Ex Parte Wong

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 6, 2017

13703776 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 6, 2017)

United States Patent and Trademark Office
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O.Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
13/703,776 06/03/2013 Shin Horng Wong LUTZ 201567US01 8168
48116 7590 09/08/2017
FAY STTARPF/T TTf’F.NT
EXAMINER
1228 Euclid Avenue, 5th Floor SHAH, SAUMIT
The Halle Building
Cleveland, OH 44115-1843 ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2414
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/08/2017 ELECTRONIC
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
docketing @ faysharpe.com
ipsnarocp @ nokia. com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte SHIN HORNG WONG
Appeal 2017-004525
Application 13/703,7761
Technology Center 2400
Before JEFFREY S. SMITH, JOHNNY A. KUMAR, and
TERRENCE W. McMILLIN, Administrative Patent Judges.
McMILLIN, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
This is a decision on appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the final
rejection of claims 1—15. Final Act. 1. We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM.
1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Alcatel Lucent (App.
Br. 1).
Appeal 2017-004525
Application 13/703,776
THE CLAIMED INVENTION
The present invention relates to “a method of requesting a radio
interface common reconfiguration, a base station, a method of performing a
radio interface common reconfiguration, user equipment and computer
program products.” Spec. 1: 5—7. Independent claims 1 and 11 are directed
to methods; independent claim 10 is directed to a base station; and
independent claim 15 is directed to user equipment. App. Br. 22, 24—27.
Claim 1 recites
1. A method of requesting a radio interface common
reconfiguration to be made by a group of user equipment from
within a plurality of user equipment being supported by a base
station in a multi-carrier wireless communications system, the
method comprising:
determining said radio interface common reconfiguration
to be made by said group of user equipment, wherein said radio
interface common reconfiguration represents one or more
requested radio interface changes to be implemented in common
across user equipment within the group of user equipment being
supported by the base station;
encoding said radio interface common reconfiguration in
a payload field of an high speed shared control channel (HS-
SCCH) order;
encoding, in said HS-SCCH order, an indication
associating said HS-SCCH order with said group of user
equipment; and
transmitting said HS-SCCH order to said plurality of user
equipment being supported by said base station.
REJECTIONS ON APPEAL
Claims 1—3, 7—12, and 15 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Gholmieh et al. (US 2009/0257387 Al, published
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Appeal 2017-004525
Application 13/703,776
Oct. 15, 2009) and Pani et al. (US 2013/0329652 Al, published Dec. 12,
2013). Final Act. 2.
Claims 4—6, 13, and 14 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
being unpatentable over Gholmieh, Pani, and Sahai et al. (US 2010/0112974
Al, published May 6, 2010). Final Act. 8.
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner’s rejections in light of Appellant’s
arguments that the Examiner erred. We are not persuaded that Appellant
identifies reversible error. Upon consideration of the arguments presented in
the Appeal Brief and Reply Brief, we agree with the Examiner that all the
pending claims are unpatentable over the cited combination of references.
We adopt as our own the findings and reasons set forth in the rejection from
which this appeal is taken and in the Examiner’s Answer. We provide the
following explanation to highlight and address specific arguments and
findings primarily for emphasis.
Appellant contends Pani describes “a common part of a joint HS-
SCCH format” but “there is no specific discussion of a single message that
can be sent to a group of user equipment to cause that group of user
equipment to make a common reconfiguration of their radio interface,” as
required in independent claim 1. App. Br. 10; Reply Br. 3.
We are not persuaded of error in the rejection, because the Examiner
relies on Gholmieh to teach the claimed “determining said radio interface
common reconfiguration to be made by said group of user equipment.”
Final Act. 3 (citing Gholmieh || 70, 73, and 78). Gholmieh discloses that
“[cjontrol module 520 employs a physical protocol module 522 to generate
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Appeal 2017-004525
Application 13/703,776
an HS-SCCH order. . . instructing AT(s) 504 to implement the identified
action” and “the order can instruct AT(s) 504 to deactivate or release non­
anchor carriers.” Gholmieh 178. We agree with the Examiner’s finding
that Gholmieh teaches “the control module generates an HS-SCCH order
