US 11879924

I'll search for litigation and docket information on this specific patent, then reconcile with the authoritative full text provided.

Let me run additional targeted searches for litigation and CAFC docket activity.

Let me pull the independent claim text to ground the claim summary.

US Patent 11,879,924 (US11879924B2) — Analyst Summary

Scope note / search outcome: I searched for this specific number and for litigation/docket activity. I found no USPTO litigation proceeding and no Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit 2026 docket involving US 11,879,924. The Keysight-related CAFC activity in 2026 (e.g., Centripetal Networks, LLC v. Keysight Technologies, Inc., Nos. 24-1406, 24-1930, 24-2246, 25-1053) concerns different patents — U.S. 10,193,917 and 11,012,474 (network-threat detection) — not this antenna-test patent. Anything on that topic should not be attributed to 11,879,924.

Bibliographic data (from the authoritative full text; corroborated by Justia)

Abstract (as issued)

A system and method determine at least one of EIRP or EIS of an AUT in a test chamber, the AUT including an antenna array whose array phase center is offset from the center of the chamber's quiet zone. The method performs a local beam peak direction scan of the AUT antenna pattern using a probe antenna at laterally offset positions at a near-field distance to determine a beam peak direction; performs EIRP/EIS near-field measurements in that beam peak direction using the probe antenna at near-field distances in a radial direction; derives a far-field equivalent of the near-field measurement along the beam peak direction; and derives the beam peak direction of the AUT.

Plain-language overview of the independent claims

I confirmed three independent claims from the claim text surfaced in search; treat numbers/scope of claim 12 with slight caution since I have its dependent context (claim 13) but not its full verbatim preamble.

• Claim 1 — Lateral-scan / radial-distance method (unknown offset, black-box). A method for determining EIRP and/or EIS of an AUT in a test chamber where the array phase center is offset (unknown) from the quiet-zone center. Steps: (a) do a local beam peak direction scan with the probe antenna at several laterally offset positions at a fixed near-field distance and pick the beam peak direction by comparing results (highest EIRP / lowest EIS); (b) measure EIRP/EIS at multiple radial near-field distances along that beam peak direction, where adjacent distances differ by known intervals (Δd₁, Δd₂); (c) model far-field EIRP as an integral of a power-vs-distance derivative approximated as a·d⁻² + Δ(d), yielding Equations (1)–(5); and (d) simultaneously solve for the three unknowns — the first distance d₁, expansion coefficient a, and EIRP(d_f) (or EIS(d_f)) — to get the far-field equivalent and identify the array's offset location (lateral offset + radial offset).

• Claim 8 — Rotational peak-search method with compensation (unknown offset). A method including: performing local beam peak direction scans to measure antenna patterns using a probe antenna at multiple near-field radii from the quiet-zone center (probe pattern known); determining the actual offset of the array phase center from those measured patterns; compensating the measured patterns for probe-gain and path-loss differences at the several radii to produce compensated patterns; deriving beam peak directions from the compensated patterns; and deriving the far-field equivalent of EIRP/EIS in those derived directions.

• Claim 12 — Known-offset variant (gray-box), per dependent claim 13 context. Claim 13 ("The method of claim 12…") recites linear fitting on the array phase center offset location and beam peaks of the compensated AUT patterns, which maps to the specification's known-offset / "gray box" embodiment (FIGS. 15–16) that uses a known array offset and only two radii/equations. I flag mild uncertainty: I did not retrieve the full verbatim text of claim 12, so its exact preamble (method vs. system) and the recitation of the known offset are inferred from that dependent claim and the specification rather than quoted.

Notable dependent-claim features

• Claim 9: iterative "loop" procedure — assume an offset, compensate, estimate the offset, compute the deviation (Δx), and select the assumed offset with the minimum deviation as the actual offset (specification's zero-crossing-point grid search, FIG. 13).
• Claim 10: compensation detail — include-angle between probe boresight and the path to the array phase center; actual probe gain (opposite number used as compensation curve); path-loss ratio of probe-to-array distance over probe-to-quiet-zone-center radius.
• Claim 11: determine the estimated array offset by linear fitting the beam peaks at each radius and taking the intersection of the fitting line with the AUT plane.

