MAVENIR SYSTEMS, INC.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Nov 19, 2021

2020005813 (P.T.A.B. Nov. 19, 2021)

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.
15/299,714 10/21/2016 Nishi Kant 0012281USU/4823 1018
27623 7590 11/19/2021
OHLANDT, GREELEY, RUGGIERO & PERLE, LLP
ONE LANDMARK SQUARE, 10TH FLOOR
STAMFORD, CT 06901
EXAMINER
SALMAN, RAIED A
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2495
MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE
11/19/2021 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 NISHI KANT
________________

Appeal 2020-005813
Application 15/299,714
Technology Center 2400
____________

Before JAMES R. HUGHES, JOYCE CRAIG, and
MATTHEW J. McNEILL, Administrative Patent Judges.

McNEILL, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s final
rejection of claims 1‒24, which are all the claims pending in this
application.1 We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.

1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in
37 C.F.R. § 1.42. Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Mavenir
Systems, Inc. Appeal Br. 2.
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellant’s application addresses a problem with mobile networks in
which “a user Internet Protocol (IP) packet from a mobile device first goes
to radio towers,” then “to a servicing gateway (S-GW),” and then “to a
packet data network (PDN) gateway (P-GW) before being sent to its
destination.” Spec. ¶ 5. The application observes that “mobile data traffic
must be brought to a carrier managed P-GW, irrespective of desired
destination,” and “[a]s mobile traffic continues to grow, data is forced
through unnecessary paths and hops, leading to inefficiency.” Id. As a
solution, the application proposes using a “Lite P-GW close to the location
of the requesting UE [user equipment]” that “will forward communications
to the nearest endpoint providing the requested service or function,” thus
“avoiding requiring using a dedicated P-GW in a remote network.” Id. ¶ 10.
Claim 1 illustrates the appealed subject matter and reads as follows:
1. A method of operating a mobile communication
network, comprising:
receiving, at a serving gateway (S-GW), a request from a
user equipment (UE) to access a network resource;
preparing, at the S-GW, in response to the received
request, an augmented domain name server (DNS) request, the
augmentation indicating a predefined function of the request;
providing, by the S-GW, the augmented DNS request to a
public DNS located on a public network;
receiving, at the S-GW, from the public DNS an Internet
Protocol (IP) address of a closest packet data network (PDN)
gateway (P-GW) to the UE based on the augmented DNS
request; and
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connecting, by the S-GW, to the P-GW at the received IP
address, to develop a flow path from the UE to the S-GW to the
closest P-GW.
The Examiner’s Rejections
Claims 1–3, 8–10, 15–17, and 24 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103
as being unpatentable over Delos Reyes (US 8,554,933 B2; Oct. 8, 2013)
and Tomici (US 2017/0195930 A1; July 6, 2017). Final Act. 8–12.
To the base combination, the Examiner adds Koodli (US
2011/0075675 A1; Mar. 31, 2011) to reject claims 4, 11, and 18 (Final Act.
12–13), Koodli and Stallings (“Cryptography and Network Security:
Principles and Practices,” Nov. 16, 2005) to reject claims 5, 12, and 19
(Final Act. 13‒14), Omar (“APN-FQDN Naming Structure,” Mar. 12, 2013)
to reject claims 6, 7, 13, 14, 20, and 21 (Final Act. 14–16), and Basta
(“Applying NFV and SDN to LTE Mobile Core Gateways; The Functions
Placement Problem,” 2014) to reject claims 22 and 23 (Final Act. 16‒18).
ANALYSIS
Independent Claims 1, 8, and 15
The Examiner finds Delos Reyes and Tomici teach or suggest all the
limitations of claim 1. Final Act. 8‒11. In particular, the Examiner finds
Delos Reyes teaches performing certain claimed steps with a mobility
management entity (MME), rather than a serving gateway (S-GW) as
claimed. Id. at 10–11. The Examiner finds “Tomici teaches that the S-GW
and the MME are integrated,” and thus concludes that “it would have been
obvious to integrate the SGW and MME and thus to use the S-GW to
perform the functions of the MME, for the purpose of minimizing hardware
resources.” Id. at 11 (citing Tomici, Abstract).
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Appellant argues, among other things, that the Examiner errs because
“[t]he term ‘integrated’ in Tomici is used to denote an overall network
including the MME and SGW within the EPC [evolved packet core], but the
functions of the MME (control plane functions) and the SGW (user plane
functions) are clearly maintained by the respective entities, i.e., MME and
the SGW.” Appeal Br. 8. Accordingly, Appellant argues, “Tomici does not
teach or suggest ‘to use the S-GW to perform the functions of the MME.’”
Id.; see also Reply Br. 4–5.
Appellant has persuaded us of Examiner error. Tomici relates to
“systems and methods for inter-system mobility in integrated long term
evolution (LTE) and trusted wireless local area network (WLAN) access
networks (TWAN).” Tomici ¶ 4. In particular,
The MME operates as a common control plane entity for both
LTE and TWAN access, while the SGW operates as a user
plane servicing gateway for both LTE and TWAN access
network. The integrated MME and SGW allow for user
equipment (UE) to access the capabilities of a 3GPP packet data
network (PDN) through either the LTE or TWAN access
network.
Id. Here, Tomici’s use of the word “integrated” does not relate to a physical
combination of the MME and SGW. Nor does it suggest using either the
MME or the SGW to perform the functions of the other. Rather, Tomici
describes an “inter-system integration of cellular and WiFi networks.” Id.
¶ 3. It is thus clear from Tomici’s disclosure that the MME and SGW are
“integrated” with two networks, and not with each other. This “allow[s] for
user equipment (UE) to access the capabilities of a packet data network
(PDN) through either the LTE access network or TWAN.” Id., Abstract.
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Accordingly, we are constrained by the record to agree with Appellant
that the Examiner fails to sufficiently establish that Delos Reyes and Tomici
teach or suggest a serving gateway (S-GW) performing the recited steps in
claim 1. We do not comment on the persuasiveness of Appellant’s
arguments relating to other aspects of claim 1 with respect to the prior art.
See Beloit Corp. v. Valmet Oy, 742 F.2d 1421, 1423 (Fed. Cir. 1984)
(finding an administrative agency is at liberty to reach a decision based on “a
single dispositive issue”).
For these reasons, we do not sustain the Examiner’s obviousness
rejection of independent claim 1. We also do not sustain the Examiner’s
obviousness rejection of independent claims 8 and 15, which recite
commensurate subject matter.
Dependent Claims
Claims 2–7, 9–14, and 16–24 depend from independent claims 1, 8,
and 15, respectively. The Examiner does not find that any of the additional
references cure the deficiencies identified above with respect to the
independent claims. Accordingly, we do not sustain the obviousness
rejections of dependent claims 2–7, 9–14, and 16–24 for the same reasons.
DECISION SUMMARY
In summary:

Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–3, 8–10,
15–17, 24
103 Delos Reyes, Tomici 1–3, 8–10,
15–17, 24
4, 11, 18 103 Delos Reyes, Tomici,
Koodli
4, 11, 18
5, 12, 19 103 Delos Reyes, Tomici, 5, 12, 19
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Koodli, Stallings
6, 7, 13,
14, 20, 21
103 Delos Reyes, Tomici,
Omar
6, 7, 13,
14, 20, 21
22, 23 103 Delos Reyes, Tomici,
Basta
22, 23
Overall
Outcome
1‒24

REVERSED