DETAILED ACTION
This Office Action is in response to the application as originally filed 01/17/2025. The detail office action to the pending claims 1-20 is as shown below.
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
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 set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied 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.
Claims 1-5, 10-15, 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over US12538179 to Sohi et al. (“Sohi”) in view of US 2021/0409977 to Dussmann et al. (“Dussmann”) (The remarks and/or references placed in the parentheses apply to the prior art)
RE claims 1 and 11, Sohi discloses an operation method of a front-haul splitter in a wireless communication system (e.g. col. 2, lines 23-30 of Sohi) and a front-haul splitter operating in a wireless communication system (e.g. Figs. 1-5 of Sohi), the operation method / the front-haul splitter comprising: a transceiver (e.g. Fig. 5 of Sohi) ; at least one processor coupled to the transceiver to operate therewith (e.g. Fig. 12 of Sohi); and memory storing instructions that (e.g. Sohi, col. 10, lines 5-50), when executed by the at least one processor (e.g. Sohi, col. 10, lines 5-50), cause the at least one processor to control (e.g. Sohi, col. 10, lines 5-50) to receive/ing first downlink in-phase and quadrature (IQ) data from a first distributed unit (DU) connected to the front-haul splitter and second downlink IQ data from a second DU connected to the front-haul splitter (e.g. Sohi, Figs. 5, 7, col. 5, line 35-47, col. 7, lines 9-11, illustrate and teach, in various example embodiments, based on the Fronthaul capacity limit (bandwidth usage) and incoming IQ samples from the plurality DUs (102a-102f) the intelligence layer (Fronthaul) is configured to perform stacking (i.e. collecting, parsing) of the incoming IQ data packets from the DUs (102a-102f) to ensure the Fronthaul capacity limit is not exceeded; and Sohi (Fig. 1 & col. 4, lines 43-50), with O-RAN Option 7.2x deployments, the DUs provide the IQ data for the downlink (DL) data on the Fronthaul link); generating third downlink IQ data, based on the first downlink IQ data and the second downlink IQ data (e.g. Sohi, Fig. 10 and col. 8, lines 50-57: the intelligence layer (fronthaul) combines signals received from adjacent cell sites of DUs, wherein the combining of signals received from the adjacent cell sites includes utilizing a Coordinated Multi-Point transmission and reception (CoMP) technique for the adjacent cell sites to avoid the fronthaul link exceeding the capacity limit); and transmitting the third downlink IQ data to a radio unit (RU) connected to the front-haul splitter (e.g. Sohi, Fig. 10-11, and col. 6, lines 10-20, col. 8, lines 57-63; the intelligence layer (fronthaul) determines DUs that are servicing the corresponding RUs, which are co-located; once the DUs that are servicing the corresponding RUs are determined, the intelligence layer (fronthaul) performs combining of signals and assigns higher modulation and coding scheme (MCS) to the combined signals to reduce the fronthaul bandwidth usage; and provide the combined signals for communication over the fronthaul link.);
the subject matter of claims 1 and 11 differ from Sohi in that Sohi does not expressly recite the functional term “splitter”. However, given the broadest reasonable interpretation (BRI), in light of the specification as it would be interpreted by one of ordinary skill in the art, Sohi’s teaching that connectivity between various DUs (102a through 102f) and the representative RU 104a is via a transport layer router 201 (intelligence layer) over the Fronthaul (FH) link, wherein the fronthaul intelligence layer operating on the transport layer router is configured to aggregate/disaggregate (combine/split) signals as taught by Sohi (e.g. col. 4 lines 52-58, col. 7, lines 45-55, col. 8, lines 50-63) can be construed as Sohi is reasonably teaching or suggesting said claim term. Additionally, the functional term splitter in the context of enabling communication between multiple DUs and RUs is well established in the field related to fronthaul transmission for scaling and distribution. See for example, Figs. 2, 5, paras [0043], [0087], [0075], [0094]-[0095] of Dussmann. Hence the prior art includes each element/feature as claimed, although not necessarily in a single prior art reference, with the only difference between the claimed invention and the prior art being the lack of actual combination of the elements in a single prior art reference. Thus, it would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person of ordinary skill in the art (POSITA) to modify the feature/element disclosed by Mehrabani with the knowledge generally available to one of ordinary skill in the art given the broadest reasonable interpretation in light of the specification or with Luo’s teaching. The suggestion/motivation in doing so would have been such that to the signals are split (for example, using one or more band splitters) in order to supply signals to respective signal paths (e.g. paras [0043], [0087], [0075], [0094]-[0095] of Dussmann). Therefore one of ordinary skill in the art, such as an individual working in a field related to a fronthaul transmission for scaling and distribution in a wireless communication system could have combined the features/elements as claimed by known methods, and that in combination, each feature/method merely performs the same function as it does separately, with each feature/method retaining its advantageous function, yielding predictable result/s. It is for at least the aforementioned reasons that the Examiner has reached a conclusion of obviousness with respect to claims 1 and 11.
