Ex Parte Levenshteyn et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardMay 23, 201612158015 (P.T.A.B. May. 23, 2016) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 12/158,015 10/28/2008 27045 7590 ERICSSON INC 6300 LEGACY DRIVE MIS EVR 1-C-11 PLANO, TX 75024 05/25/2016 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Roman Levenshteyn 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 ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. P21213-US1 5844 EXAMINER HENRY, MARIEGEORGES A ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2455 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 05/25/2016 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): kara.coffman@ericsson.com kathryn.lopez@ericsson.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte ROMAN LEVENSHTEYN and IO ANNIS FIKOURAS Appeal2014-009563 Application 12/158,015 Technology Center 2400 Before JEFFREYS. SMITH, HUNG H. BUI, and AivIBER L. HAGY, Administrative Patent Judges. SMITH, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appeal2014-009563 Application 12/158,015 STATEMENT OF THE CASE This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the rejection of claims 22-36 and 38--44. The Examiner has objected to claim 37. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We reverse. Representative Claim 22. In a telecommunications network, a method of providing interoperability between an Internet protocol multimedia subsystem (IMS) domain and a non-IMS domain, comprising the steps of: receiving on a service layer a service invocation message from the non-IMS domain; analyzing the message to identify the message as a request to invoke a service within the IMS domain; identifying whether or not the message relates to an ongoing session within the IMS domain by using a table listing currently ongoing sessions; converting, on a session control layer, non-IMS session control protocol elements related to the message into IMS session control related protocol elements; sending one or more messages towards the IMS domain to provide an IMS control session in the IMS domain based on the IMS session control related protocol elements; and forwarding on the service layer the service invocation message using the IMS control session. Examiner's Rejections Claims 22-36 and 39--44 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Naqvi (US 2006/0291489 Al, published Dec. 28, 2006) Ropolyi (US 2004/0121775 Al, published June 24, 2004, and Devine (US 2003/0191970 Al, Oct. 9, 2003). 2 Appeal2014-009563 Application 12/158,015 ANALYSIS Claim 22 recites "receiving on a service layer a service invocation message from the non-IMS domain." Appellants contend Navqi does not teach receiving a service invocation message from a non-IMS domain, but instead, teaches the opposite, an IMS network invoking services provided by a non-IMS network. App. Br. 6. The Examiner responds that paragraph 14 ofNavqi teaches an example of an IP Multimedia subsystem. Ans. 3--4. The Examiner finds paragraph 89 ofNavqi teaches data roaming messages from a non-IMS network. Ans. 4. The Examiner also finds paragraph 111 of Navqi teaches a data message from a circuit switched network that is not an IMS network. Id. Appellants reply that paragraph 14 ofNavqi does not mention IMS, paragraph 89 teaches providing non-IMS services in an IMS network, and paragraph 111 does not teach that a circuit switched network is a non-IMS network. Reply Br. 1-2. We disagree with the Examiner's finding that Navqi discloses that a circuit switched network is a non-IMS network. We highlight paragraph 16 ofNavqi, rather than paragraph 14 as cited by the Examiner, discusses an IMS network. In particular, paragraph 16 teaches that IMS is independent of the type of network access, and legacy circuit switched traffic can be handled by an inter-working function called a breakout gateway control function (BGCF). The Examiner has not persuasively explained why a circuit switched network that uses a BGCF to function in an IMS network is a non-IMF network. The additional portions ofNavqi cited by the Examiner are consistent with the Abstract ofNavqi, which teaches systems and methods to mediate non-IMS services on an IMS network. We agree with 3 Appeal2014-009563 Application 12/158,015 Appellants that Navqi does not teach receiving a service invocation message from a non-IMS domain. We do not sustain the rejection1 of claim 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103. Because claims 23-36 and 39--44 either contain or depend from a claim containing a limitation similar to that recited in claim 22 for which the rejection fails, we do not sustain the rejection of claims 23-36 and 39--44 under 35 U.S.C. § 103. DECISION We reverse the rejection of claims 22-36 and 39--44. REVERSED 1 In the event of further prosecution, the Examiner should consider whether claims 22-36 and 38--44 are patentable over the references cited in the International Search Report for the corresponding International Application, either alone or in combination. For example, pages 115-16 of "Flexent IMS-The Convergence of Circuit and Packet Core Networks," cited on page 2 of the International Search Report, teaches a roaming scenario for a non- IMS subscriber roaming in an IMS-capable access network. 4 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation