Ciena Corporation

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Dec 8, 2021

2020005343 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 8, 2021)

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.
15/806,416 11/08/2017 Petar DJUKIC 10.2262.CON 4029
22474 7590 12/08/2021
Clements Bernard Baratta Walker
4500 Cameron Valley Parkway
Suite 350
Charlotte, NC 28211
EXAMINER
MIAN, OMER S
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2461
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/08/2021 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):
cjones@worldpatents.com
patlaw@worldpatents.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte PETAR DJUKIC, TODD MORRIS,
and DAVID JORDAN

Appeal 2020-005343
Application 15/806,416
Technology Center 2400

Before ALLEN R. MACDONALD, JEAN R. HOMERE,
and JEREMY J. CURCURI, Administrative Patent Judges.

HOMERE, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
I. STATEMENT OF THE CASE1
Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant appeals from the
Examiner’s rejection of claims 1, 4–10, 13–18, 21–25, and 27, all of the
pending claims.2 Appeal Br. 1. Claims 2, 3, 11, 12, 19, 20, and 26 are
canceled. Claims App. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.

1 We refer to the Specification filed Nov. 8, 2017 (“Spec.”); the Final Office
Action, mailed Oct. 10, 2019 (“Final Act.”); the Appeal Brief, filed Mar. 17,
2020 (“Appeal Br.”); the Examiner’s Answer, mailed May 27, 2020
(“Ans.”); and the Reply Brief, filed July 10, 2020 (“Reply Br.”).
2 “Appellant” refers to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a).
Appellant identifies Ciena Corp, as the real party in interest. Appeal Br. 2.
Appeal 2020-005343
Application 15/806,416

2
II. CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER
According to Appellant, the claimed subject matter relates to a
method and system for service enhancement in a Software Defined
Networking (SDN) network wherein an SDN controller temporarily applies
service enhancements along with current measurements taken to the SDN
network to determine benefits thereto while excluding historical
measurements (i.e. measurements taken prior to the implementation of the
temporary service enhancements) in the benefits estimation. Spec. ¶¶ 39–40,
112, 113. Fig. 23, reproduced and discussed below, is useful for
understanding the claimed subject matter:

Figure 23 above illustrates an SDN network including an SDN
controller using historical and current service measurements to
Appeal 2020-005343
Application 15/806,416

3
optimize the SDN network wherein the controller uses only the
current measurements along with temporary implementation of
service enhancements to estimate the benefits to the network.
Id. ¶¶ 112, 113.
Claims 1, 10, and 21 are independent. Claim 1, reproduced below
with disputed limitations emphasized, is illustrative:
1. A method of service enhancement in a Software
Defined Networking (SDN) network, the method comprising:
in an SDN controller associated with the SDN network,
obtaining measurements for one or more services in the SDN
network, wherein the measurements include historical
measurements from the SDN network and current
measurements from the SDN network, wherein the current
measurements are based in part on temporary implementation
of service enhancements for the one or more services by the
SDN controller and measuring a benefit thereof, and wherein
the temporary implementation is performed to derive the
current measurements where the historical measurements
cannot be used to estimate the benefit;
performing an evaluation of the one or more services in
the SDN network for the service enhancements based on the
measurements;
performing a scoring of the service enhancements of the
one or more services; and
causing implementation of at least one of the service
enhancements in the SDN network.

Appeal Br. 12 (Claims App.).

Appeal 2020-005343
Application 15/806,416

4
III. REFERENCES
The Examiner relies upon the following references.3
Name Reference Date
Li US 2016/0197839 A1 July 7, 2016
Porras US 2016/0219048 A1 July 28, 2016
Brech US 2017/0249193 A1 Aug. 31, 2017
IV. REJECTIONS
The Examiner rejects the claims on appeal as follows:
Claims 1, 4, 5, 8–10, 13, 14, 17, 18, 21–23, and 27 stand rejected
under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over the combined teachings of
Brech and Porras. Final Act. 3–7.
Claims 6, 7, 15, 16, 24, and 25 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103
as being unpatentable over the combined teachings of Brech, Porras, and Li.
Final Act. 7–13.
V. ANALYSIS
We consider Appellant’s arguments, as they are presented in the
Appeal Brief, pages 6–10 and the Reply Brief, pages 1–3.4 We are persuaded
by Appellant’s contentions as discussed below.
Appellant argues, inter alia, that the Examiner errs in finding that the
combination of Brech and Porras teaches or suggests the following:
wherein the current measurements are based in part on
temporary implementation of service enhancements for the one

3 All reference citations are to the first named inventor only.
4 We have considered in this Decision only those arguments Appellant
actually raised in the Briefs. Arguments not made are waived. See
37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).
Appeal 2020-005343
Application 15/806,416

5
or more services by the SDN controller and measuring a benefit
thereof,
as recited in independent claim 1. Appeal Br. 8. In particular, Appellant
argues that the Examiner erroneously finds Brech’s disclosure of feeding
measurements into models for performing analysis teaches or suggests an
SDN controller taking current measurements based on the temporary
application of service enhancements to a network. Id. at 8–9 (citing Brech ¶¶
85–87). More particularly, Appellant states the following:
As such, in Brech, the measurements are taken and fed
into models for performing analysis on potential changes to the
network of Brech by the modeling module 804, which, as
disclosed in paragraph [0087] of Brech, then determines
whether a net utility of the changes analyzed in the models is
"acceptable, or good."
Thus, unlike the requirements in claims 1, 10, and 21, the
measurements taken in Brech do not include measurements
taken with the service enhancements temporarily applied to the
network of Brech, but rather are the current measurements
(taken without the temporary service enhancements) that are
then applied to one or more models to determine an "expected
utility" of changes/enhancements to the network of Brech.
Indeed, the actions to improve the network in Brech are
not actually applied to the network in Brech until the last step in
the method (step 935), well after the measurements were taken,
as disclosed in paragraph [0090] and as can be seen in FIG. 9 of
Brech.

Id. at 8–9 (emphasis added).
However, while Brech does teach continuously
monitoring the services of the network, once the
implementation/improvement actions are taken at step S935,
further changes are not disclosed as being made until the
process iterates again. Thus, the data captured during the
monitoring after the implementation of services or
improvement actions are taken at step S935 are not used to
Appeal 2020-005343
Application 15/806,416

6
determine whether to implement those services or
improvement actions (that decision was already made), but
rather that data is then fed into behavior models to make the
next determination on further improvement actions to take.
Thus, the historical data from the previous iteration of changes
(i.e. data captured with the changes from the previous iteration,
but without the changes to be implemented at step S935 of the
current iteration) is again used to determine whether the
changes in the model (i.e. the changes to be made at step S935
of the current iteration) are "acceptable, or good" (See
paragraphs [0085]-[0087] of Brech).

Reply Br. 2.

In response, the Examiner finds that Brech’s disclosure of taking
unsatisfactory KPI improvements actions teaches implementing temporary
improvements to derive current measurements. Ans. 7. In particular, the
Examiner finds the following:
When it is determined by the process of Fig. 9 that the
output value of the utility functions, which is based on the
evaluations of KPIs that includes evaluation of QoS metrics of
the SDN, is not acceptable according to a policy, there are some
KPI improvement actions (equivalent to the claimed "service
enhancements") that are determined.

Id. (citing Brech ¶¶ 85–87).

A person of ordinary skill in the art would reasonably
interpret this as "implementing" the "service enhancements".
The measurements in the next loop of process 900 of Fig. 9, are
actually measurements of the SDE/SDN with these
enhancements/ improvement actions implemented. Since, these
enhancements/ improvement actions, in at least one scenario,
are not valid in the next evaluation iteration of the process of
Fig. 9 (as explained below with annotated four steps), a person
of ordinary skill in the art would reasonably interpret this as a
"temporary" implementation of the service assignments.
Appeal 2020-005343
Application 15/806,416

7

Id. at 8 (citing Brech ¶ 90).

Fig. 9 as explained above, explains how KPI
improvements (including QoS improvements) are temporarily
applied to the SOE/SON. These improvements are temporary
because the next iteration or a future iteration changes them (i.e.
when S925's outcome is "NO"). Furthermore, the
measurements of this temporarily applied
enhancements/improvements continue to be measured and
evaluated by the model in steps S905-S920.

Id. at 9–10.

Appellant’s arguments are persuasive of reversible Examiner error.
While we agree with the Examiner that Brech’s disclosure of applying
unsatisfactory KPI improvements to the SDN/SDE teaches implementing
temporary enhancements to measurements, we do not concur with the
Examiner that such implementation of temporary improvements form the
basis of current measurements as required by the claim. As persuasively
argued by Appellant, Brech discloses taking KPI improvement actions
(S935) in future determinations of whether the net utility is good (S925).
Upon determining that a KPI improvement action results in a good or
satisfactory net utility, it is applied to the SDE/SDN. Fig. 9 (S925).
However, upon determining that the KPI improvement action is not good or
unsatisfactory, another improvement action is taken. Brech ¶¶ 89–90, Fig. 9.
Because each of those KPI improvement actions is applied to a
corresponding future measurement, the cited disclosure does not meet the
claim requirement that a temporary enhancement forms the basis of a current
measurement.
Appeal 2020-005343
Application 15/806,416

8
Accordingly, we are persuaded that the cited portions of Brech do not
teach or suggest the disputed limitations.
Because Appellant shows at least one reversible error in the
Examiner’s obviousness rejection of independent claim 1, we do not reach
Appellant’s remaining arguments. Accordingly, we do not sustain the
Examiner’s obviousness rejection of independent claim 1 obvious over the
combination of Brech and Porras. Similarly, we do not sustain the rejections
of claims 4–10, 13–18, 21–25, and 27, which also recite the disputed
limitations.
VI. CONCLUSION
We reverse the Examiner’s rejections of claims 1, 4–10, 13–18, 21–
25, and 27.
VII. DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35
U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1, 4, 5, 8–10,
13, 14, 17, 18,
21–23, 27
103 Brech, Porras
1, 4, 5, 8–10,
13, 14, 17,
18, 21–23, 27
6, 7, 15, 16, 24,
25 103 Brech, Porras, Li
6, 7, 15, 16,
24, 25
Overall
Outcome
1, 4–10, 13–
18, 21–25, 27

REVERSED