MAVENIR SYSTEMS, INC.

Patent Trials and Appeals BoardNov 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. Appeal 2020-005813 Application 15/299,714 2 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 Appeal 2020-005813 Application 15/299,714 3 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). Appeal 2020-005813 Application 15/299,714 4 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. Appeal 2020-005813 Application 15/299,714 5 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 Appeal 2020-005813 Application 15/299,714 6 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