Ex Parte Martin et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jun 22, 2017

14053859 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 22, 2017)

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.
14/053,859 10/15/2013 Douglas R. Martin 83396647(65080-1103) 1084
7590 06/26/2017
Bejin Bieneman PLC
Ford Global Technologies, LLC
300 River Place
Suite 1650
Detroit, MI 48207
EXAMINER
RAMESH, KRISHNAN
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
3668
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
06/26/2017 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):
docket @ b2iplaw .com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte DOUGLAS R. MARTIN
and KENNETH J. MILLER1
Appeal 2017-001724
Application 14/053,859
Technology Center 3600
Before MICHAEL J. STRAUSS, LARRY J. HUME, and
AARON W. MOORE, Administrative Patent Judges.
MOORE, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
1 This paper is captioned by inventor name according to our pre-AIA
convention. The AIA Applicant/Appellant is Ford Global Technologies,
LLC. Appellant identifies Ford Motor Company as the real party in interest.
(See App. Br. 3.)
Appeal 2017-001724
Application 14/053,859
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a Final Rejection of
claims 1, 3—14, and 16—20, which are all of the pending claims. We have
jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
THE INVENTION
The instant application is directed to “vehicle location and tracking.”
(Spec. 12.) Claim 1, reproduced below, exemplifies the subject matter on
appeal:
1. A system, comprising a computer server that includes a
processor and a memory, the memory storing instructions
executable by the processor such that the server is configured to:
receive an aerial image;
identify a portion of the aerial image that represents an area
of interest that includes a vehicle;
analyze the portion of the aerial image to generate an
identification of one or more objects in the area of interest related
to a route of the vehicle;
receive a request for navigational assistance from the vehicle,
wherein the request identifies the vehicle; and
transmit to the vehicle, in response to the request and based at
least in part on the identification of the one or more objects, one
or more instructions to navigate.
THE REFERENCE AND THE REJECTION
Claims 1, 3—14, and 16—20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 102(a)(2)
as anticipated by Zych (US 2014/0257621 Al; published Sept. 11, 2014).
(See Final Act. 3—11.)
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Appeal 2017-001724
Application 14/053,859
ANALYSIS
Claims 1, 3, 4, 6—12,14,16,17,19, and 20
Appellant argues Zych does not anticipate claim 1 because it does not
disclose “[receiving] a request for navigational assistance from the vehicle,
wherein the request identifies the vehicle” or “[transmitting] to the vehicle,
in response to the request and based at least in part on the identification of
the one or more objects, one or more instructions to navigate.” (App. Br. 7.)
Appellant also argues claim 14 is not anticipated because it “includes similar
recitations.” (Id.)
The Examiner finds Zych to teach these limitations because it
describes a vison system 104 that includes a processing circuit and describes
in paragraph 49 how “[i]n some embodiments, processing circuit 902 may
represent a collection of processing devices (e.g., servers, data centers,
etc.).” (Final Act. 4—5.) The Examiner finds this to disclose that “some or
all of the processing may be performed outside of the vehicle.” (Ans. 3,
emphasis added.) Appellants do not contest the Examiner’s finding that
Zych discloses “all” of the processing being outside the vehicle.
We agree that where all of the processing is performed outside the
vehicle, the server (because it is located outside of the vehicle) would
“receive a request for navigational assistance from the vehicle” and
“transmit to the vehicle, in response to the request and based at least in part
on the identification of the one or more objects, one or more instructions to
navigate.” Appellant’s arguments regarding these limitations are
unpersuasive because they are premised on the idea that some of the
processing occurs in the vehicle. That is not the case where, as the
Examiner found, “all of the processing may be performed outside of the
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Appeal 2017-001724
Application 14/053,859
vehicle.” (Ans. 3.) Appellant’s resort to the Specification is unavailing
because, as explained above, Zych does in fact describe “a computing device
that is a distinct element in addition to the vehicle.” (App. Br. 8.)
Appellants also argue Zych fails to describe that “the request
identifies the vehicle.” (App. Br. 8—9.) The Examiner finds this in
paragraph 92 of the reference, which explains that the “route determination
process 1100 may be initiated when a request for a vehicle route is received
by the vision system” and “[t]he request for the route may include the
starting location (which may be the current vehicle location or a different
location) and a target location (e.g., a destination).” (Ans. 4.) The Examiner
finds “[t]he current, starting, and target locations are all aspects which
identify the vehicle in some regard.” (Ans. 5.) We agree that, under the
broadest reasonable interpretation of the claim language,2 the Zych request
does “identify the vehicle” as, for example, a vehicle currently at the starting
location. We also observe that, as one of skill in the art would appreciate, a
request sent to a remote system would need to include some identifying
information in order for the results of the remote processing to be returned to
the requester.
Because we find Appellant’s arguments unpersuasive, we sustain the
Section 102 rejection of (a) independent claims 1 and 14, which are argued
together, (b) independent claim 9, which is argued to be patentable “for the
same reasons,” and (c) dependent claims 3, 4, 6—8, 10-12, 16, 17, 19, and
20, for which no additional arguments are offered.
2 See In re American Academy of Science Tech Center, 367 F.3d 1359, 1364
(Fed. Cir. 2004).
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Appeal 2017-001724
Application 14/053,859
Dependent Claims 5,13, and 18
Claim 5 adds to claim 1 that “the vehicle includes a computer that is
configured to generate an autonomous driving instruction based at least in
part on at least one of the identification of one or more objects by the server
and a second identification of one or more objects by the computer.” The
Examiner finds the claimed “computer” in Zych’s “vehicle control system
944 [which] is an autonomous or semi-autonomous vehicle control system.”
(Final Act. 6; Ans. 8 (“Examiner notes that. . . the ‘vehicle control system’
is its own, separate computer.”).)
We agree with the Examiner. The claim requires only that the
computer generate an autonomous driving instruction based in part on “at
least one of (i) identification of objects by the server and (ii) identification
of objects by the computer. In Zych, when all of the processing is being
performed outside the vehicle, vehicle control system 944 generates the
autonomous driving instructions based at least in part on the identification of
one or more objects by the server. (See Zych | 67 (“Vision system 104 may
be coupled to vehicle control system 944, which may control general vehicle
operation.”).) Appellant’s argument that “Zych does not disclose both of the
vision system 104 and vehicle control system 944 recognizing objects”
(Reply Br. 4) is not commensurate with the scope of the claims, which only
require identification of objects by one of the server and computer.
Because we find Appellant’s argument unpersuasive, we sustain the
Section 102 rejection of claims 5, 13, and 18, which are argued together.
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Appeal 2017-001724
Application 14/053,859
DECISION
The rejections of claims 1, 3—14, and 16—20 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)(l)(iv). See 37
C.F.R. § 41.50(f).
AFFIRMED
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