Ex Parte Jung et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Oct 10, 2017

14325276 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 10, 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.
14/325,276 07/07/2014 Jung-Soo Jung 0201-1461 3636
68103 7590
Jefferson IP Law, LLP
1130 Connecticut Ave., NW, Suite 420
Washington, DC 20036
EXAMINER
CROMPTON, CHRISTOPHER R
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2463
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
10/12/2017 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):
u sdocketing @ j effersonip .com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte JUNG-SOO JUNG, BEOM-SIK BAE, DAE-GYUN KIM, and
YU-CHUL KIM
Appeal 2017-001085
Application 14/325,2761
Technology Center 2400
Before ST. JOHN COURTENAY III, KRISTEN L. DROESCH, and
CARL L. SILVERMAN, Administrative Patent Judges.
SILVERMAN, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
Final Rejection of claims 1, 4, 7, 10, and 15—18, which constitute all the
pending rejected claims. Claims 3, 6, 9, and 12—14 are cancelled. We have
jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
1 The real party in interest is identified as Samsung Electronics Co. App.Br.
2.
Appeal 2017-001085
Application 14/325,276
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants’ invention relates to transmitting and receiving packet data
in a mobile communication system. Abstract; Spec. 1:21 to 2:7, 7:10—15.
Claim 1 is exemplary of the subject matter on appeal (emphasis added):
1. A method for transmitting a medium access control
(MAC) packet in a mobile communication system, the method
comprising:
generating a MAC packet comprising a MAC header and
a MAC payload; and
transmitting the MAC packet to a plurality of terminals on
a channel, wherein the MAC header comprises n Info fields, and
each of n info fields includes a respective identifier field
associated with a terminal, where n is a natural number, wherein
the MAC header is octet aligned and each of the Info fields is one
octet,
wherein the MAC payload comprises n packets, a i-th
multiple packet corresponds to a i-th Info field, where i is one
value of 1, 2,. . ., n, and
wherein a padding is located after the n-th packet
optionally and a length of the padding is based on a size of the
MAC header and a number of the packets.
App. Br. 13 (Claims Appendix).
REJECTION* 2
Claims 1, 4, 7, 10, and 15—18 stand rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Attar et al. (Enhanced Forward Traffic
2 The rejections of claims 2,5,8, and 11 are withdrawn. Ans. 2; Reply Br.
2. Double patenting and 35 U.S.C § 101 rejections are also withdrawn. Id.
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Appeal 2017-001085
Application 14/325,276
Channel MAC Protocol dated 9/16/2003) (“NPL1”) in view of Sidhushayana
et al. (US 2004/0160984 Al; pub. Aug. 19, 2004) (“Rl”). Final Act. 7-12.
ANALYSIS
Appellants argue the Examiner errs in finding NPL1 teaches the claim
1 limitation “wherein the MAC header comprises n Info fields, and each of n
info files includes a respective identifier field associated with a terminal.'1'’
(Emphasis added). App. Br. 7—9; Reply Br. 3—6.
Appellants argue:
The Examiner alleges that "wherein the MAC header comprises n Info
fields, and each of n info fields includes a respective identifier field
associated with a terminal, where n is a natural number" of the claim 1
is similar to "the Packetlnfo field contains a MACindex which is
assigned to an access terminal" on page 11 of NPL1, "the ith occurrence
of this field corresponds to the ith packet in the payload" on page 11 of
NPL1 and "if n<8, then the last packetinfo field become a padding field
and is not for a packet" on page 11 of NPL1.
Specifically, the Examiner alleges that the feature "the ith occurrence
of this field corresponds to the ith packet in the payload" on page 11 of
NPL 1 indicates the feature related to the order, and the feature on page
11 of NPL 1 is similar with "each of n info fields includes a respective
identifier field associated with a terminal" of the claim 1.
However, the claim 1 recites "each of n info fields includes a respective
identifier field associated with a terminal", but page 11 of NPL1 merely
discloses "the ith occurrence of this field corresponds to the ith packet
in the payload". Herein, this field on page 11 of NPL1 is a Length field,
and the ith occurrence of this field, i.e., the Length field shall
correspond to the ith Security Layer packet in a MAC Layer packet.
And, even though the Examiner does not point out, page 10 of NPL1
merely discloses "Security Layer packet", and Security Layer packet
includes Connection Layer packet.
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Application 14/325,276
Accordingly, we believe that the Examiner's rejection on "each of n info
fields includes a respective identifier field associated with a terminal"
of the claim 1 over "the ith occurrence of this field corresponds to the
ith packet in the payload" on page 11 of NPL1 is not reasonable.
NPL1 at page 11. (Note ith occurrence of this field (the Packet Info
field) contains the MACindex - the rest do not). Thus, each of n info
fields cannot be asserted to contain a respective identifier field
associated with a terminal.
App. Br. 8- 9
The Examiner finds:
Applicant appears to believe the value of "i" to be a constant set value;
however, as known in the art, this is clearly not the case and goes
against the accepted rules of mathematics (For example See page 9 of
NPL1, A security layer packet has N occurrences of a "Security Layer
Packet" field, where each one has a length of 8 x i, where i is a value of
the corresponding Length field which clearly shows i is a variable value
used to understand the function of each separate field without having to
write out "n" different fields individually. The use of the variable "i" is
termed "an index of summation" which is an indexed variable
representing each successive term in the series, which is incremented
by 1 for each successive term.) AND contradicts Applicant's own
claims which use the SAME notation as a variable (See claims 1, 4, 7,
and 10, which state- "a i-th multiple packet corresponds to a i-th Info
field"). Therefore Applicant's arguments appear to represent the same
notation as having two different meanings subject to the whims of the
Applicant.
Examiner points out that the notation that Applicant is referring to, if
understood as Applicant is attempting [to] interpret, would make
BOTH the NPL1 Reference and Applicant's own invention unusable.
For example, NPL1 [page 11] in Table 1.1.6.1-5: Packetlnfo format,
discloses the Packetlnfo format include two fields, a Format and a
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Application 14/325,276
MACindex field. Therefore if Applicant's argument is correct, that only
a Single One of the Packetlnfo fields includes a MACindex, then
why would NPL1 show that ALL Packetlnfo Fields include a
MACindex?
Additionally, Applicant's own claim 1 states "wherein the MAC
payload comprises n packets, a i-th multiple packet corresponds to a i-
th Info field, where I is one value of 1,2,....n" which using Applicant's
own interpretation of the claims would mean that only a Single one of
the Multiple Packets corresponds to only a single Info field since it
states "where I is one value’; however, this is clearly not the case based
on Applicant's specification [See Fig. 4 of Applicant's specification as
filed]. Applicant's Fig.4 shows that "i" is a countable value and
increments which each check since multiple Packet# "i"s appear to be
selected, one which each repeat of Applicant's process. Therefore
Applicant's interpretation of limitation would not be in line with the
broadest reasonable interpretation consistent with the specification and
claims and arguments with respect to it should be considered moot.
Ans. 4—5; see also Final Act. 8—9.
We are not persuaded by Appellants’ arguments and agree, instead,
with the findings of the Examiner. Appellants present insufficient
persuasive argument the Examiner’s claim interpretation is unreasonable or
overbroad. Claim terms in a patent application are given the broadest
reasonable interpretation consistent with the Specification, as understood by
one of ordinary skill in the art. In re Crish, 393 F.3d 1253, 1256 (Fed. Cir.
2004). Based on the record before us, Appellants present attorney argument
which is insufficient to persuade us of Examiner error. Mere attorney
argument and conclusory statements that are unsupported by factual
evidence are entitled to little probative value. See In re Geisler, 116 F.3d
1465, 1470 (Fed. Cir. 1997) (“An assertion of what seems to follow from
common experience is just attorney argument and not the kind of factual
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Application 14/325,276
evidence that is required to rebut a prima facie case of obviousness.”); see
also In re De Blauwe, 736 F.2d 699, 705 (Fed. Cir. 1984).
Appellants present arguments in the Reply Brief for the first time that
are not responsive to a new rejection or shift in the Examiner's position
raised in the Answer. Therefore, in the absence of good cause shown, these
untimely arguments are waived, and we do not consider them in our
decision. Ex Parte Borden, 93 USPQ2d 1473, 1474 (BPAI 2010)
(informative).
In view of the above, we sustain the rejection of claim 1, independent
claims 4, 7, and 10 as these claims are argued together with claim 1, and
dependent claims 15—18 as these claims are not argued separately.
See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(l)(iv).
DECISION
We affirm the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1, 4, 7, 10, and
15-18.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.136(a)(l)(iv).
AFFIRMED
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