Technical context (brief, building on the full text)

The patent's problem statement is black-box OTA testing of mmWave/5G devices: when a DUT's geometric center is aligned to the quiet-zone center, an edge-mounted AUT's array phase center is offset by an unknown amount, corrupting EIRP/EIS/TRP/TIS/EVM and beam selection in near-field chambers. Prior approaches (direct far-field, indirect far-field, and 3D near-field scanning with near-field-to-far-field transforms) are described as bulky, lossy, and/or slow. The disclosure also covers beam-lock embodiments (FIGS. 3A–4) where a far-field probe establishes and locks the best beam so that near-field measurements evaluate the same beam, and rotational peak-search embodiments (FIGS. 9–14) that avoid a lateral positioner.

Uncertainty statement

• I have no authoritative record of any patent litigation, USPTO proceeding (IPR/PGR), or CAFC appeal involving US 11,879,924. The 2026 CAFC dockets involving Keysight concern unrelated Centripetal Networks patents.
• Claim 12's exact verbatim text was not retrieved; its characterization above is an inference from dependent claim 13 and the specification's known-offset embodiment.
• Legal status ("Active"), assignee listing, and expiration date are as reported by Google Patents and are assumptions, not legal conclusions.

I'll search for litigation involving US patent 11879924.

Let me search litigation-specific databases.

Litigation Search Results: US Patent 11,879,924

No litigation involving US Patent 11,879,924 was found in the sources searched.

What the patent is

Before reporting the null result, it's worth confirming the asset was identified literally and correctly:

Litigation findings

Searching for the patent number — both as "11879924" and "11,879,924" — returned only patent-documentation and analytics sources (Google Patents, Justia Patents, Golden wiki mirror, Patent Leaderboard), plus unrelated results. Specifically:

• No district court complaints naming US 11,879,924 were surfaced.
• No CAFC appeals naming US 11,879,924 were surfaced.
• No PTAB proceedings (IPR/PGR) against US 11,879,924 were surfaced. Note that PTAB activity is not "litigation" in the strict sense, but it is often run in parallel with infringement suits; none was found for this patent either.
• No ITC Section 337 investigations naming US 11,879,924 were surfaced.

Cases that appeared but are NOT this patent

Several Keysight-related matters surfaced in searches and should be explicitly excluded as non-responsive:

1. Centripetal Networks, Inc. v. Keysight Technologies, Inc. — filed January 1, 2022 in the Eastern District of Virginia (per Keysight's Form 10-K). This concerns network-security technology, not antenna measurement. The European parallel proceedings (CC_62952/2024, filed 2024‑12‑03; UPC_CFI_729/2024, filed 2024‑12‑03) are likewise the Centripetal/Keysight network-security dispute.
2. Keysight – APP_15688/2025 (filed 2025‑04‑02) and APP_34668/2025 (filed 2025‑08‑12), listed on the GreyB/IPVerse UPC tracker — these are UPC application proceedings involving Keysight Deutschland GmbH, unrelated to US 11,879,924.
3. Various unrelated search artifacts (a True Return Systems v. Compound blockchain complaint, an Abbott/Cordis interference brief, etc.) that merely co-occurred with the query terms.

None of these reference US 11,879,924 or any of its claims.

Important qualifications

I want to be precise about the limits of this answer rather than imply more certainty than I have:

• I was unable to directly query the specific databases you named. I could not pull live results from the Unified Patents litigation caselist (portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/caselist), PACER, or the CAFC docket. Where a source did not return content, I am reporting absence of search-surfaced evidence, not a certified negative across those systems.
• A null result is not proof no suit exists. Complaints filed in the last several months may not yet be indexed by the sources reachable here, and a case that settles or is voluntarily dismissed very early can leave a thin public footprint.
• Timing context lowers the expected hit rate. The patent issued 2024‑01‑23 (roughly two years ago as of today's stated date). Assertion campaigns frequently begin later than that, and a patent this young with no visible enforcement history is unremarkable.
• My search was also step-limited, so I was not able to iterate through every secondary aggregator.

Recommended verification steps

To convert this into a defensible negative clearance, check these directly:

1. Unified Patents litigation portal — search the patent number in the caselist tool.
2. PACER / CourtListener RECAP — docket-text search for "11,879,924."
3. Docket Navigator or Lex Machina — patent-level case lookup (these will catch complaints filed in the last 90 days that free sources miss).
4. USPTO PTAB (Patent Trial and Appeal Board End-to-End / PTAB Center) — search for the patent number to rule out IPR/PGR.
5. USITC EDIS — rule out Section 337 investigations.

