Ex Parte Zou et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 9, 2016

12138656 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 9, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
12/138,656 06/13/2008
48116 7590
FAY SHARPE/LUCENT
1228 Euclid Avenue, 5th Floor
The Halle Building
Cleveland, OH 44115-1843
09/13/2016
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Jialin Zou
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.
LUTZ 2 00595 9854
EXAMINER
GENACK, MATTHEW W
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2645
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/13/2016 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):
docketing@faysharpe.com
ipsnarocp@nokia.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte JIALIN ZOU and SUBRAMANIAN VASUDEVAN
Appeal2015-005066
Application 12/138,656
Technology Center 2600
Before JUSTIN BUSCH, CATHERINE SHIANG, and ALEX S. YAP,
Administrative Patent Judges.
YAP, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants 1 appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's
final rejection of claims 1-3, 5-11, 13, 14, 16, 17, and 19-21, which are all
the claims pending in this application.2 We have jurisdiction under 35
U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Lucent Technologies
Inc. (App. Br. 1.)
2 Claims 4, 12, 15, and 18 were cancelled previously. (App. Br. 13-16.)
Appeal2015-005066
Application 12/138,656
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellants' invention relates "to a method and apparatus for
discovering the geographical location of idle mobile devices, without
requiring the mobile devices to wake up and enter a connected state." (June
13, 2008 Specification ("Spec.") i-f 1.) Claim 1 is illustrative, and is
reproduced below:
1. A system that retrieves geolocation information from an
idle mobile access terminal (AT), comprising:
a processor that generates a geolocation request for an idle
AT·
'
a transmitter that transmits the request to the idle AT over
a control channel; and
a receiver that receives a geolocation report from the idle
AT over an access channel;
wherein the transmitter transmits the received geolocation
report over a backhaul or air link connection to a requesting
entity;
wherein the processor is further configured to:
map geolocation information including at least one of
latitude, longitude and altitude information included in the
geolocation report to a geographic map;
provide a mapped geographical location of the idle AT to
the requesting entity.
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Application 12/138,656
Prior Art and Rejections on Appeal
The following table lists the prior art relied upon by the Examiner in
rejecting the claims on appeal:
Myr
Kaplan
Do et al.
("Do")
Doherty et al.
("Doherty")
US 6,901,264 B2
US 2008/0059063 Al
US 2008/0096581 Al
US 2008/0125959 Al
May 31, 2005
Mar. 6, 2008
Apr 24, 2008
May 29, 2008
Claims 1, 2, 5-11, 13, 14, 16, 17, and 21 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Myr in view of Doherty. (See
Final Office Action (mailed Sept. 25, 2013) ("Final Act.") 2-10.)
Claim 19 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Myr in view of Doherty, and further in view of Kaplan.
(See Final Act. 10-13.)
Claims 3 and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Myr in view of Doherty, and further in view of Do. (See
Final Act. 13.)
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner's rejections in light of Appellants'
arguments that the Examiner has erred. We are not persuaded that the
Examiner erred in rejecting claims 1-3, 5-11, 13, 14, 16, 17, and 19-21.
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Application 12/138,656
Claims 1, 2, 5-11, 13, 14, 16, 17, and 21
With respect to claim 1, the Examiner finds that:
Myr does not expressly disclose that the processor is
further configured to map geolocation information . . . and
provide a mapped geographical location of the idle AT to the
requesting entity.
Doherty et al. discloses that the processor is further
configured to map geolocation information . . . and provide a
mapped geographical location of the idle AT to the requesting
entity (the latitude and longitude historical information is plotted
on a map, according to [0182], Figs. 4--5, whereby the historical
location data is provided to the user of the computer, according
to [0169]).
(Final Act. 3.) Appellants disagree and contend that:
the cited paragraphs [in Doherty] only mention that the user
device for which location tracking is performed may be a
handheld device with GPS. Nothing in the cited passages
mentions the claimed feature of delivering an idle terminal's
mapped location information to a requesting entity as set forth in
claim 1, let alone to a requesting non-idle mobile AT.
(App. Br. 6, emphasis in original.) The Examiner responds that Doherty
clearly teaches or suggests "that mapped geographical information is
provided to the terminal of a requesting party." (Ans. 14.) For example, the
Examiner points to paragraph 35 of Doherty:
The present invention relates to the frequent tracking and
transmission of person-based geographical location data (e.g.,
longitude and latitude coordinates) to a computer server for
storage and processing. An automated activity detection facility,
which in a particular implementation is best understood as a
computer implemented Activity Detection Algorithm (ADA),
processes the data and provides predicted stationary activity and
movement/trip segment information along with segment
attributes (e.g., start/end times, building names, travel modes,
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etc.). This information can then be used as a basis for generating
a variety of spatial, temporal and interpersonal displays of a
persons [sic] data based on the algorithm's outputs, including
temporal (either diary or calendar-type) and map-based displays
for one or more persons.
