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 Arguments
The applicant has argued that the amendments made to the independent claims overcome the previously rendered prior art rejections. These arguments are moot as a new grounds of rejection has been identified in a renewed search necessitated by said amendments.
Status of Claims
Claims 1-6, 9-10, and 12-18, and 20-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Khasis (US 2017/0262790) in view of Mukherjee (US 2010/0082226).
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Khasis in view of Mukherjee in view of Christensen (US 10,403,133)
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Khasis in view of Mukherjee in view of Munoz (US 2021/0110323).
Claim 11 is rejected as being unpatentable over Khasis in view of Mukherjee in view of Scofield (US 2014/0278032).
Priority
The priority date for this application is 11/30/2023.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 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.
The factual inquiries 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 nonobviousness.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1-6, 9-10, and 12-18, and 20-21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Khasis (US 2017/0262790) in view of Mukherjee (US 2010/0082226).
As per Claim 1:
Khasis discloses all of the following limitations:
“A method comprising: identifying, by one or more processors of one or more server computing devices, a plurality of routes, each route of the plurality of routes comprising a plurality of road segments and being a current route on which an autonomous vehicle of a fleet of autonomous vehicles is currently traveling, wherein each of the autonomous vehicles uses a cost-based analysis to determine routes”
Khasis Paragraph [0089] discloses communication between autonomous vehicles all travelling based on the system disclosed in the reference that assigns dynamic costs to routes being driven.
“determining, by the one or more processors and based on the comparison, that a cluster of autonomous vehicles of the fleet of autonomous vehicles is likely to occur on the road segment; and sending, by the one or more processors, a signal to one or more of the autonomous vehicles of the cluster of autonomous vehicles to adjust a cost of traversing the road segment in order to increase a likelihood of the one or more of the autonomous vehicles of the cluster of autonomous vehicles avoiding the road segment”
Khasis Paragraph [0089] discloses autonomous vehicles optimizing routes (i.e. solving cost functions) in coordination with each other to avoid congestion, which would include with each other.
Khasis does not disclose the following limitations that Mukherjee teaches:
“comparing, by the one or more processors, respective times at which respective autonomous vehicles of a plurality of autonomous vehicles are expected to traverse a road segment included in the plurality of routes”
Mukherjee Paragraphs [0029]-[0032] teaches predicting “capacity” for road segments in the future which represents the amount of traffic that will occupy each road segment at distinct future time periods. The capacity prediction is based on comparing possible routes of various vehicles (See Paragraph [0004]) and the respective arrival time (and therefore occupancy time) of the various vehicles in the various route segments. The weighting is dynamically adjusted as capacity is affected by traffic congestion. In Paragraph [0043] teaches updating a route based on changes in predicted capacity of a route. It would be obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art that the vehicles in question could be autonomous or not without affecting the recited invention.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date, to modify the system disclosed by Khasis with the comparison of arrival times at route segments affecting route planning taught by Mukerjee
With regards to Claim 2, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 1 and further discloses the following limitations:
“wherein each route of the plurality of routes includes a list of edges of map information each corresponding to a different road segment.”
Khasis [Abstract] discloses map data composed of edges representing road segments.
With regards to Claim 3, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 1 and further discloses the following limitations:
“wherein determining that the cluster of autonomous vehicles is likely to occur is based on a sliding window of time.”
Khasis Paragraph [0089] discloses avoiding congestion between vehicles wherein congestion itself represents a surplus of vehicles co-located during a given, arbitrarily sliding, window of time.
With regards to Claim 4, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 3 and further discloses the following limitations:
“wherein determining that the cluster of autonomous vehicles is likely to occur is based on a threshold number of autonomous vehicles expected to traverse the road segment during the sliding window of time.”
Khasis Paragraph [0089] discloses avoiding congestion between autonomous, and non-autonomous, vehicles. In order to avoid "congestion" some arbitrary threshold must be adapted for the two pertinent variables used in defining congestion at a location, i.e. time-window and number of vehicles. The system is also disclosed as being predictive in nature (See at least [Abstract]).
With regards to Claim 5, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 4 and further discloses the following limitations:
“further comprising, determining the threshold number of autonomous vehicles based on a type of the road segment.”
Khasis [Abstract] discloses predicting future traffic and Paragraph [0089] discloses avoiding congestions along routes, such an action would require consideration of road type and how it relates to road capacity.
With regards to Claim 6, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 3 and further discloses the following limitations:
“further comprising, determining the sliding window of time based on a type of the road segment.”
Khasis [Abstract] discloses predicting future traffic and Paragraph [0089] discloses avoiding congestions along routes, such an action would require consideration of arrival time at road segments and how they compare with the arrival times of other vehicles.