instructing ATs to implement the identified action” (Ans. 4, 7), meaning a
single order is sent to the group of ATs to make a common “carrier
activation/deactivation” reconfiguration of their radio interface (Final Act. 3
(citing Gholmieh || 70, 73, and 78)). Appellant does not persuasively rebut
these findings by the Examiner regarding Gholmieh.
Appellant further argues Pani does not teach “an indication that is
encoded in an HS-SCCH order which associates that order with a
predetermined group of user equipment so as to help differentiate the HS-
SCCH order intended for a group of user equipment from existing HS-
SCCH orders intended for individual user equipment.” App. Br. 10 (citing
Spec. 3); Reply Br. 3.
Appellant’s Specification provides an example wherein “indication
may also be encoded in the HS-SCCH order which associates that order with
a predetermined group of user equipment” and that it “will be appreciated
that this indication helps to differentiate the HS-SCCH order intended for a
group of user equipment from existing HS-SCCH orders intended for
individual user equipment.” However, claim 1 merely recites “encoding, in
said HS-SCCH order, an indication associating said HS-SCCH order with
said group of user equipment,” and there is no requirement in the claim for
the indication to also “help differentiate the HS-SCCH order intended for a
group of user equipment from existing HS-SCCH orders intended for
individual user equipment.”
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Application 13/703,776
We conclude Appellant is attempting to interpret claim 1 to
impermissibly import “help differentiate the HS-SCCH order intended for a
group of user equipment from existing HS-SCCH orders intended for
individual user equipment” from the Specification into the claim. See
Phillips v. AWHCorp., 415 F.3d 1303, 1323 (Fed. Cir. 2005) (en banc)
(cautioning against reading limitations from the Specification into the
claims). As such, we find Appellant’s argument unpersuasive and we
decline to find Examiner error based on Appellant’s proposed importation of
limitations from the Specification. Although the claims are interpreted in
light of the Specification, limitations from the Specification are not read into
the claims. See In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 1184 (Fed. Cir. 1993).
Under the broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with
Appellant’s disclosure, we agree with the Examiner’s finding that the
claimed “indication associating said HS-SCCH order with said group of user
equipment” encompasses Pani’s group WTRU identity applied to the
common part of the joint HS-SCCH to identify the WTRUs in the group.
Final Act. 3^4 (citing Pani || 5, 144—145, 148); Ans. 3, 4, 6.
However, even under Appellants’ narrower construction, that the
claimed “indication associating said HS-SCCH order with said group of user
equipment” will help differentiate the HS-SCCH order intended for a group
of user equipment from existing HS-SCCH orders intended for individual
user equipment (App. Br. 10; Reply Br. 3), we find the combination of
Gholmieh and Pani teaches this limitation. We find Pani’s group WTRU
identity, shared by a group of WTRUs, helps differentiate the group order
from the individual order. See Pani 1148 (“The group WTRU identity... to
indicate which WTRUs the control information is addressed to. The
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Application 13/703,776
WTRUs belonging to this group may decode the common part... by using
the group WTRU identity, and then each WTRU detects which one of the
WTRU-specific parts is addressed to itself...”).
Therefore, in light of the above discussion, we agree with the
Examiner’s findings that the claimed “radio interface common
reconfiguration represents one or more requested radio interface changes to
be implemented in common across user equipment” is taught by Gholmieh’s
HS-SCCH order to deactivate carriers sent to ATs, and the claimed
“indication associating said HS-SCCH order with said group of user
equipment” is taught by Pani’s group WTRU identity applied to HS-SCCH
to identity the WTRUs in the group. We further highlight that Gholmieh’s
teaching of an HS-SCCH order instructing ATs to deactivate carriers, which
suggests identifying the ATs to receive this instruction, by itself
encompasses all of the claim limitations including the claimed radio
interface common reconfiguration common to the user equipment and the
claimed indication of the association between an HS-SCCH order with the
group of ATs to receive the instruction.
Accordingly, we sustain the § 103 rejection of independent claim 1, as
well as the rejection of commensurate independent claims 10, 11, and 15,
and dependent claims 2—9 and 12—14. See App. Br. 10—20.
DECISION
The rejections of claims 1—15 are affirmed.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv).
AFFIRMED
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