DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . This Office Action is in response to the submission filed 2026-08-27 (herein referred to as the Reply) where claim(s) 1-8, 10-15, 17-19 are pending for consideration.
35 USC §103 - Claim Rejections
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 of this title, 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.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or non-obviousness.
Claim(s) is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over ZOU_718 (US20250168718) in view of PALLE VENKATA_249 (US20260239249)
Claim(s) 1, 19
ZOU_718 teaches
at least one processor; and at least one memory storing instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the user device at least to: UE <FIG. 1A, 26A-27>
receive timing alignment information of a network resource; TA assistance information including a timing offset between CU and DU is provided to the UE. <FIG(s). 7; para. 0016, 0135-0140, 0149>.
receive timing alignment information of a network resource; TA assistance information including a timing offset between CU and DU is provided to the UE. <FIG(s). 7; para. 0016, 0135-0140, 0149>.
determine, based on the timing alignment information, timing alignment offset between the network resource and another network resource; and Based on the assistance information from the network, the current one way delay (OWD) or TA, the UE measures the timing offset between source and target DL reference signals and determines the TA to the target cell. <FIG(s). 6, 7; para. 0149-0151>.
perform timing advance estimation for the network resource at least partially based on the timing alignment offset. Based on the assistance information from the network, the current one way delay (OWD) or TA, the UE measures the timing offset between source and target DL reference signals and determines the TA to the target cell. <FIG(s). 6, 7; para. 0019, 0149-0152, 0188-0190>.
ZOU_718 does not explicitly teach
send, to a network device, a capability indication of the user device being capable of performing timing advance estimation based on a receive time difference;
However in a similar endeavor, PALLE VENKATA_249 teaches
send, to a network device, a capability indication of the user device being capable of performing timing advance estimation based on a receive time difference; UE sends, to a network device, indication that UE is capable of perform the measurement and derive a timing difference between two cells. <FIG(s). 9; para. 0018, 0096-0101, 0107, 0117-0118; Claim(s) 48, Claim(s) 49>.
Before the effective filing date of the claim invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in art to have modified the system/techniques disclosed by ZOU_718 with the embodiment(s) disclosed by PALLE VENKATA_249. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification in order to provide methods that enable a UE-based TA estimation that can be performed in a faster manner than the procedure for the network-based TA, the overall mobility latency and throughput can be improved. <para. 0019>.
Claim(s) 2
ZOU_718 teaches
wherein the timing alignment information indicates at least one of:
a timing alignment offset between the network resource and a serving network resource of a source network device of a handover, or Timing offset is between CU and DU for handover. <FIG(s). 6, 7; para. 0131, 0150-0151>.
Claim(s) 3
ZOU_718 teaches
wherein the network resource comprises at least one of: a cell, a transmission and reception point, or candidate cells/TRPs/beams <FIG(s). 10; para. 0186-0190>.
Claim(s) 4, 15
ZOU_718 teaches
wherein the network resource is associated with a candidate target network device of a handover, and the timing alignment information is received from a source network device. TA assistance information including a timing offset between CU and DU is provided to the UE. In one embodiment, the assistance information is provided by the source DU. <FIG(s). 7; para. 0016, 0135-0140, 0149>.
Claim(s) 6, 14
ZOU_718 teaches
wherein the instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the user device to:
receive information about at least one of accuracy, validity, variation or update of the timing alignment information. Providing UE with TA assistance information can be dynamic updated <para. 0189, 0204, 0218>.
Claim(s) 7
ZOU_718 teaches
wherein the instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the user device to:
receive updated timing alignment information of the network resource. Providing UE with TA assistance information can be dynamic updated <para. 0189, 0204, 0218>.
Claim(s) 8
ZOU_718 teaches
wherein the instructions, when executed by the at least one processor, further cause the user device to:
receive information about at least one validity condition of the timing alignment information; and check validity of the timing alignment information based on the at least one validity condition. UE checks TAT to validate TA <para. 0081, 0218>.
Claim(s) 10, 18
ZOU_718 teaches
wherein the network resource and the another network resource are a candidate target cell and a source cell of a handover, respectively. Cell/TRP/beams of network nodes are target and source nodes for a handover. <FIG(s). 10, 6, 7; para. 0131, 0150-0151, 0186>.