RE claims 2 and 12, Sohi discloses the operation method of claim 1 and the front-haul splitter of claim 11, wherein the third downlink IQ data corresponds to a vector sum of the first downlink IQ data and the second downlink IQ data (e.g. Sohi, Fig. 10-11, and col. 6, lines 10-20, col. 8, lines 57-63: generates the combined (i.e. third) signal by combining the received IQ samples from the plurality DUs), wherein the first downlink IQ data corresponds to downlink data (e.g. Sohi, Fig. 8, col. 4, lines 43-47 and col. 7, lines 45-55: corresponds to downlink data), and wherein the second downlink IQ data corresponds to the downlink data (e.g. Sohi, Fig. 8, col. 4, lines 43-47 and col. 7, lines 45-55: corresponds to downlink data), or is a value of (0, 0).
RE claims 3 and 13, Sohi discloses the operation method of claim 1 and the front-haul splitter of claim 11, as set forth above with the claim rejection.
The subject matter of claims 3 and 13 differ from Sohi in that Sohi does not disclose the feature “further comprising: transmitting identification information of the front-haul splitter to at least one of the first DU, the second DU, or the RU, wherein the identification information of the front-haul splitter comprises at least one medium access control (MAC) address of the front-haul splitter, or information associated with an Internet Protocol (IP) of the front-haul splitter.”
However, Dussmann teaches or suggests, in the same field of endeavor, transmitting identification information of the front-haul splitter to at least one of the first DU, the second DU, or the RU, wherein the identification information of the front-haul splitter comprises at least one medium access control (MAC) address of the front-haul splitter, or information associated with an Internet Protocol (IP) of the front-haul splitter (see for example, Fig. 11, para [0160], of Dussmann). Hence the prior art includes each element/feature as claimed, although not necessarily in a single prior art reference, with the only difference between the claimed invention and the prior art being the lack of actual combination of the elements in a single prior art reference. Thus, it would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person of ordinary skill in the art (POSITA) to modify the feature/element disclosed by Mehrabani with the knowledge generally available to one of ordinary skill in the art given the broadest reasonable interpretation in light of the specification or with Luo’s teaching. The suggestion/motivation in doing so would have been such that to the signals are split (for example, using one or more band splitters) in order to supply signals to respective signal paths (e.g. paras [0043], [0087], [0075], [0094]-[0095] of Dussmann). Therefore one of ordinary skill in the art, such as an individual working in a field related to a fronthaul transmission for scaling and distribution in a wireless communication system could have combined the features/elements as claimed by known methods, and that in combination, each feature/method merely performs the same function as it does separately, with each feature/method retaining its advantageous function, yielding predictable result/s. It is for at least the aforementioned reasons that the Examiner has reached a conclusion of obviousness with respect to claims 3 and 13.
RE claims 4 and 14, Sohi discloses the operation method of claim 3 and the front-haul splitter of claim 13, as set forth above with the claim rejection.
The subject matter of claims 4 and 14 differ from Sohi in that Sohi does not disclose the feature “wherein the first downlink IQ data and the second downlink IQ data are received based on the identification information of the front-haul splitter, and wherein the third downlink IQ data is transmitted based on the identification information of the front-haul splitter.” However, Dussmann teaches or suggests, in the same field of endeavor, wherein the first downlink IQ data and the second downlink IQ data are received based on the identification information of the front-haul splitter, and wherein the third downlink IQ data is transmitted based on the identification information of the front-haul splitter (see for example, Fig. 11, para [0161], of Dussmann). Hence the prior art includes each element/feature as claimed, although not necessarily in a single prior art reference, with the only difference between the claimed invention and the prior art being the lack of actual combination of the elements in a single prior art reference. Thus, it would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person of ordinary skill in the art (POSITA) to modify the feature/element disclosed by Mehrabani with the knowledge generally available to one of ordinary skill in the art given the broadest reasonable interpretation in light of the specification or with Luo’s teaching. The suggestion/motivation in doing so would have been such that to the signals are split (for example, using one or more band splitters) in order to supply signals to respective signal paths (e.g. paras [0043], [0087], [0075], [0094]-[0095] of Dussmann). Therefore one of ordinary skill in the art, such as an individual working in a field related to a fronthaul transmission for scaling and distribution in a wireless communication system could have combined the features/elements as claimed by known methods, and that in combination, each feature/method merely performs the same function as it does separately, with each feature/method retaining its advantageous function, yielding predictable result/s. It is for at least the aforementioned reasons that the Examiner has reached a conclusion of obviousness with respect to claims 4 and 14.
RE claims 5 and 15, Sohi discloses the operation method of claim 1 and the front-haul splitter of claim 11, wherein the front-haul splitter is in a DU pool including the first DU and the second DU (e.g. Figs. 4, 5 of Sohi illustrate the intelligent layer (i.e. front-haul splitter) is in a DU pool including the first DU and the second DU).
RE claims 10 and 20, Sohi discloses the operation method of claim 1 and the front-haul splitter of claim 11, wherein the first downlink IQ data and the second downlink IQ data are received based on time resource allocation information (see for example, col. 5, lines 15-25: ….based on time resource allocation information).
Objected but Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 6-9, 16-19 are objected to as being directly or indirectly dependent upon rejected base claims but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the Independent claim plus base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure are (See the attached Notice of References Cited (PTO-892)). These prior arts are considered pertinent because they relate generally to wireless communication, more specifically to techniques associated with open radio access network communication.
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/BERHANU TADESE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2632
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