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 .
2. 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. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis 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.
Status of Claims
1. The following is a non-final office action in response to the applicant’s submission received on 11/01/2024.
2. Claims 1 – 20 are currently pending and have been examined.
Foreign Priority/Domestic benefit
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d). The certified copy has been filed under 35 U.S.C. §119 for Chinese Patent Application No.202010122593.4, filed on February 27, 2020 and the priority benefit of Chinese Patent Application No.202010293567.8, filed on April 15,2020.
Domestic benefit is claimed with regards to continuation of the United States Patent application No.17/726,551, filed on April 22,2022, and is a continuation of International Application No.PCT/CN2021/078038, filed February 26, 2021.
Oath/Declaration
1. The applicant’s oath/declaration filed on 11/01/2024 has been reviewed by the examiner and is found to conform to the requirements prescribed in 37 C.F.R. 1.63.
Information Disclosure Statement
1. The information disclosure statements filed on 11/26/2024 is in compliance with the provision of 37 CFR 1.97, 1.98 and MPEP § 609. It has been placed in the application file and the information referred to therein has been considered as to the merits.
Drawings
1. The applicant’s drawings submitted on 11/01/2024 are acceptable for examination purposes.
Claim interpretation
1. Limitations appearing in the specification but not recited in the claim should not be read into the claim. E-Pass Techs., Inc. v. 3Com Corp., 343 F.3d 1364, 1369, 67 USPQ2d 1947, 1950 (Fed. Cir. 2003) (claims must be interpreted "in view of the specification" without importing limitations from the specification into the claims unnecessarily) [MPEP 2106 Sec I, C]. “Though understanding the claim language may be aided by explanations contained in the written description, it is important not to import into a claim limitations that are not part of the claim. For example, a particular embodiment appearing in the written description may not be read into a claim when the claim language is broader than the embodiment.” Superguide Corp. v. DirecTV Enterprises, Inc., 358 F.3d 870, 875, 69 USPQ2d 1865, 1868 (Fed. Cir. 2004). [MPEP 2111.01 Sec II]. Thus, the Examiner interprets Applicant’s claims "in view of the specification" and does not “import into a claim limitations that are not part of the claim”.
2. When multiple limitations are connected with “OR”, one of the limitations does not have any patentable weight since both of the limitations are optional.
Claim(s) Objection
Lines 9 – 11 of claim 1 recites: “…the first signaling does not comprise a first field, the first field indicating a spatial relation corresponding to a signal scheduled by a signaling to which the first field belongs…”, this statement declares the first signaling does not possess a first field, however, the above excerpt went on to describe the use of the first field (“…first field indicating a spatial relation corresponding to a signal scheduled by a signaling to which the first field belongs…), it appears the above excerpt contradicts itself, that is, not having a first field and later describing what the first field is used for. This objection also applies to independent claims 8, 11 and 18. The dependent claims are objected to by virtue of their dependency on an objected based claim.
Regarding Independent claims 1, 8, 11 and 18, the acronyms “CORESET”, “DCI”, “MCS”, “DMRS”, “HARQ”, “RV”, “NDI”, “TCI”, “QCL” and “PDSCH” should be written in expanded form at least once at the first instance of its appearance in each claim set. Appropriate correction is required.
Regarding claims 3, 10, 13 and 20, the acronym “PDCCH” should be written in expanded form at least once at the first instance of its appearance in each claim set. Appropriate correction is required.
Regarding claims 6 and 16, the acronyms “RRC” and “MAC CE” should be written in expanded form at least once at the first instance of its appearance in each claim set. Appropriate correction is required.
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.
1. Claim(s) 1, 5 - 6, 8, 11, 15 - 16 and 18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Liou (US 2020/0305168 A1) in view of Grossmnn et al. (US 2023/0379108) and Matsumura et al. (US 2025/0344209A1).
Regarding claim 1, Liou discloses: A first node for wireless communications, [¶ 0030 and figure 3] comprising:
a first receiver, [figure 3, label 314] receiving a first signaling in a first resource pool, the first resource pool comprising a CORESET or a search space set, [¶ 0141: the IE controlrsourceset when received defined the time and frequency of the CORESET that houses a variety of parameters (interpreted as the resource pool since the controlrsourceset is known in the art configured set of time–frequency resources ) as seen in the table of ¶ 0141] and the first signaling comprising DCI; and [ in the table below ¶ 0141 the coreset consists of a list of parameters of which the PDCCH and DCI is present. The CORESET is designed to be searched by the UE to obtain the DCI]
a first processor, [figure 3, label 308] receiving a first signal, the first signal being transmitted on a PDSCH; [¶ 0130: “…A UE receives PDCCH and PDSCH…”]
wherein the first signaling indicates scheduling information of the first signal, and the scheduling information of the first signal [first sentence of ¶0141, the first signaling in seen as the IE controlrsourceset which houses the PDDCH that carries the DCI (see table in ¶ 0141), it is well known in the art the DCI is used to schedule PDSCH (first signal)] comprises one or more of a time-domain resource occupied, a frequency-domain resource occupied, a MCS, DMRS port(s), a HARQ process number, a RV or a NDI; [see the table in ¶ 0141: “frequency domain resources”].