With regards to Claim 9, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 1 and further discloses the following limitations:
“wherein the signal is a first signal, and the method further comprises sending a second signal to a second one of the one or more of the autonomous vehicles of the cluster of autonomous vehicles to adjust the cost of traversing the road segment, wherein the first signal is configured to cause a first adjustment in the cost and the second signal is configured to cause a second adjustment in the cost, and wherein the first adjustment is different from the second adjustment.”
Khasis Paragraph [0089] discloses an arbitrary number of autonomous vehicles avoiding congestion, the number of signals sent to the arbitrary number of vehicles is, itself, also arbitrary.
With regards to Claim 10, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 1 and further discloses the following limitations:
“further comprising, continuing to send additional signals to the one or more of the autonomous vehicles of the cluster of autonomous vehicles until the one or more of the autonomous vehicles of the cluster of autonomous vehicles change to one or more new routes that do not include the road segment.”
Khasis Paragraph [0089] discloses autonomous vehicles communicating in order to avoid congestion amongst themselves. Such an act would require at least one vehicle to avoid a congestion-potential area.
With regards to Claim 12, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 1 and further discloses the following limitations:
“wherein the signal includes an instruction indicating how long the cost is to be adjusted.”
Khasis Paragraph [0057] discloses the creation of temporary avoidance zones which would represent a temporarily increased road segment cost.
As per Claim 13: this claim is substantially similar to Claim 1 and is therefore rejected using the same references and rationale.
With regards to Claim 14, this claim is substantially similar to Claim 3 and is therefore rejected using the same references and rationale.
With regards to Claim 15, this claim is substantially similar to Claim 4 and is therefore rejected using the same references and rationale.
With regards to Claim 16, this claim is substantially similar to Claim 5 and is therefore rejected using the same references and rationale.
With regards to Claim 17, this claim is substantially similar to Claim 9 and is therefore rejected using the same references and rationale.
With regards to Claim 18, this claim is substantially similar to Claim 10 and is therefore rejected using the same references and rationale.
With regards to Claim 20, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 13 and further discloses the following limitations:
“further comprising the autonomous vehicle”
Khasis Paragraph [0039] discloses an autonomous vehicle.
As per Claim 21: this claim is substantially similar to Claim 1 and is therefore rejected using the same references and rationale.
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Khasis in view of Mukherjee in view of Christensen (US 10,403,133).
With regards to Claim 7, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 1 but does not disclose the following limitations that Christensen does disclose:
“wherein sending the signal is based on whether the one or more of the autonomous vehicles of the cluster of autonomous vehicles are transporting passengers.”
Christensen Column 16 Lines 8-37 discloses a passenger dictating whether an autonomous vehicle takes a less traffic-dense route or not.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date, to modify the system disclosed by Khasis in view of Mukherjee with the passenger priority disclosed by Christensen. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to make the system more effective by prioritizing passenger vehicles.
Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Khasis in view of Mukherjee in view of Munoz (US 2021/0110323).
With regards to Claim 8, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 1 but does not disclose the following limitations that Munoz does disclose:
“wherein sending the signal is based on a state of charge or fuel of the one or more of the autonomous vehicles of the cluster of autonomous vehicles.”
Munoz Paragraph [0131] discloses identifying route optimization based on charge level of vehicles.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date, to modify the system disclosed by Khasis in view of Mukherjee with the state of charge consideration disclosed by Munoz. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to make the system more effective by minimizing the risk of becoming stranded because of traffic congestion.
Claim 11 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Khasis in view of Mukherjee in view of Scofield (US 2014/0278032).
With regards to Claim 11, Khasis in view of Mukherjee discloses all of the limitations of Claim 9 but does not disclose the following limitations that Munoz does disclose:
“further comprising, limiting adjustments of the cost of the road segment for the one or more of the autonomous vehicles of the cluster of autonomous vehicles to a threshold maximum.”
Scofield Paragraph [0025] discloses presenting alternative routes based on traffic congestion, however, if the route with the congestion is less than a threshold amount the congestion route will be selected equating to a limited cost threshold.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date, to modify the system disclosed by Khasis in view of Mukherjee with the threshold adjustment disclosed by Scofield. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to make the system more effective by allowing for the tuning of route priorities.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Examiner Godfrey Maciorowski, whose telephone number is (571) 272-4652. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday-Friday from 7:30am to 5:00pm EST.
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If attempts to reach examiner by telephone are unsuccessful the examiner’s supervisor, Thomas Worden can be reached on (571) 272-4876. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571) 273-8300.
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/GODFREY ALEKSANDER MACIOROWSKI/Examiner, Art Unit 3658
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