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 .
Response to Amendment
1. Claims 1-7, 9-17, and 21-24 are currently pending.
2. Claims 22-24 are new.
3. Claims 8 and 18-20 are canceled.
4. Claims 1-7, 9-11, 14, 16-17, and 21 are currently amended.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
5. 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.
6. 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.
7. 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.
8. Claims 1-3, 9-13, and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bonk (US 20190135283 A1) in view of Gupta (US 20170076599 A1).
9. Regarding Claim 1, Bonk teaches a first vehicle configured to travel along a road surface, the first vehicle comprising (Bonk: [0024] and [0047]):
At least one sensor (Bonk: [0010] and [0051]);
And at least one processor configured to perform the steps of: determining a location current position of the first vehicle based on a comparison of data about the road surface collected by the at least one sensor and reference data about the road surface received from a database (Bonk: [0037], [0043], and [0058] Note that determine the AV is on a current route that will impact a pothole positioned on the right tire track is equivalent to determining a current position of the first vehicle.);
From the database, receiving information about a road surface feature located in a portion of the road surface to be traversed by the first vehicle (Bonk: [0037], [0043], and [0057]);
And based on the information, determining a position of the road surface feature relative to the current position of the first vehicle (Bonk: [0043] and [0058]).
Bonk fails to explicitly teach a display; and displaying on the display the position of the one or more road surface feature relative to the current position of the first vehicle on the road surface.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Gupta teaches a display; and displaying on the display the position of the one or more road surface feature relative to the current position of the first vehicle on the road surface (Gupta: [0110]).
Bonk and Gupta are considered to be analogous to the claim invention because they are in the same field of road feature detection and vehicle control. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Bonk to incorporate the teachings of Gupta to include a display to present a position of the road surface features relative to the current position of the vehicle to improve the awareness of the driver indicating a road anomaly (e.g., pothole). Bonk explains in [0060] that an operator can be used to decide an action to overcome the road anomaly (e.g., position adjustment). Therefore, it would be beneficial to include Gupta's display to assist the operator of Bonk to avoid road anomalies. This provides the additional benefit of increased comfort for the driver and passengers of the vehicle.
10. Regarding Claim 2, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 1, and further, Gupta teaches wherein the received information includes data indicative of a size of the road surface feature (Gupta: [0098]),
And wherein the at least one processor is further configured to, based on the received information, render an image of the road surface feature at a location on the display corresponding to the position of the road surface feature (Gupta: [0109]).
11. Regarding Claim 3, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 1, and further, Gupta teaches the display is selected from the group consisting of a heads-up display and a monitor (Gupta: [0109]).
12. Regarding Claim 9, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 1, and further, Gupta teaches the display is a heads-up display and the displaying comprises overlaying, using the display, a graphical representation of the road surface feature on an image of the road surface (Gupta: [0110]).
13. Regarding Claim 10, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 1, and further, Gupta teaches the rendered image includes a visualization of a shape of the road surface feature (Gupta: [0109] Note that Figures 4A-D indicate a pothole 438 and the size/shape/position.).
14. Regarding Claim 11, Bonk teaches a method of operating a first vehicle, the method comprising (Bonk: [0024] and [0047]):
While the first vehicle is traveling along a road surface, determining a current location of the first vehicle based on a comparison of data about the road surface collected by at least one sensor of the first vehicle with reference data about the road surface received from a database (Bonk: [0037], [0043], and [0058] Note that determine the AV is on a current route that will impact a pothole positioned on the right tire track is equivalent to determining a current position of the first vehicle.);
Receiving, from the database, information about the location of a road surface feature located in a portion of the road surface (Bonk: [0037], [0043], and [0057]);
And based on the information, determining a position of the road surface feature relative to the current location of the first vehicle (Bonk: [0043] and [0058]).
Bonk fails to explicitly teach presenting, on a display of the first vehicle, the position of the road surface feature relative to the current location of the first vehicle, wherein the road surface feature is located in a portion of the road surface in front of the first vehicle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Gupta teaches presenting, on a display of the first vehicle, the position of the road surface feature relative to the current location of the first vehicle, wherein the road surface feature is located in a portion of the road surface in front of the first vehicle (Gupta: [0110]).
Bonk and Gupta are considered to be analogous to the claim invention because they are in the same field of road feature detection and vehicle control. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Bonk to incorporate the teachings of Gupta to include a display to present a position of the road surface features relative to the current position of the vehicle to improve the awareness of the driver indicating a road anomaly (e.g., pothole). Bonk explains in [0060] that an operator can be used to decide an action to overcome the road anomaly (e.g., position adjustment). Therefore, it would be beneficial to include Gupta's display to assist the operator of Bonk to avoid road anomalies. This provides the additional benefit of increased comfort for the driver and passengers of the vehicle.