the first resource pool corresponds to a first spatial relation set, a number of spatial relation(s) comprised in the first spatial relation set is equal to either 1 or 2; [in the latter part of ¶ 0317, present are two TRP which results in embodiment 5 of ¶ 0414 - ¶ 0415, entails two spatial relation forming a set pertaining to a single UE that is associated with the CORESET and DCI that involves a resource pool as accounted for in the earlier limitation above]
the first signaling does not comprise a first field, the first field indicating a spatial relation corresponding to a signal scheduled by a signaling to which the first field belongs; the first signal corresponds to a first spatial relation, and the number of spatial relation(s) comprised in the first spatial relation set is used for determining the first spatial relation; when the first spatial relation set comprises K spatial relations and K is equal to 2, the first spatial relation is one of the K spatial relations, and the first spatial relation has a default position among the K spatial relations. [In ¶ 0414 - ¶ 0416: first, it should be noted there is no field being involved in assigning the default spatial relationship. In other words, since there are 2 TRP being considered then there are two spatial relationships to select from at the UE. The UE is able to determine from the PUCCH which spatial relationship to use in view of the first or second TRP. ¶ 0417 provides the idea that the default spatial relationship can be a first spatial relation or the second spatial relationship. A pre assignment of making the “first” or “second” spatial relationship (interpreted as default position among the K spatial relations) is evident].
Liou discloses every aspect of claim 1, except: the first signaling schedules the first signal ( PDSCH) and the spatial relation comprises a TCI state or QCL assumption. In the same field of endeavor, such difference is seen in the reference of Grossmann, see paragraph 0081 in view of ¶ 0080, first looking at ¶ 0081 states “…with a control resource set pool index, wherein the control resource set pool index is a higher-layer parameter in a configuration of a CORESET; wherein the CORESET comprises resources on which a PDCCH is transmitted from the network node…”, ¶ 0080 states : “…the PDCCH that schedules one or more PDSCH(s)…”, together ¶ 0080 and ¶ 0081 suggests the PDCCH (which is known in the art to transmit the DCI) that is part of the first signaling helps to schedule the PDSCH (first signal).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Liou’s system in view of Grossmann. The motivation for making the above modification would have been for enabling the UE to derive a spatial relation or a reference signal, [see ¶ 0081 of Grossmann].
Liou in view of Grossmann does not disclose: the spatial relation comprises a TCI state or QCL assumption, such difference is seen in the reference of Matsumura, see ¶ 0029.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Liou’s system in view of Gorssmann and Matsumura. The motivation for making the above modification would have been for Information corresponding to the TCI state applied to an uplink signal/channel may be expressed as spatial relation. [see ¶ 0028 of Matsumura].
Claims 8, 11 and 18 recite similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 1.
Claim 5, Liou further discloses: The first node according to claim 1, wherein when the number of spatial relation(s) comprised in the first spatial relation set is equal to 1, the first spatial relation is a spatial relation comprised in the first spatial relation set. [see ¶ 0414 - ¶ 0415 and ¶ 0417, although these paragraphs deals with two TRP and two spatial relation in a given set, it can be configured for the set to have a single spatial relation].
Claim 15 recites similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 5.
Claim 6, Liou further discloses: The first node according to claim 1, wherein the correspondence relation between the first resource pool and the first spatial relation set is configured by an RRC signaling, or, the correspondence relation between the first resource pool and the first spatial relation set is configured by an RRC signaling and a MAC CE together. [¶ 0228].
Claim 16 recites similar features using respective language and are also rejected by the applied references for similar reasons as claim 5.
Allowable Subject Matter
1. Claims 2 – 4, 7, 9 – 10, 12 – 14, 17 and 19 - 20 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 as well as overcoming all rejection(s)/objection(s) set forth in this office action.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MAHARISHI V KHIRODHAR whose telephone number is (571)270-7909. The examiner can normally be reached 6:00 AM - 3:00 PM.
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MAHARISHI V. KHIRODHAR
Examiner
Art Unit 2463
/MAHARISHI V KHIRODHAR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2463
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