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 text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
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 non-obviousness.
Claim(s) 1, 7-8, 14-15 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bao et al. (US 2023/0046045)(hereafter Bao) in view of Manolakos et al. (US 2024/0340145)(hereafter Manolakos).
Regarding claims 1, 8 and 15, Bao discloses a communication method, applied to a first device, the method comprising:
receiving first information, wherein the first information comprises phase information of a second device on M resources (see, Fig. 16, the step 1610, the transmitting wirelessly , form an apparatus, a positioning reference signal comprising a carrier signal with a carrier phase, see, para [0123], For example, the PRS transmitter 700 transmits the PRS 812, 814 and 816);
receiving a first signal on one or more of the M resources (see, Fig. 16, step 1620, [0124] At stage 1620, the method 1600 includes transmitting, from the apparatus, an indication of a reference carrier phase of the positioning reference signal, comprising a phase of the carrier signal of the positioning reference signal at a reference time of transmission of the positioning reference signal); and
obtaining measurement information, wherein the measurement information is determined based on the first signal and the first information (see, Fig. 8., determine position information).
Bao does not explicitly disclose the M resources are frequency resources, and M is a positive integer that is greater than 1.
However, in same field of endeavor, Manolakos teaches in para [0092], A collection of resource elements (REs) that are used for transmission of PRS is referred to as a “PRS resource.” The collection of resource elements can span multiple PRBs in the frequency domain and ‘N’ (e.g., 1 or more) consecutive symbol(s) within a slot in the time domain. In a given OFDM symbol in the time domain, a PRS resource occupies consecutive PRBs in the frequency domain.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skilled in the art before the effective filling date of the claimed invention to combine the teachings of Manolakos with the Bao, as a whole, so as to receiving phase information on frequency resources, the motivation is to determine the positioning.
Regarding claims 7, 14 and 19, Bao further discloses the communication method according to claim 1, wherein the measurement information is used for positioning (see, Fig. 8, determine position information).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-6, 9-13, 16-18 and 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.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Li (US 2025/0330283) discloses positioning method and device.
Karjalainen et al. (US 2025/0266880) discloses reporting procedure, information for simultaneous multi panel uplink transmission.
Manolakos et al. (US 2024/0334371) discloses positioning frequency layer discovery and measurement.
Saily et al. (US 2024/0179494) discloses use of backscatter signals for positioning with wireless networks.
Dai et al.(US 2023/0345204) discloses scheduled positioning of target devices using mobile anchor devices.
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/DHAVAL V PATEL/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2631
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