Claim(s) 11
ZOU_718 teaches
at least one processor; and at least one memory storing instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the network device at least to: network node such as DU <FIG. 1A, 26A-27>
send, to a user device, timing alignment information of a network resource, to enable the user device to perform a timing advance estimation for the network resource at least partially based on the timing alignment information, TA assistance information including a timing offset between CU and DU is provided to the UE. In one embodiment, the assistance information is provided by the source DU. <FIG(s). 7; para. 0016, 0135-0140, 0149>.
wherein the timing alignment information indicates timing alignment offset between the network resource and another network resource. Timing offset is between CU and DU. <FIG(s). 7; para. 0016, 0135-0140, 0149>.
ZOU_718 does not explicitly teach
receive, from a user device, a capability indication of the user device being capable of performing timing advance estimation based on a receive time difference;
However in a similar endeavor, PALLE VENKATA_249 teaches
receive, from a user device, a capability indication of the user device being capable of performing timing advance estimation based on a receive time difference; UE sends, to a network device, indication that UE is capable of perform the measurement and derive a timing difference between two cells. <FIG(s). 9; para. 0018, 0096-0101, 0107, 0117-0118; Claim(s) 48, Claim(s) 49>.
Before the effective filing date of the claim invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in art to have modified the system/techniques disclosed by ZOU_718 with the embodiment(s) disclosed by PALLE VENKATA_249. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification in order to provide methods that enable a UE-based TA estimation that can be performed in a faster manner than the procedure for the network-based TA, the overall mobility latency and throughput can be improved. <para. 0019>.
Claim(s) is/are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over ZOU_718 (US20250168718) in view of PALLE VENKATA_249 (US20260239249), and further view of KHOSHKHOLGH DASHTAKI_334 (US20250324334)
Claim(s) 5, 17
ZOU_718 does not explicitly teach
wherein the timing alignment information is received from a location service device of a core network.
However in a similar endeavor, KHOSHKHOLGH DASHTAKI_334 teaches
wherein the timing alignment information is received from a location service device of a core network. TA information is provided by network device that provides GNSS-acquired information. <para. 0377-0378>.
Before the effective filing date of the claim invention, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in art to have modified the system/techniques disclosed by ZOU_718 and PALLE VENKATA_249 with the embodiment(s) disclosed by KHOSHKHOLGH DASHTAKI_334. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification in order to reduce power consumption and/or for other purposes, a UE may adapt the size of the UE's receive bandwidth based on the amount of traffic the UE is scheduled to receive. <para. 0128>.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim(s) is/are indicated as having allowable subject matter and objected to.
The claim(s) is/are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Claim(s) 12, 13
Closest prior art is SHIN - US20210274526, KWON - US20130034087, TSAI - US20180124724 which teaches a UE that evaluated a timer to determine whether TA information is still valid which is different from the invention that requires a network node determine whether TA information is invalid and in response sends updated timing alignment information to the UE.
In addition to the explicit reasons given herein, allowability is also determined in view of the combination of references required for obviousness, the inter-relationship between other claimed limitations, and the claimed invention as a whole. Accordingly, amendments that do not incorporate the allowable claims into the base/intervening claims in its entirely, are not allowable. This includes amendments that incorporate the allowable claims into the base/intervening claims in part or in a non-narrowing manner (i.e., changing the scope of the subject matter).
Relevant Cited References
KWON - US20130034087
Response to Arguments
The following arguments in the Reply have been fully considered but they are not persuasive:
An updated/refreshed search resulted in art that was pertinent to the amended subject matter. Accordingly, the subject matter of now canceled claim 9 is no longer deemed allowable.
The Reply’s arguments with respect to the other matters have been considered but are moot because the arguments do not apply to the rejection(s), which was necessitated by the Applicant’s amendments, being used in the current rejection.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ANDRE TACDIRAN whose telephone number is 571-272-1717. The examiner can normally be reached on M-TH, 10-5PM EST. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jeffrey Rutkowski can be reached on 571-270-1215. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ANDRE TACDIRAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2415
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