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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 11/27/2024 has been made record of and considered by the examiner.
Drawings
The drawings are objected to because the vehicle pillar “58d” of figure 6 is not recited in the specification (see [0035]). Corrected drawing sheets in compliance with 37 CFR 1.121(d) are required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application. Any amended replacement drawing sheet should include all of the figures appearing on the immediate prior version of the sheet, even if only one figure is being amended. The figure or figure number of an amended drawing should not be labeled as “amended.” If a drawing figure is to be canceled, the appropriate figure must be removed from the replacement sheet, and where necessary, the remaining figures must be renumbered and appropriate changes made to the brief description of the several views of the drawings for consistency. Additional replacement sheets may be necessary to show the renumbering of the remaining figures. Each drawing sheet submitted after the filing date of an application must be labeled in the top margin as either “Replacement Sheet” or “New Sheet” pursuant to 37 CFR 1.121(d). If the changes are not accepted by the examiner, the applicant will be notified and informed of any required corrective action in the next Office action. The objection to the drawings will not be held in abeyance.
Claim Interpretation
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(f):
(f) Element in Claim for a Combination. – An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
This application includes one or more claim limitations that do not use the word “means,” but are nonetheless being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, because the claim limitation(s) uses a generic placeholder that is coupled with functional language without reciting sufficient structure to perform the recited function and the generic placeholder is not preceded by a structural modifier. Such claim limitation(s) is/are: “processing device” in claim 1.
Because this/these claim limitation(s) is/are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, it/they is/are being interpreted to cover the corresponding structure described in the specification as performing the claimed function, and equivalents thereof.
If applicant does not intend to have this/these limitation(s) interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, applicant may: (1) amend the claim limitation(s) to avoid it/them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph (e.g., by reciting sufficient structure to perform the claimed function); or (2) present a sufficient showing that the claim limitation(s) recite(s) sufficient structure to perform the claimed function so as to avoid it/them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph.
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 and 2 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Ekchian (US 2021/0221258 A1), in further view of Yamazaki (US 2023/0394702 A1).
Consider claim 1, Ekchian discloses a vehicle seat, the vehicle seat comprising an electric device for moving at least one of a seat cushion and a seat back (¶35; “the state of an active seat may be adjusted, for example, manually or by using switch activated powered adjustment mechanisms to adjust the position of the active seat by translating it, relative to a base state and/or the vehicle”; FIG. 1, ¶49; “top view of an embodiment of an adjustable active seat 1 that includes seat back 2, seat bottom 3”), comprising:
an in-vehicle capturing device, capturing an interior image including the at least one of the seat cushion and the seat back (¶46; “an external sensor such as an ultrasonic sensor, stereoscopic camera, range camera, or other ranging device may be used to map a vehicle passenger compartment… an external sensor is a sensor that provides information about the surroundings of the seat. The map may be used to determine the position of vehicular components, seat components…”; ¶55, 58, 61, 67, 75, 80; “At block 152, sensor information is received from an active seat and a vehicle. The sensor information may incorporate internal sensors 253 or external sensors 251d. In block 154, the sensor information received in block 152 is used to determine the orientation of the active seat from a predetermined baseline state”); and
a processing device, comparing the interior image with an interior specified [pre-defined base state] (¶6; “when the controller receives information that the seat back of the active seat is reclined by a certain amount or is at a certain angle, the controller may use that information to…”; ¶38; pre-defined base state; ¶43; “the seat control unit may incorporate information about other objects or vehicle components that are proximate to the active seat, such as for example, their size, orientation, and/or location”; ¶55, 58; “In block 156, the position of the active seat is determined relative to the predetermined baseline state. The position of the seat may be determined relative to the vehicle, and may represent a shift in three-dimensional space from predetermined baseline state in the vehicle”; ¶61, ¶63; “the control unit may adjust various control parameters… in the new position to… account for the change in the distance between the roll axis of the seat and the roll axis of the vehicle”).
Ekchian fails to explicitly disclose a processing device, comparing the interior image with an interior specified image when the at least one of the seat cushion and the seat back is in a specified position to calculate an absolute position of the at least one of the seat cushion and the seat back from an amount of change of the at least one of the seat cushion and the seat back relative to the specified position.
In related, art Yamazaki discloses an in-vehicle capturing device, capturing an interior image including the at least one of the seat cushion and the seat back (Yamazaki ¶25; interior camera 2); and
a processing device, comparing the interior image with an interior specified image when the at least one of the seat cushion and the seat back is in a specified position to calculate an absolute position of the at least one of the seat cushion and the seat back from an amount of change of the at least one of the seat cushion and the seat back relative to the specified position (Yamazaki ¶6; “a memory configured to store one or more reference images representing the interior of a vehicle where a driver's seat of the vehicle is at a predetermined position that differs among the one or more reference images”; ¶41; “Each reference image represents the interior of the vehicle 10 where the driver's seat and the steering are set at predetermined positions… the multiple reference images preferably include two or more reference images in which only one of movable portions of the driver's seat and the steering is set at a position that differs among the reference images. For example, it is preferable to prepare two or more reference images in which the position of the seating surface of the driver's seat and the positions in the depth direction and up-and-down direction of the steering are fixed and only the slope of the backrest of the driver's seat differs. Alternatively, it is preferable to prepare two or more reference images in which the position of the seating surface and the slope of the backrest of the driver's seat and the position in the up-and-down direction of the steering are fixed and only the position in the depth direction of the steering differs. This clarifies the difference in the position of a particular movable portion between the mask image and a corresponding reference image, in an individual difference image.”; ¶42, 48; difference image; “the difference image generation unit 32) calculates the absolute value of the difference between pixel values of corresponding pixels of the reference image and the mask image”).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to incorporate the interior image comparison and absolute difference calculation of Yamazaki into the interior imaging/mapping system of Ekchian to estimate seat positions by comparing interior images to reference interior images of the vehicle or seat component at a specified baseline position. As stated by Ekchian, “the position of the active seat is determined relative to the predetermined baseline state (Ekchian ¶58)”
Consider claim 2, Ekchian, as modified by Yamazaki, discloses the claimed invention wherein the processing device compares the interior image with a vehicle body portion included in the interior specified image (Ekchian ¶43, 46, 55-58, 61, 80; ¶43; “the seat control unit may incorporate information about other objects or vehicle components that are proximate to the active seat, such as for example, their size, orientation, and/or location”; Yamazaki ¶41-48).
Relevant Prior Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. JPH05208630A discloses a power seat control unit.
US 2007/0289800 A1 discloses a vehicle seat detecting system.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ASHLEY HYTREK whose telephone number is (703)756-4562. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:00-5:00.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Steve Koziol can be reached at (408)918-7630. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ASHLEY HYTREK/Examiner, Art Unit 2665
/BOBBAK SAFAIPOUR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2665
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