Prosecution Insights
Last updated: August 17, 2026
Application No. 18/913,704

AMBIENT INTERNET OF THINGS CONTENTION BASED RANDOM ACCESS WITH DUPLICATE PAGING IN A 3-STEP RANDOM ACCESS PROCEDURE

Non-Final OA §103
Filed
Oct 11, 2024
Examiner
BEYEN, ZEWDU A
Art Unit
2461
Tech Center
2400 — Computer Networks
Assignee
Sharp Corporation
OA Round
1 (Non-Final)
83%
Grant Probability
Favorable
1-2
OA Rounds
11m
Est. Remaining
98%
With Interview

Examiner Intelligence

Grants 83% — above average
83%
Career Allowance Rate
710 granted / 852 resolved
+25.3% vs TC avg
Moderate +15% lift
Without
With
+15.0%
Interview Lift
resolved cases with interview
Typical timeline
2y 9m
Avg Prosecution
31 currently pending
Career history
885
Total Applications
across all art units

Statute-Specific Performance

§101
5.1%
-34.9% vs TC avg
§103
61.3%
+21.3% vs TC avg
§102
16.9%
-23.1% vs TC avg
§112
10.8%
-29.2% vs TC avg
Black line = Tech Center average estimate • Based on career data from 852 resolved cases