(Ans. 14-15, emphasis in original.) Appellants then argue that "the cited
passage relates to receiving latitude and longitude information and
predicting future stationary and movement activity based thereon. In
contrast, claim 1 sets forth providing a mapped location of an idle AT based
on currently received geolocation data." (Reply 4, emphasis added.)
Appellants have not persuaded us that the Examiner erred. We agree
with the Examiner's finding that Doherty teaches or suggests the limitation
at issue. (Final Act. 3--4; Ans. 14-17.) For example, "the information
[(regarding a mobile device 210)] generated by the ADA [(running on server
250)] is logged and displayed to a user after secure login via one or more
computers 260 connected to the Internet 240." (Doherty i-fi-143, 169, FIG. 2.)
Figure 2 of Doherty is reproduced below.
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Figure 2 depicts "a schematic of a system in accordance with an
embodiment of' Doherty. (Doherty i-f 28, FIG. 2.) We are also not
persuaded by Appellants' contention that "the cited passages [0035] and
[0038] [(of Doherty)] relate to predicting mobile device location as a
function of historical data." (Reply 5, emphasis added.) Specifically,
Appellants' contention is based on a strained reading of paragraph 35 of
Doherty: "An automated activity detection facility ... processes the data and
provides predicted stationary activity and movement/trip segment
information along with segment attributes." (Doherty i-f 35, emphasis
added.) We find that paragraph 35 of Doherty teaches or suggests that the
ADA is capable of predicting the stationary activity of the user (i.e., what
the user is doing when stationary) not "predicting mobile device location as
a function of historical data" (Reply Br. 5), as Appellants contend. (See,
e.g., Doherty i-fi-115 ("What is a person doing? (Stationary activity,
exercising, travelling, etc.)"), 39 ("The ADA 140 in an implementation of
the present invention is in essence a set of modules that systematically
reduces the raw location data into a sequence of stationary (activity) and
moving (trip) episodes along with their attributes (when, where, what)."), 40
("Subsequent to processing by the ADA 140, an algorithm output table 150
preferably provides a listing of stationary (activity) episodes by, for
example: what type (work, shop, at-home, etc.) ... ").)
For the foregoing reasons, we are not persuaded of Examiner error in
the rejection of claim 1. Thus, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection of
claim 1, as well as dependent claims 2, 3, and 5-8, which are not argued
separately. (App. Br. 7.)
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With respect to claim 9, the Examiner finds that:
Myr does not expressly disclose that the geolocation report
includes a report-type field that identifies the report as a
geolocation report.
Doherty et al. discloses that the geolocation report
includes a report-type field that identifies the report as a
geolocation report (the location report contains fields that
indicate that said report is a location report, according to [0175]).
(Final Act. 4--5.) Appellants disagree and contend that "the cited passage
mentions GPS sentences that comprise latitude and longitude fields, but is
silent with regard to a report 'type' field that identifies a report as a
geolocation report, as set forth in claim 9." (App. Br. 7-8; Reply 6-8.) The
Examiner responds that:
On the contrary, in [0175], Doherty et al. states "The GPS
receiver was setup to wirelessly broadcast various GPS sentences
in the NMEA (National Marine Electronics Association) 0183
standard, at one second intervals. Among other fields, this
sentence includes the date, time, latitude, longitude, speed, and
satellite strength." [Emphasis added] [sic]. Clearly, the GPS
sentence is a field that identifies the field as a report, since
latitude and longitude information is included in that field.
(Ans. 18-19, emphasis in original.)
Appellants have not persuaded us that the Examiner erred. Moreover,
we observe that the NMEA 0183 standard has a type of message field (see
NMEA 0183 standard, version 3.01 (Jan. 1, 2002)) and it would have been
obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art that the GPS sentences would
contain a report type field that identifies the GPS sentence as a geolocation
report since it contains geolocation information.
For the foregoing reasons, we are not persuaded of Examiner error in
the rejection of claim 9. Thus, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection of
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claim 9, as well as dependent claims 10, 11, and 13, which are not argued
separately. (App. Br. 8.)
Claim 14 contains many limitations similar to claim 1 but further
recites that "the requesting entity is a non-idle mobile AT without a
geographical map database." (App. Br 15.) The Examiner points to many
of the same portions in Myr and Doherty for support. (Final Act. 2--4, 5-7.)
Appellants also make similar arguments but further contend that "the
Examiner has not addressed the claimed aspect that the requesting entity is a
non-idle mobile AT without a geographical map database" because the cited
paragraphs at most teach that "the mapping of the idle AT is performed by
Doherty by a server computer ... and then the mapped geographical
location is delivered to a user device." (App. Br. 8-9; Reply 8-9.) The
Examiner disagrees and states that "as outlined above, the mapping is done
by the server computer, rather than any of the computing devices (which
may be mobile computing devices) that users log into to request the mapped
information (making them non-idle access terminals)." (Ans. 20.)
Appellants have not persuaded us that the Examiner erred and we
agree with the Examiner's findings regarding this claim for the reasons
stated by the Examiner. Thus, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection of
claim 14, as well as dependent claims 16, 17, 20, and 21, which are not
argued separately. (App. Br. 9.)
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Claim 19
Claim 19 is similar to claim 14 but recites that "the requesting entity is
a non-idle mobile AT with a geographical map database." (Emphasis added.)
The Examiner finds that:
Neither Myr nor Doherty et al. expressly discloses that the
requesting entity is a non-idle mobile AT with a geographical
map database.
Kaplan discloses that a requesting entity is a non-idle
mobile AT with a geographical map database (an end user's
computing platform, which requests certain functions from a
navigation services provider, has a geographic database installed
locally, for the purposes of map display, according to [0071 ]).
(Final Act. 12-13, emphasis added.) Appellants, however, contend that:
Kaplan relates to providing information to an end-user device
for the purpose of navigation via the end-user device. Thus,
providing geolocation information related from an idle device to
the end-user device of Kaplan would not result in the claimed
innovation.
(ii .. pp. Br. 9-10, emphasis added; Reply 10.) The Examiner responds that
Kaplan "is only relied on for disclosing a non-idle AT that has a
geographical map database." (Ans. 20.) Appellants have not persuaded us
that the Examiner erred.
Appellants further contend that "there is no motivation in any of the
cited references to provide an idle mobile device's geolocation information
to an end-user device such as Kaplan's to solve any problem disclosed in the
cited references." (App. Br. 10; Reply 10.) The Examiner disagrees and
states that
The fact that Kaplan [] relates to mobile device navigation, and
the instant invention relates to tracking the movements of an idle
device, is not relevant, since both inventions relate to mobile
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device position determination, and [] only one specific feature
from the former is used to modify the primary and tertiary
references.
(Ans. 20-21.) Appellants have not persuaded us that the Examiner erred.
We find that the Examiner has articulated a reasoning with a rational
underpinning for why a person of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the
invention would combine the references. (Final Act. 15; Ans. 28-31.) See
KSR Int'! Co., v. Teleflex, Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 415, 418 (2007). We agree
with the Examiner's finding that "[o]ne of ordinary skill in the art would
have been motivated to make this modification in order to [make sure that]
some navigation services are available even when a user is outside of a
wireless coverage area." (Ans. 13.) Furthermore, the rationale for
combining or modifying the prior art need not be in the cited references, as
Appellants contend, rather, it "may be found in any number of sources,
including common knowledge, the prior art as a whole, or the nature of the
problem itself." Dystar Textilfarben GmbH & Co. Deutschland KG v. C.H.
Patrick Co., 464 F.3d 1356, 1361 (Fed. Cir. 2006).
For the foregoing reasons, we are not persuaded of Examiner error in
the rejection of claim 19. Thus, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection of
claim 19.
Claims 3 and 20
Claims 3 and 20 recite the "geolocation request comprises a report-
type field that identifies the request as a geolocation request" (App. Br. 12)
and "the geolocation request [includes] a report-type indicator that identifies
the request as a geolocation request," respectively (App. Br. 17.) For both
claims, the Examiner finds that:
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Neither Myr nor Doherty et al. expressly discloses that the
geolocation request comprises a report-type field that identifies
the request as a geolocation request.
Do et al. disclose that a geolocation request comprises a report-
type field that identifies the request as a geolocation request (a
location request message transmitted to a node includes a report
type field that includes instructions pertaining to the location
response message, thereby identifying itself as a location request
message, according to [0018], [0040], [0128]-[0131]).
(Final Act. 13, emphasis added.) Appellants contend that "Do only
mentions that the report type field indicates whether the message is of a
periodic reception type, a random reception type, or a trigger-event reception
type." (App. Br. 10; Reply 10-11.) The Examiner responds that:
On the contrary, in [0018], Do et al. states: "In this embodiment,
the location request message includes a report type field which
indicates whether to receive the location response message
regularly or irregularly, or indicates whether to receive the
location response message when a particular event is triggered."
[Emphasis added] [sic]. Clearly, the report type field makes
direct reference to location: specifically, a location response
message, along with instructions associated with said response
message. Therefore, the report type field of the location request
message clearly indicates that said message is a request for a
location.
(Ans. 21, emphasis in original.)
Appellants have not persuaded us that the Examiner erred. We
agree with the Examiner's finding that Do teaches or suggests a report
type field that identifies the request as a geolocation request. (Final
Act. 13; Ans. 21.) For example, paragraph 18 of Do states that the
request message contains "a report type field [that] includes a report
type field[,] which indicates whether to receive the location response
message regularly or irregularly." (Do i-f 18.) We agree with the
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Examiner's finding that such a field would "identit1y] the request as a
geolocation request," even though it additionally states whether it
wants the "location response message regularly or irregularly." (Id.)
For the foregoing reasons, we are not persuaded of Examiner error in
the rejection of claims 3 and 20. Thus, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103
rejection of claims 3 and 29.
DECISION
The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1-3, 5-11, 13, 14, 16,
17, and 19-21 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)(l )(iv).
AFFIRMED
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