Patent 10020919

Prior art

Earlier patents, publications, and products that may anticipate or render the claims unpatentable.

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Prior art

Earlier patents, publications, and products that may anticipate or render the claims unpatentable.

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Analysis of Prior Art Cited in U.S. Patent 10,020,919

Under 35 U.S.C. § 102, a person shall be entitled to a patent unless the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention. The priority date for US Patent 10,020,919 is October 12, 2015. Therefore, any reference published or filed before this date could potentially be considered prior art.

The following analysis details the prior art references cited by the examiner during the prosecution of the patent application.

U.S. Patent Documents

  1. US Patent 9,674,833 B2

    • Publication Date: June 6, 2017 (Filed: April 1, 2015)
    • Assignee: Intel IP Corporation
    • Description: This patent, titled "Apparatus and method for multi-user uplink access," describes a method for an access point (AP) to transmit a trigger frame to multiple stations (STAs) to solicit uplink multi-user transmissions. The trigger frame includes resource unit allocation information. This is relevant to the coordination of multi-user transmissions, a key aspect of the '919 patent.
    • Potential Anticipation: This reference is pertinent to independent claims 10 and 15 of the '919 patent, which detail methods for soliciting and receiving Channel State Information (CSI) feedback in a multi-user context. Specifically, the '833 patent's disclosure of a trigger frame for resource allocation in uplink multi-user scenarios shares conceptual ground with the '919 patent's use of a trigger frame to coordinate CSI feedback from multiple stations after an NDPA/NDP exchange. However, the '919 patent's claims specify a two-pronged approach based on the number of stations in the NDPA, which may differentiate it from the teachings of this reference.

  2. US Patent 9,848,401 B2

    • Publication Date: December 19, 2017 (Filed: October 30, 2015)
    • Assignee: Qualcomm Incorporated
    • Description: Titled "Sounding feedback for single-user and multi-user transmissions," this patent focuses on methods for a station to provide channel state feedback. It discloses procedures for both single-user and multi-user feedback. For multi-user feedback, it describes a station receiving a trigger from an AP and transmitting its feedback on an assigned uplink resource.
    • Potential Anticipation: With a filing date after the '919 patent's priority date, this reference is not prior art under 35 U.S.C. § 102.

  3. US Patent 10,237,929 B2

    • Publication Date: March 19, 2019 (Filed: April 1, 2015)
    • Assignee: Intel IP Corporation
    • Description: This patent, a continuation of the technology in US 9,674,833, also titled "Apparatus and method for multi-user uplink access," further details the use of trigger frames for soliciting uplink OFDMA transmissions from multiple stations.
    • Potential Anticipation: This reference shares the same filing date as US 9,674,833 and is therefore relevant prior art. It strengthens the concepts disclosed in the '833 patent concerning trigger frames for MU uplink transmissions. As with the '833 patent, this reference is relevant to claims 10 and 15. The core inventive step of the '919 patent appears to be the conditional use of the trigger frame based on the number of STAs in the NDPA, which may not be explicitly taught in this reference.

  4. US Patent Application Publication 2014/0286307 A1

    • Publication Date: September 25, 2014
    • Assignee: Qualcomm Incorporated
    • Description: Titled "MU-MIMO SOUNDING WITH TRIGGERED FEEDBACK," this application describes a sounding procedure where an AP sends a sounding announcement frame (similar to an NDPA) followed by a sounding packet (like an NDP). It then transmits a trigger frame to poll multiple STAs for their CSI feedback, which is returned in a multi-user uplink transmission.
    • Potential Anticipation: This is a highly relevant prior art reference for claims 10 and 15. It discloses a sequence of NDPA, NDP, and a trigger frame to elicit multi-user CSI feedback. The key distinction for the '919 patent would be whether this reference teaches the alternative path where, if only one station is in the announcement frame, feedback is sent immediately after the NDP without a trigger frame. If the '307 application only describes the triggered multi-user case, then claims 10 and 15 of the '919 patent might be considered novel.

  5. US Patent Application Publication 2015/0319730 A1

    • Publication Date: November 5, 2015 (Filed: April 29, 2015)
    • Assignee: LG Electronics Inc.
    • Description: This publication, titled "Method for transmitting and receiving downlink data in wireless LAN system and apparatus therefor," discusses a method where an AP transmits a trigger frame to schedule uplink multi-user transmissions from several STAs. The trigger frame contains information specifying the resources each STA should use.
    • Potential Anticipation: This reference is relevant to the general concept of using a trigger frame to manage multi-user uplink communications, as recited in claims 10 and 15. However, its relevance as anticipating prior art would depend on whether it discloses the specific conditional logic for sending CSI feedback based on the number of users in an NDPA frame.

  6. US Patent Application Publication 2017/0034789 A1

    • Publication Date: February 2, 2017 (Filed: July 28, 2016)
    • Assignee: LG Electronics Inc.
    • Description: Titled "Method for performing uplink transmission in wireless LAN system and device for supporting same," this application describes a station receiving a trigger frame from an AP and performing an uplink multi-user transmission in response.
    • Potential Anticipation: With a filing date well after the '919 patent's priority date, this is not prior art.

  7. US Patent Application Publication 2017/0111195 A1

    • Publication Date: April 20, 2017 (Filed: October 14, 2016)
    • Assignee: Mediatek Inc.
    • Description: This application, "Uplink Multi-User Transmission with Unified Trigger Frame," discusses the use of a unified trigger frame to initiate various types of uplink multi-user responses, including data, acknowledgments, and channel feedback.
    • Potential Anticipation: This is not prior art, as its filing date is after the priority date of the '919 patent.

Foreign Patent Documents

No foreign patent documents were cited by the examiner during the prosecution of this patent.

Non-Patent Literature

No non-patent literature was cited by the examiner.

Summary of Prior Art Analysis

The most relevant prior art appears to be US 2014/0286307 A1, which discloses a multi-user sounding procedure involving an announcement frame, a sounding packet, and a subsequent trigger frame for coordinated CSI feedback. The patentability of claims 10 and 15 of US 10,020,919 likely hinges on the novel element of a conditional procedure: transmitting feedback immediately for a single user versus sending a trigger frame for multiple users. If the '307 application does not explicitly teach this single-user alternative, the claims of the '919 patent would not be anticipated.

Regarding independent claim 1, none of the cited references appear to directly address the specific method of deriving a second scrambling sequence for a CTS frame as a cyclic shift of the first scrambling sequence from a received MU-RTS frame. This claim, which focuses on enabling RF-combining of CTS responses, seems to be a distinct inventive concept not clearly taught by the cited prior art.

Generated 5/5/2026, 11:05:02 PM