15. Regarding Claim 12, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 11, and further, Gupta teaches presenting the location of the road surface feature comprises presenting a graphical representation of the road surface feature on the display (Gupta: [0110]).
16. Regarding Claim 13, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 11, and further, Gupta teaches the display is a heads-up display (Gupta: [0109]).
17. Regarding Claim 17, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 11, and further, Gupta teaches while the first vehicle is traveling along the road surface, determining, using at least one sensor associated with the first vehicle, a location, relative to the road surface, of a second vehicle (Gupta: [0090], [0105], and [0107]);
and presenting, on the display of the first vehicle, the determined location of the second vehicle relative to a graphical representation of the road surface (Gupta: [0110]).
18. Claims 4-7, 14-15, and 21-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bonk (US 20190135283 A1), in view of Gupta (US 20170076599 A1), and in further view of Ferrer (US 20210039715 A1).
19. Regarding Claim 4, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 3.
Bonk and Gupta fails to explicitly teach to display, a projected tire path of at least one tire of the vehicle relative to the road surface feature.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Ferrer teaches to display, a projected tire path of at least one tire of the vehicle relative to the road surface feature (Ferrer: [0046] and [0047]).
Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer are considered to be analogous to the claim invention because they are in the same field of road feature displays and vehicle control. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Bonk and Gupta to incorporate the teachings of Ferrer to present a projected tire path of the vehicle relative to the road surface feature because it provides the benefit of increasing the awareness of the driver by indicating an obstacle in the tire path of the vehicle. This provides the additional benefit of increased comfort for the driver and passengers of the vehicle.
20. Regarding Claim 5, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 3.
Bonk and Gupta fails to explicitly teach to present, on the display, a projected tire path of two tires of the first vehicle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Ferrer teaches to present, on the display, a projected tire path of two tires of the first vehicle (Ferrer: [0046] and [0047]).
Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer are considered to be analogous to the claim invention because they are in the same field of road feature displays and vehicle control. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Bonk and Gupta to incorporate the teachings of Ferrer to present a projected tire path of the two tires of the vehicle because it provides the benefit of increasing the awareness of the driver by indicating an obstacle in the tire path of the vehicle. This provides the additional benefit of increased comfort for the driver and passengers of the vehicle.
21. Regarding Claim 6, Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer remain as applied above in Claim 4, and further, Bonk teaches the road surface feature is selected from the group consisting of a pothole, a bump, a road surface crack, an expansion joint, and a frost heave (Bonk: [0012] Note that an expansion joint and frost heave are equivalent to road bumps.).
22. Regarding Claim 7, Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer remain as applied above in Claim 5, and further, Gupta teaches to determine a position of a second vehicle relative to the first vehicle and render an image of the second vehicle on the display at a location on the display corresponding to the position of the second vehicle (Gupta: [0109] and [0110]).
23. Regarding Claim 14, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 12.
Bonk and Gupta fails to explicitly teach presenting, on the display a projected tire path of at least one tire of the vehicle, wherein the road surface feature and the projected tire path are rendered in their relative positions to each other.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Ferrer teaches presenting, on the display a projected tire path of at least one tire of the vehicle, wherein the road surface feature and the projected tire path are rendered in their relative positions to each other (Ferrer: [0046] and [0047]).
Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer are considered to be analogous to the claim invention because they are in the same field of road feature displays and vehicle control. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Bonk and Gupta to incorporate the teachings of Ferrer to present a projected tire path of the vehicle relative to the road surface feature because it provides the benefit of increasing the awareness of the driver by indicating an obstacle in the tire path of the vehicle. This provides the additional benefit of increased comfort for the driver and passengers of the vehicle.
24. Regarding Claim 15, Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer remain as applied above in Claim 14, and further, Bonk teaches based on the projected tire path of the at least one tire of the vehicle, adjusting a steering angle of a steering wheel of the vehicle to avoid the road surface feature (Bonk: [0043]).
25. Regarding Claim 21, Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer remain as applied above in Claim 14, and further, Gupta teaches the graphical representation of the road surface feature includes an indication of a size and a shape of the road surface feature at a location on the display corresponding to the position of the road surface feature (Gupta: [0109] Note that Figures 4A-D indicate a pothole 438 and the size/shape/ position.).
26. Regarding Claim 22, Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer remain as applied above in Claim 21, and further, Ferrer teaches presenting, on the display, a projected tire path of at least one tire further comprises presenting a second projected path of a second tire relative to the road surface feature (Ferrer: [0046] and [0047]).
27. Regarding Claim 23, Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer remain as applied above in Claim 22, and further, Ferrer teaches presenting the two tire paths straddling the road surface feature (Ferrer: [0046] and [0047]).
28. Regarding Claim 24, Bonk, Gupta, and Ferrer remain as applied above in Claim 23, and further, Bonk teaches the road surface feature is a pothole or a bump (Bonk: [0012]).
29. Claim 16 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bonk (US 20190135283 A1), in view of Gupta (US 20170076599 A1), and in further view of Thakur (US 20210197846 A1).
30. Regarding Claim 16, Bonk and Gupta remain as applied above in Claim 11.
Bonk and Gupta fail to explicitly teach the road surface feature is obscured from a driver's view by a second vehicle.
However, in the same field of endeavor, Thakur teaches the road surface feature is obscured from a driver's view by a second vehicle (Thakur: [0093]).
Bonk, Gupta, and Thakur are considered to be analogous to the claim invention because they are in the same field of road feature displays and vehicle control. Therefore, it would have been obvious to someone of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to modify Bonk and Gupta to incorporate the teachings of Thakur to identify a road surface feature obscured from a driver's view by a second vehicle because it provides the benefit of alleviating the risk of the vehicle with the obscured view by providing an alert that can be used to avoid the running over the road feature.
Response to Arguments
31. Applicant's arguments filed 1/13/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
32. First, the Applicant has alleged "Bonk does not disclose determining the location of the vehicle based on a comparison of road surface data with reference road surface data from a database." The Examiner disagrees.
Bonk teaches comparing ground truth data obtained by on-board sensors with a localization map obtained from a stored database in [0037]. Based on the comparison between the sensor data collected and the reference data obtained from the data, the vehicle in Bonk can determine a relative feature. Bonk's [0043] and [0058] explains that the vehicle can determine the right tire track is in the path of a pothole and based on the determination, control the vehicle to avoid the pothole. Therefore, determining the AV is on a current route that will impact a pothole positioned on the right tire track is equivalent to determining a current position of the first vehicle. The current position of the vehicle is relative to the pothole.
Further, Bonk includes a positioning module (e.g., GPS module). However, the positioning module is used to by the network to select a specific vehicle to complete a transport request. The relative position of the vehicle on the route is still determined by the comparison of the on-board sensor data and the stored localization map.
33. Second, the Applicant has alleged "that one of ordinary skill in the art would not have been motivated to modify Bonk in view of Gupta" and "when the vehicle of Bonk is operating in autonomous mode, there is no driver that would benefit from a displayed indication of the location of the road anomaly on the road surface." The Examiner disagrees.
In response to applicant’s argument that there is no teaching, suggestion, or motivation to combine the references, the examiner recognizes that obviousness may be established by combining or modifying the teachings of the prior art to produce the claimed invention where there is some teaching, suggestion, or motivation to do so found either in the references themselves or in the knowledge generally available to one of ordinary skill in the art. See In re Fine, 837 F.2d 1071, 5 USPQ2d 1596 (Fed. Cir. 1988), In re Jones, 958 F.2d 347, 21 USPQ2d 1941 (Fed. Cir. 1992), and KSR International Co. v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 82 USPQ2d 1385 (2007).
In this case, Bonk teaches in [0060] that an operator can be used to decide an action to overcome a road anomaly (e.g., position adjustment). Although the preferred embodiment of Bonk may include autonomous control, the vehicle may still be controlled in a manual control, where a display is beneficial. As a result, Bonk teaches the hand over control to a manual driver to perform a mitigating action when approaching (before) a road anomaly.
Additionally, Gupta teaches a vehicle with a display that can be controlled in manual or autonomous modes. Therefore, one or ordinary skill in the art would include a display in the vehicle because it provides information to the driver when it is being controlled in a manual mode.
34. Bonk (US 20190135283 A1), in view of Gupta (US 20170076599 A1), and in further view of Ferrer (US 20210039715 A1) and Bonk (US 20190135283 A1), in view of Gupta (US 20170076599 A1), and in further view of Thakur (US 20210197846 A1) teaches all aspects of the invention. The rejection is modified according to the newly amended language but still maintained with the current prior art of record.
35. Claims 1-7, 9-17, and 21 remain rejected and Claims 22-24 are newly rejected under their respective grounds and rational as cited above, and as stated in the prior office action which is incorporated herein. Also, although not specifically argued, all remaining claims remain rejected under their respective grounds, rationales, and applicable prior art for these reasons cited above, and those mentioned in the prior office action which is incorporated herein.
Conclusion
36. Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
37. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MICHAEL T SILVA whose telephone number is (571)272-6506. The examiner can normally be reached Mon-Tues: 7AM - 4:30PM ET; Wed-Thurs: 7AM-6PM ET; Fri: OFF.
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, Angela Ortiz can be reached at 571-272-1206. 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.
/MICHAEL T SILVA/Examiner, Art Unit 3663
/ANGELA Y ORTIZ/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3663