Ex Parte Frenger et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jan 12, 2018

14711898 (P.T.A.B. Jan. 12, 2018)

United States Patent and Trademark Office
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
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APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
14/711,898 05/14/2015 Pal FRENGER 0110-657 CON/P26142
US2
1734
113648 7590 01/17/2018
Patent Portfolio RnilHers PT T C
EXAMINER
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ALIA, CURTIS A
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2414
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
01/17/2018 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.
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PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte PAL FRENGER, PETER LARS SON, and
NIKLAS JOHANSSON
Appeal 2017-006406
Application 14/711,898
Technology Center 2400
Before ELENI MANTIS MERCADER, NORMAN H. BEAMER, and
ADAM J. PYONIN, Administrative Patent Judges.
BEAMER, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON REQUEST FOR REHEARING
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
On December 11, 2017, Appellants filed a Request for Rehearing
(“Request”) under 37 C.F.R. § 41.52 from the Decision on Appeal
(“Decision”) of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (“Board”), mailed
November 1, 2017. In the Decision, we affirmed the Examiner’s
obviousness rejections of claims 22, 23, 25—39, 41, and 42.
We deny the Request.
Appellants argue the Decision “misapprehends how the Relay Amble
is employed in Okuda” because “Okuda does not disclose or suggest
inserting a Relay Amble into an unused resource portion of a received
Appeal 2017-006406
Application 14/711,898
transmission as stated in the Decision.” (Request 1.) (Emphasis omitted). In
particular, Appellants first contend that, “Okuda does not support the
Examiner’s conclusion that the Relay Amble is placed in portions of a frame
‘reserved in previously formed gaps.’” (Request 3.)
Appellants also contend that as illustrated in Figure 1 of Okuda, the
operation of a MR-BS is such that “there is no disclosure that a Parent RS
inserts a Relay Amble in an unused portion of a received frame; instead the
Parent RS either removes the Relay Amble and inserts it into the used
portion or maintains the received Relay Amble.” (Request 5.) Appellants
finally contend that because Okuda states “[t]he relay amble is located at the
end of the last DL Relay zone”, the “last DL Relay zone” would be “in the
same time location as the Relay Amble transmitted by the Parent RS to the
Child RS.” (Request 5—6; Okuda at 298 col. 1.)
We are not persuaded that we misapprehended the teachings of the
references forming the basis of the rejection. In the rejection the Examiner
combined the teachings of Okuda with that of Naden, because “Naden does
not explicitly teach that the signal is a reference signal or a control signal
and that the resource portion is an unused resource portion.” (Final Act. 8.)
Contrary to Appellants’ assertions, the Examiner relies on Naden to teach
“inserting a signal in the selected resource portion of the received
transmission.” (Final Act. 8; Naden || 14, 25, Fig. 4.) (Emphasis added).
Appellants argue deficiencies of Okuda for features taught or suggested by
the combination of Okuda and Naden, and thus fail to address the
Examiner’s findings. See In re Merck & Co., Inc., 800 F.2d 1091, 1097
(Fed. Cir. 1986) (“Non-obviousness cannot be established by attacking
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Application 14/711,898
references individually where the rejection is based upon the teachings of a
combination of references.”).
Although Appellants correctly point to the R-TTI and R-RTI gaps
illustrated in Figure 4 of Okuda as “not located where the Relay Amble is
placed” (Request 3), the Examiner finds, and we agree, that “the relay amble
is placed in a portion reserved for that specific information, if the RS is
allowed to place the Relay Amble in that portion of the DL TX resources,
then it would have been previously unused.” (Final Act. 8; Okuda at 298
column 1 and Fig. 4.). The Examiner further finds, and we agree, that under
the combination of the teachings of Naden and Okuda, “the second preamble
set has not yet been used for transmission until after it has been transmitted
by the relay station (intermediate device), therefore it would still be
considered yet unused.” (Advisory Act. 2.) Appellants overlook the broad
teachings of Okuda of using a relay amble in an unused portion; see In re
Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981) “The test for obviousness is not
whether the features of a secondary reference may be bodily incorporated
into the structure of the primary reference .... Rather, the test is what the
combined teachings of the references would have suggested to those of
ordinary skill in the art.”
In summary, having fully considered the arguments in the Request, on
this record, we are not persuaded that we have misapprehended or
overlooked any points raised by Appellants. We find none of Appellants’
arguments are persuasive that our Decision was in error. We have
reconsidered our Decision, but decline to grant the relief requested.
DECISION
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Application 14/711,898
In view of the foregoing discussion, we have granted Appellants’
Request to the extent that we have reconsidered the original Decision but
have denied it with respect to making any changes to the Decision.
REHEARING DENIED
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