Office Action

§103
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 § 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. Claim(s) 1,3-4,6-8 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Jeon to (US 20250350399 A1) in view of KHAN to (WO2025212033 A1) further in view of Wang to (WO 2026018787 A1) Regarding claims 1,8, Jeon teaches an energy harvesting electronic device or an ambient Internet of Things (AIoT) device, comprising:( [0074] Discloses an A-IoT device or an A-IoT UE based on energy harvesting with ultra-low complexity and power consumption and for low-end IoT applications. For example, the UE may have limited (or no) energy storage or battery capability (e.g., a capacitor), such as an energy storage unit for amplification) an energy storage device configured to store energy harvested by the energy harvesting electronic device; :( [0074] Discloses an A-IoT device or an A-IoT UE based on energy harvesting with ultra-low complexity and power consumption and for low-end IoT applications…an energy storage unit for amplification) memory for storing instructions; ([0057] a processor 340… and a memory 360. The memory 360 includes an operating system (OS) 361 and one or more applications 362) and a processor configured to execute the instructions to cause the energy harvesting electronic device([0057] a processor 340… and a memory 360. The memory 360 includes an operating system (OS) 361 and one or more applications 362) to: receive a message on a physical random downlink control channel (PRDCH), ([0267] Discloses a device receives PRDCH transmission from a reader. In 1820, the device reads header field of the PRDCH and determines to read or skip the rest of the PRDCH based on the message type or receiver address field. In 1830, the device reads the rest of the PRDCH, if it determines that the message is intended to the device) wherein the message includes any combination of a paging identification (ID), a reader ID, a paging re-transmission counter, and a type of random access, for random access paging; ([0269] The header field of PRDCH/PDRCH carries necessary control information for R2D/D2R signal reception. Some additional control information may be contained in the payload and that handling may be similar to NR MAC CE and MAC service data unit (SDU). Header may include the following sub-elements. [0270] Message type: Indicator for the signal type conveyed in the payload such as R2D data, control information, broadcast information such as paging, if defined, random access triggering, random access response, command for PRDCH. Similarly, it can be D2R data, control information, random access, etc., for PDRCH. [0271] Transmitter ID: Transmitter ID of the signal. For R2D, it's the reader ID) Jeon does not explicitly teach determine that the message is a retransmission of an ongoing paging process for a three-step random access procedure, that a first message has been reported for a previous message, and that a second message has not been received; and determine whether a second message response timer has expired However, KHAN teaches determine that the message is a retransmission of an ongoing paging process for a three-step random access procedure, that a first message has been reported for a previous message, and that a second message has not been received([0005] Feedback e.g. 1 -bit ACK/NACK for the previous PRDCH message; and/or for the N previous PRDCH messages where N is fixed in the standard and/or the range of N is fixed in the standard and one value is indicated by the reader to A-IoT device or the range of N is fixed in the standard and one value is reported by the A-IoT device in addition to the feedback) However, Wang teaches determine whether a second message response timer has expired([0160,[0161] discloses A-IoT device 3-1 is able to indicate to the A-IoT device reader a time period (which may be expressed using a configured timer) within which the A-IoT device 3-1 does not expect (and/or does not want) the A-IoT device reader to schedule a subsequent D2R transmission - i.e., the A-IoT device reader should not schedule a subsequent D2R transmission for that A-IoT device until expiry of the configured timer. It will be appreciated that the A-IoT device 3-1 may not be able generate the next D2R transmission and/or monitor for R2D messages until expiry of that configured timer) Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinarily skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to enable the system of Jeon include determine that the message is a retransmission of an ongoing paging process for a three-step random access procedure, that a first message has been reported for a previous message, and that a second message has not been received; and determine whether a second message response timer has expired, as suggested by Khan and Wang. This modification would benefit the system to reduce collision. Regarding claim 3, Jeon and Khan and Wang teaches wherein the processor is configured to determine whether a first message transmission maximum has been reached when the device determines the second message response timer has expired(Wang,[0172],[0173] the A-IoT device reader should not schedule a subsequent D2R transmission for that A-IoT device until expiry of the configured timer. It will be appreciated that the A-IoT device 3-1 may not be able generate the next D2R transmission and/or monitor for R2D messages until expiry of that configured timer). Regarding claim 4, Jeon and Khan and Wang teaches wherein the processor is configured to not retransmit the first message and to ignore the retransmission of the message when the device determines the first message transmission maximum has been reached(Wang,[0172],[0173] the A-IoT device reader should not schedule a subsequent D2R transmission for that A-IoT device until expiry of the configured timer. It will be appreciated that the A-IoT device 3-1 may not be able generate the next D2R transmission and/or monitor for R2D messages until expiry of that configured timer). Regarding claim 6, Jeon and Khan and Wang teaches wherein the second message response timer is defined from an end of a contention access region indicated by the previous message(Wang,[0162]That selected TBS may be the TBS used by the A-IoT device 3-1 for the D2R transmission at step S504 (e.g., D2R Msg#1). It will be appreciated that the A-IoT device reader may use that indicated TBS to determine/identify the end of the data transmission in D2R Msg#1).. Regarding claim 7, Jeon and Khan and Wang teaches wherein the second message response timer is defined from a previous first message transmission in response to the previous message(Wang, [0162]That selected TBS may be the TBS used by the A-IoT device 3-1 for the D2R transmission at step S504 (e.g., D2R Msg#1). It will be appreciated that the A-IoT device reader may use that indicated TBS to determine/identify the end of the data transmission in D2R Msg#1). Claim(s) 2,5 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Jeon to (US 20250350399 A1) in view of KHAN to (WO2025212033 A1) further in view of Wang to (WO 2026018787 A1) and Bae to (US20210352735) Regarding claim 2, the combination of Jeon and Khan and Wang does not explicitly teach, wherein the processor is configured to not retransmit the first message and to ignore the retransmission of the message when the device determines the second message response timer has not expired However, Bae teaches wherein the processor is configured to not retransmit the first message and to ignore the retransmission of the message when the device determines the second message response timer has not expired([0099] [The UE 502 may be allowed to send one or more repetitions of the contention resolution message 504-2 . . . 504-K to the base station 500. Depending on a monitoring technique that may be implemented to enable the UE 502 to determine if the base station 500 has successfully decoded the initial contention resolution message 504-1, the UE 502 may send any number from zero through K of the repetitions of the contention resolution message 504-2 . . . 504-K) Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinarily skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to enable the system of Jeon and Khan and Wang include wherein the processor is configured to not retransmit the first message and to ignore the retransmission of the message when the device determines the second message response timer has not expired, as suggested by Bae. This modification would benefit the system to reduce network resource waste. Regarding claim 5, Jeon and Khan and Wang does not explicitly teach wherein the processor is configured to transmit the first message in response to the received message when the device determines the first message transmission maximum has not been reached However, Bae teaches wherein the processor is configured to transmit the first message in response to the received message when the device determines the first message transmission maximum has not been reached(Bae, [0099] [The UE 502 may be allowed to send one or more repetitions of the contention resolution message 504-2 . . . 504-K to the base station 500. Depending on a monitoring technique that may be implemented to enable the UE 502 to determine if the base station 500 has successfully decoded the initial contention resolution message 504-1, the UE 502 may send any number from zero through K of the repetitions of the contention resolution message 504-2 . . . 504-K). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one ordinarily skilled in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to enable the system of Jeon and Khan and Wang include wherein the processor is configured to transmit the first message in response to the received message when the device determines the first message transmission maximum has not been reached, as suggested by Bae. This modification would benefit the system to reduce network resource waste. Conclusion Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ZEWDU A BEYEN whose telephone number is (571)270-7157. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00-6:00. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Huy D Vu can be reached at 571-272-3155. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /ZEWDU A BEYEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2461
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Prosecution Timeline

Oct 11, 2024
Application Filed
Jul 30, 2026
Non-Final Rejection mailed — §103 (current)

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Study what changed to get past this examiner. Based on 5 most recent grants.

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Prosecution Projections

1-2
Expected OA Rounds
83%
Grant Probability
98%
With Interview (+15.0%)
2y 9m (~11m remaining)
Median Time to Grant
Low
PTA Risk
Based on 852 resolved cases by this examiner. Grant probability derived from career allowance rate.

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