24, 2009; p. 2. To overcome this rejection, the claim may be amended to recite "One or more non-transitory processor readable storage devices..."
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 2, 4, 5, 12-14, and 16-18 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.
Claims 2, 12, and 16 recites the limitation "the frequency domain" in lines 3-4. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
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)(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, 11, and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as being anticipated by Chalfin et al., US PGPUB No. 20180239992 A1, hereinafter Chalfin.
Regarding claim 1, Chalfin discloses an apparatus (Chalfin; an apparatus (i.e. data processing system) [¶ 0105-0107], as illustrated within Fig. 1) comprising:
processing circuitry (Chalfin; the apparatus [as addressed above] comprises processing circuitry [¶ 0106-108], as illustrated within Fig. 1) to:
facilitate a lossy compression, based on data transform and quantization process, to compress data in a convolutional neural network (CNN) layer (Chalfin; processing circuitry [as addressed above] facilitate a lossy compression [¶ 0053] to compress data in a CNN layer [¶ 0121-0124] based on data transform (i.e. DCT) and quantization process [¶ 0051 and ¶ 0126]), wherein the data comprises one or more weight relating to the CNN layer (Chalfin; the data comprises one or more weight(s) relating to the CNN layer [¶ 0121-0122 and ¶ 0126]).
Regarding claim 11, the rejection of claim 11 is addressed within the rejection of claim 1, due to the similarities claim 11 and claim 1 share, therefore refer to the rejection of claim 1 regarding the rejection of claim 11. Although, claim 11 and claim 1 may not be identical, they are considerably comparable or substantially equivalent given their overlapping subject matter. Thus, it is reasonable to reject claim 11 based on the teachings and rational in relation with the prior art within the rejection of claim 1.
Regarding claim 15, the rejection of claim 15 is addressed within the rejection of claim 1, due to the similarities claim 15 and claim 1 share, therefore refer to the rejection of claim 1 regarding the rejection of claim 15. Although, claim 15 and claim 1 may not be identical, they are considerably comparable or substantially equivalent given their overlapping subject matter. However, the subject matter/limitations not addressed by claim 1 is/are addressed below.
Chalfin discloses at least one computer-readable medium having stored thereon instructions which, when executed, cause a computing device to perform operations (Chalfin; at least one computer-readable medium having stored thereon instructions which, when executed, cause a computing device to perform operations [¶ 0089 and ¶ 0098-0100]; moreover, CRM and instructions [¶ 0101-0102]).
(further refer the rejection of claim 1)
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) 2, 4, 5, 12-14, and 16-18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Chalfin, and further in view of Cai et al., US PGPUB No. 20170280161 A1, hereinafter Cai.
Regarding claim 2, Chalfin further teaches the apparatus of claim 1, wherein the one or more weights are quantized in the domain (Chalfin; the one or more weights are quantized in blocks (of matrix) of weight values (i.e. domain (of values)) [¶ 0126]).
Chalfin fails to disclose data quantization in the frequency domain.
However, Cai teaches one or more data values are quantized in the frequency domain (Cai; data values are quantized in a (spatial) frequency domain [¶ 0062]).
Chalfin and Cai are considered to be analogous art because both pertain to data handling, wherein data is modified using compression/encoding.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to modify Chalfin, to incorporate one or more data values are quantized in the frequency domain (as taught by Cai), in order to maintain media quality while reducing raw data into a compressed/reduced format (Cai; [¶ 0001 and ¶ 0062]).
Regarding claim 4, Chalfin in view of Cai further discloses the apparatus of claim 2, wherein the processing circuitry (Chalfin; the processing circuitry [as addressed within the parent claim(s)]) is further:
decompress the data in the CNN layer (Chalfin; decompress the data in the CNN layer [¶ 0122 and ¶ 0127]; additionally, decompressing compressed weight values [¶ 0128-0129]).
Regarding claim 5, Chalfin in view of Cai further discloses the apparatus of claim 2, wherein the processing circuitry (Chalfin; the processing circuitry [as addressed within parent claim(s)]) is further to:
apply an inversed transform to the CNN layer before saving the compute in one or more processing resources (Chalfin; processing circuitry [as addressed above] (configured) to apply an inversed transform to the CNN layer before saving the compute in one or more processing resources [¶ 0128]; moreover, the decompression scheme can take any desired and suitable form that corresponds to (e.g. is the inverse of) the compression scheme [¶ 0070]), wherein the processing circuitry is coupled to a memory (Chalfin; the processing circuitry [as addressed above] is coupled to a memory [¶ 0106-0108]), the processing circuitry comprising graphics processing circuitry or application processing circuitry (Chalfin; the processing circuitry [as addressed above] comprising graphics processing circuitry (i.e. GPU) or application processing circuitry (i.e. CPU) [¶ 0106-0108]).
Regarding claim 12, the rejection of claim 12 is addressed within the rejection of claim 2, due to the similarities claim 12 and claim 2 share, therefore refer to the rejection of claim 2 regarding the rejection of claim 12.
Regarding claim 13, the rejection of claim 13 is addressed within the rejection of claim 4, due to the similarities claim 13 and claim 4 share, therefore refer to the rejection of claim 4 regarding the rejection of claim 13.
Regarding claim 14, the rejection of claim 14 is addressed within the rejection of claim 5, due to the similarities claim 14 and claim 5 share, therefore refer to the rejection of claim 5 regarding the rejection of claim 14.
Regarding claim 16, the rejection of claim 16 is addressed within the rejection of claim 2, due to the similarities claim 16 and claim 2 share, therefore refer to the rejection of claim 2 regarding the rejection of claim 16.
Regarding claim 17, the rejection of claim 17 is addressed within the rejection of claim 4, due to the similarities claim 17 and claim 4 share, therefore refer to the rejection of claim 4 regarding the rejection of claim 17.
Regarding claim 18, the rejection of claim 18 is addressed within the rejection of claim 5, due to the similarities claim 18 and claim 5 share, therefore refer to the rejection of claim 5 regarding the rejection of claim 18.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
Alistarh et al. (US PGPUB No. 20180075347 A1) : regarding lossy encoding scheme compression of neural network data;
Georgiadis (US PGPUB No. 20200143249 A1) : regarding compression of weights of a neural network; and
Thiagarajan et al. (US PGPUB No. 20180084280 A1) : regarding compression based on DCT and/or quantization.
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Refer to PTO-892, Notice of Reference Cited for a listing of analogous art.
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 Charles Lloyd Beard whose telephone number is (571)272-5735. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday, 8:00 AM - 5: 00 PM, alternate Fridays EST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Tammy Goddard can be reached at (571) 272-7773. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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CHARLES LLOYD. BEARD
Primary Examiner
Art Unit 2611
/CHARLES L BEARD/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2611
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