Ex Parte Miller et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardMay 25, 201612848121 (P.T.A.B. May. 25, 2016) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 12/848, 121 07 /31/2010 22917 7590 05/27/2016 MOTOROLA SOLUTIONS, INC. IP Law Docketing 1301 EAST ALGONQUIN ROAD IL02 5th Floor - SHS SCHAUMBURG, IL 60196 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR TRENT J. MILLER 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. CM13467 5279 EXAMINER RUSSELL, WANDA Z ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2462 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 05/27/2016 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): USAdocketing@motorolasolutions.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte TRENT J. MILLER, ANATOL Y AGULNIK, ROBERT A. FREDERICKS, JAMES A. MAROCCHI, RANDY L. EKL, PETER E. THOMAS, and RYAN P. ZIOLKO Appeal2014-006447 Application 12/848, 121 1 Technology Center 2400 Before JOSEPH P. LENTIVECH, KARA L. SZPONDOWSKI, and SHARON PENICK, Administrative Patent Judges. PENICK, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's Final Rejection of claims 1-22. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b )(1 ). We reverse. 1 Appellants identify Motorola Solutions, Inc. as the real party in interest. (Appeal Br. 2.) Appeal2014-006447 Application 12/848, 121 Invention Appellants' invention concerns implementation of location-based policies for user equipment operating in different enterprise operating areas (EOAs) of a shared Long Term Evolution (LTE) system. When a determination is made whether the user equipment is in a home or visited EOA, that determination is used to select the policy rules for the user equipment. (Abstract.) Illustrative claim 1 is reproduced below, with key limitations emphasized: 1. A method for operating area based policy for user equipment (UE) operating in different areas of a shared home Long Term Evolution (L TE) system, wherein the L TE system comprises a core network that provides service to a plurality of radio access networks, the method comprising: detecting a trigger, and responsive to the trigger, determining a first enterprise operating area in which the UE is currently located, wherein the first enterprise operating area is one of a plurality of enterprise operating areas of the LTE system and wherein each enterprise operating area of the plurality of enterprise operating areas is associated with a one or more different radio access networks of the plurality of radio access networks; determining whether the first enterprise operating area is a home enterprise operating area for the UE from among the plurality of enterprise operating areas or a visited enterprise operating area for the UE from among the plurality of enterprise operating areas; when the first enterprise operating area is the home enterprise operating area, selecting a first set of policy rules for the UE; when the first enterprise operating area is the visited enterprise operating area, selecting a second set of policy rules forthe UE. 2 Appeal2014-006447 Application 12/848, 121 Rejections The Examiner rejects claims 1-8, 11, 15, 16, and 19 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Kotecha (US 2009/0197597 Al; Aug. 6, 2009) and Gallagher et al. (US 2009/0270099 Al; Oct. 29, 2009) ("Gallagher"). (Final Act. 2-10.) The Examiner rejects claims 9, 10, 12-14, 18, and 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Kotecha, Gallagher, and Foresti et al. (US 2012/0040667 Al; Feb 16, 2012) ("Foresti"). (Final Action 10-14.) The Examiner rejects claim 17 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Kotecha, Gallagher, and Buckley et al. (US 2007 /0004404 Al; Jan. 4, 2007) ("Buckley"). (Final Action 14.) The Examiner rejects claims 21 and 22 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Kotecha, Gallagher, and Keutmann et al. (US 2004/0072578 Al; Apr. 15, 2004) ("Keutmann"). (Final Action 14--15.) Issue Appellants' arguments present us with the following issue: Did the Examiner err in finding that the combination of Kotecha and Gallagher teaches or suggests the claimed "plurality of enterprise operating areas of [an] L TE system" which include as possible locations for user equipment (UE) "a home enterprise operating area for the UE from among the plurality of enterprise operating areas or a visited enterprise operating area for the UE from among the plurality of enterprise operating areas," as recited in claim 1? We address only this issue, which is dispositive. We do not address additional, non-dispositive issues raised by Appellants' arguments. 3 Appeal2014-006447 Application 12/848, 121 ANALYSIS The Examiner finds that Kotecha teaches an L TE system with home and visited areas in which user equipment may be located. (Final Action 3.) The Examiner cites to Figure 3 of Kotecha, which shows a home network and a visited network (Kotecha, Fig. 3; i-fi-147--49.) Appellants argue that Kotecha' s teaching is not of two areas of a single system, but rather show how a user equipment (a mobile device in Kotecha' s parlance) could function when it is outside of its home network. (Appeal Br. 11.) We agree with the Appellants. The Examiner cites Kotecha's teachings regarding an L TE system (Final Action 3 (citing Kotecha i1 5) ), however these teachings relate to the technology used for mobile devices in a network to connect to the home access router via base stations. As the Appellants argue, there is no indication in Kotecha that the home network and visited network are two areas of a single system, and in fact Kotecha specifically teaches the home and visited networks as two networks operated by different carriers. (Appeal Br. 11 (citing Kotecha i154.)) The Examiner also finds that Gallagher teaches or suggests a L TE system with a core network and a plurality of enterprise operating areas taught or suggested in Gallagher's HPLMN and VPLMN (home and visiting public land mobile networks). (Final Action 4; Answer 16.) Appellants argue that in Gallagher, "there is no indication that the HPLMN and VPLMN share a same core network (the core network of the HPLMN is not depicted)." (Appeal Br. 12; Reply Br. 6-7.) We agree with the Appellants. The Examiner cites all paragraphs from Gallagher containing the word "policy" to support the finding that "Gallagher teaches providing different policies for a UE within a same network, that is, serviced by a same core 4 Appeal2014-006447 Application 12/848, 121 network, and based on enterprise operating areas (EOAs)." (Answer 16.) However, while these may show that Gallagher teaches the application of policies, they do not show that the different mobile networks are serviced by the same L TE core network, as required by the disputed limitation. Thus, we agree with the Appellants that the combination of Kotecha and Gallagher does not teach or suggest the disputed limitation of claim 1, commensurately recited in independent claims 15 and 19. Dependent claims 2-14, 16-18, and 20-22 include this limitation due to their dependence from claims 1, 15, and 19, and we likewise do not sustain the Examiner's rejection of these claims for the reasons discussed above with respect to claim 1. DECISION The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1-22 is reversed. REVERSED 5 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation