Ex Parte Ponce De Leon et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Feb 11, 2016

13369860 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 11, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO.
13/369,860
124192
GOOGLE
7590
FILING DATE
02/09/2012
02/16/2016
C/O Faegre Baker Daniels LLP
311 S. Wacker Drive, Suite 4300
Chicago, IL 60606
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Lorenzo A. Ponce De Leon
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.
GP-100463-00-US-DIV 1679
EXAMINER
LEE, JUSTIN YE
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2644
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
02/16/2016 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):
googleusinternal@faegrebd.com
inteas@faegrebd.com
michelle.davis@faegrebd.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte LORENZO A. PONCE DE LEON and
WILLIAM P. ALBERTH JR.
Appeal2014-002924
Application 13/369,860
Technology Center 2600
Before JEFFREYS. SMITH, DANIEL N. FISHMAN, and
NABEEL U. KHAN, Administrative Patent Judges.
SivIITH, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appeal2014-002924
Application 13/369,860
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
This is an appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's Final
Rejection of claims 1-7, which are all the claims pending in the application.
We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
Representative Claim
1. A method of a serving base station for facilitating a mobile station
to perform a fast handoff, comprising:
determining, by the serving base station, a high probability target base
station with which the mobile station is most likely to perform handoff based
on a historical data;
requesting, by the serving base station, allocation of air interface
resources at the high probability target base station to the mobile station,
prior to the mobile station reporting to the serving base station reception of
signals from the high probability target base station, to facilitate the mobile
station to perform the fast handoff with the high probability target base
station.
Bahl
Wang
Lindquist
Ogami
Park
Prior Art
US 6,385,454B1
US 2004/0192341 Al
US 2004/0235478 Al
US 2007 /0238463 Al
US 2008/0293423 Al
Examiner's Rejections
May 7, 2002
Sept. 30, 2004
Nov. 25, 2004
Oct. 11, 2007
Nov. 27, 2008
Claims 1 and 4 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Wang, Park, and Ogami.
Claims 2, 3, 5, and 6 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Wang, Park, Ogami, and Lindquist.
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Appeal2014-002924
Application 13/369,860
Claim 7 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over
Wang, Park, Ogami, and Bahl.
ANALYSIS
We adopt the findings of fact made by the Examiner in the Final
Rejection and Examiner's Answer as our own. We concur with the
conclusions reached by the Examiner for the reasons given in the
Examiner's Answer. We highlight the following for emphasis.
Section 103 rejection of claims 1 and 4
Appellants contend the combination of Wang, Park, and Ogami does
not teach "requesting, by the serving base station, allocation of air interface
resources at the high probability target base station to the mobile station,
prior to the mobile station reporting to the serving base station reception of
signals from the high probability target base station" as recited in claim 1.
App. Br. 3-5; Reply Br. 2--4. Appellants' contention is based on the premise
that Park alone does not teach multiple base stations. See App. Br. 4; Reply
Br. 2. However, the Examiner relies on Wang and Ogami to teach multiple
base stations. Ans. 2-3. Appellants have not persuasively rebutted the
Examiner's findings.
Appellants also contend neither Wang nor Park teaches the base
station requesting allocation of resources "prior to the mobile station
reporting to the base station reception of signals from the high probability
target base station." Reply Br. 3--4. The Examiner finds Park teaches a base
station requesting allocation of resources before another station transmits
and receives signals. Final Act. 4. Appellants have not provided persuasive
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Appeal2014-002924
Application 13/369,860
evidence or argument to rebut the Examiner's finding. Further, Appellants'
contention that Wang does not teach the base station requesting allocation of
resources at the target base station prior to the mobile station receiving
signals from the target base station is inconsistent with the teachings of
Wang.
In particular, we highlight Wang teaches reserving resources in a
mobile communication system through the use of historical indicia. Title. A
predictor forms a prediction of a path of travel of the mobile system
responsive to historical indicia, and the predicted path is utilized in
allocating resources to the mobile system. Abstract. A base transceiver
station (BTS) 22 containing apparatus 36 includes a path predictor 42 to
predict a path of travel of the mobile station based on historical indicia, and
a resource requestor 62 to generate a request for allocation of resources to
the mobile station. Fig. 1; i-fi-135, 40-46. For example, ifthe path predictor
predicts the mobile system routinely travels through "abcdefg" cells (such as
those cells shown in Figure 2), the resource requestor can request resources
for predicted path segment "be" (i-f 61-62), predicted path segment "cde" (i-f
63), and predicted path segment "de" (i-f 64).
Appellants have not persuasively distinguished the claimed "high
probability target base station" from the target base stations in the predicted
path shown in Figure 2 and discussed in paragraphs 61 through 64 of Wang.
The resource requestor of the serving base transceiver station of Wang,
which requests allocation of air interface resources along the predicted path
of travel, teaches "requesting, by the serving base station, teaches requesting
"allocation of air interface resources at the high probability target base
station to the mobile station, prior to the mobile station reporting to the
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Application 13/369,860
serving base station reception of signals from the high probability target base
station" within the meaning of claim 1.
We sustain the rejection of claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. § 103. Appellants
do not present arguments for the patentability of claim 4, which falls with
claim 1.
Section 103 rejection of claims 2, 3, 5, and 6
Claim 2 recites "if a handoff procedure ... is successful within a
predefined time period, updating the historical data to reflect a successful
handoff .... " Appellants contend the timer element taught by Lindquist is
not relevant to whether the handoff is successful. App. Br. 7, citing
Lindquist i-f 83. Paragraphs 82 and 83 of Lindquist teach gathering statistics
of successful and unsuccessful handoffs during a predetermined time period.
Appellants have not persuasively distinguished gathering statistics of a
successful handoff during a predetermined time period as taught by
Lindquist from updating historical data to reflect a successful handoff if the
handoff procedure is successful within a predefined time period as recited in
claim 2. Cumulative to the Examiner's findings, we highlight paragraphs 44
and 62 of Wang as evidencing that handoff timers and indicating a selected
time interval has timed out were within the level of skill in the art.
Similarly, Appellants have not persuasively distinguished gathering
statistics of an unsuccessful handoff during a predetermined time period as
taught by Lindquist from updating historical data to reflect an unsuccessful
handoff if the handoff procedure is not successful within a predefined time
period as recited in claim 5.
We sustain the rejections of claims 2 and 5 under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
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Application 13/369,860
Section 103 rejection of claim 7
Appellants present arguments for patentability of claim 7 similar to
those presented for claim 1, which we find unpersuasive. App. Br. 8.
For the same reasons as claim 1, we sustain the rejection of claim 7
under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
DECISION
The rejections of claims 1-7 are 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). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.50(±).
AFFIRMED
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