Ex Parte Kim et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Dec 16, 2013

11787425 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 16, 2013)

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.
11/787,425 04/16/2007 Soeng-Hun Kim 678-3162 3150
66547 7590 12/17/2013
THE FARRELL LAW FIRM, P.C.
290 Broadhollow Road
Suite 210E
Melville, NY 11747
EXAMINER
CHANG, TOM Y
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2456
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/17/2013 PAPER
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.
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte SOENG-HUN KIM, GERT-JAN VAN LIESHOUT, and
HIMKE VAN DER VELDE
____________

Appeal 2012-003865
Application 11/787,425
Technology Center 2400
____________

Before JOSEPH L. DIXON, CARLA M. KRIVAK, and
JOHNNY A. KUMAR, Administrative Patent Judges.

KRIVAK, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a final rejection of
claims 1-5 and 10-14. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.

Appeal 2012-003865
Application 11/787,425

2
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants’ claimed invention is directed to “a method and apparatus
for transmitting and receiving a status report of an Automatic Repeat
reQuest (ARQ) in an ARQ layer” (Spec. 1:15-17).
Independent claim 1, reproduced below, is representative of the
subject matter on appeal.
1. A method for transmitting a status report of an Automatic Repeat
reQuest (ARQ) layer in a mobile communication system including the ARQ
layer and a Hybrid Automatic Repeat reQuest (HARQ) layer, the method
comprising:

determining by an ARQ receiving (Rx) entity whether transmission
opportunity of the status report is permitted, if a predetermined status report
generation condition is satisfied;

if the transmission opportunity of the status report is permitted,
generating a status report depending on a reception status of ARQ packets
received; and

transmitting the generated status report to an ARQ transmitting (Tx)
entity at the transmission opportunity of the status report.

REFERENCE and REJECTION
The Examiner rejected claims 1-5 and 10-14 under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b)
based upon the teachings of Hebsgaard (US 2005/0094632 A1; published
May 5, 2005).

ANALYSIS
The Examiner finds Hebsgaard teaches all the limitations of
Appellants independent claims 1 and 10 (Ans. 4-5). We agree with and
Appeal 2012-003865
Application 11/787,425

3
adopt the Examiner’s findings as our own (Ans. 4-10). We highlight and
address specific findings and arguments below.
Appellants contend the Examiner is incorrect in finding ¶ 0011 of
Hebsgaard teaches the steps recited in Appellants’ claim 1 (App. Br. 8).
Appellants also contend Hebsgaard does not teach generating and sending a
status report after a scheduling delay by an ARQ Rx and estimating, by
generating a time of a status report, an initial reception time of an HARQ
packet containing a status report by an ARQ Tx (App. Br. 8).
We initially note Appellants’ claims do not recite the above argued
features. Additionally, Appellants’ claims recite the terms “transmission
opportunity” and “status report,” which Appellants have neither defined in
the Specification nor provided a definition of any type (Ans. 8). Further,
Appellants, in the Reply Brief, state the Examiner newly relies on ¶ 0031 of
Hebsgaard. However, this paragraph, albeit used to reject claims 5 and 14, is
not new to the 102 rejection (Ans. 6).
We agree with the Examiner the transmission opportunity is met by
Hebsgaard’s non-acknowledgement message sent based on a periodic
receiver time (Ans. 8) and the status report generation condition is met by
Hebsgaard’s receive window and missing PDUs (packet data unit) (Ans. 9).
We do not find the Examiner’s interpretation of these terms overly broad in
light of Appellants’ Specification and broad claim language. Given the
Examiner’s broader construction, we find unpersuasive Appellants’
assertions and find Appellants’ have failed to clearly distinguish their
claimed invention over Hebsgaard.
Appeal 2012-003865
Application 11/787,425

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Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s anticipation rejection of
independent claims 1 and 10, and claims 2-5 and 11-14, not separately
argued.

DECISION
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1-5 and 10-15 under 35
U.S.C. § 102 is 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)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED

ELD