Bottom line: Based on the sources I was able to search, there is no known litigation involving US Patent 11,879,924 — no plaintiff, defendant, jurisdiction, docket number, filing date, or outcome can be reported because no case referencing this patent number was located. The only Keysight enforcement activity that surfaced concerns unrelated network-security patents (Centripetal Networks) and unrelated UPC matters. If you need a court-certified negative, run the patent number through PACER, Docket Navigator, and the Unified Patents portal directly.

I'll verify the canonical "no proceedings" signal with targeted searches before writing up.

No relevant hits. Let me run a couple more targeted checks (patent-specific and litigation context) to be sure nothing is hiding.

Let me check the most likely petitioner candidates and any defensive-aggregator activity, since a competitor like Rohde & Schwarz or Unified Patents would be the natural challenger.

Proceedings overview

Zero AIA trial proceedings are on file for US 11,879,924. The USPTO Open Data Portal canonical list — reproduced in the structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block — returns no IPRs, PGRs, or CBMs, and my independent web searches surfaced nothing to contradict that: no petitions, no institution decisions, no FWDs, no appellate dockets naming this patent. Bottom line for a defendant: there is no PTAB kill shot to inherit and no estoppel to leverage — the patent stands untested, but it is also unhardened, meaning every invalidity ground remains open to you and no petitioner has yet burned the Board's goodwill on art that you would otherwise be free to use.

Because there is no proceeding to walk through, the per-proceeding template is not populated; instead I document the verification and the implications.

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No proceeding — verification record

• Type: N/A
• Filed: N/A
• Status: No AIA trial proceeding on file (verbatim: "The USPTO ODP API returns no AIA trial proceedings for this patent as of the most recent ingest.")
• Judge panel: None assigned — no panel exists absent an instituted trial.
• Petition grounds: None. No § 102/§ 103/§ 112 challenge has been lodged.
• Institution decision: None.
• Final Written Decision: None. No claim of US 11,879,924 has ever been canceled, confirmed, or adjudicated by the PTAB.
• Settlement / termination: N/A.
• Appeal: None. I found no Federal Circuit docket (Fed. Cir. or CourtListener) involving an appeal from a PTAB decision on this patent.
• Defensive value: The patent is a clean slate — untested, un-narrowed, and un-estopped. You lose the "claims already canceled" short cut, but you gain full freedom in choosing art and forum. Related context worth noting: the assignee (Keysight Technologies) is a serial IPR filer as a petitioner, not a PTAB target — e.g., Keysight's petition in Keysight Technologies, Inc. v. Centripetal Networks, Inc. (Director vacatur/remand reported 2023-08-24). That is a different patent and a different posture; it does not bear on 11,879,924's validity.

Search caveat: My checks (patent-number queries, application-number queries, "PTAB"/"IPR"/"PGR" combinations, and named-competitor/aggregator queries) are not a substitute for a live PTAB E2E docket pull. PTAB filings are indexed with a lag and are sometimes discoverable only by party name. Treat "no activity" as the strongly supported default, not a certified negative. The absence is meaningful: well-asserted patents reliably attract IPRs, and the fact that none exists here suggests 11,879,924 is not currently the subject of a significant assertion campaign (or, if it is, that defendants have not yet moved).

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Strategic summary

Claim status. All claims are UNTESTED — none canceled, none confirmed, none narrowed by adverse judgment or disclaimer on the PTAB record. From the public prosecution record the patent carries at least claims 1–11 (claim 8 is an independent method claim; claims 9, 10, and 11 depend from 8, with claim 9 reciting the loop-procedure array-offset estimation, claim 10 reciting the included-angle/probe-gain/path-loss-ratio compensation, and claim 11 reciting the linear-fitting-on-multiple-beam-peaks step). Because no IPR has run, there is no cancellation-benefit analysis available — any invalidity position must be built from scratch rather than cited from a prior FWD.

Estoppel landscape. There is no § 315(e)(2) estoppel against anyone. No petitioner has obtained a final written decision, so no party or privy is barred from raising § 102/§ 103 grounds in district court or the ITC. Equally, you face no residual estoppel from a prior petition (no § 315(e)(1) Office bar either). Practically, the entire universe of patents-and-printed-publications prior art is available to you — and, unlike a post-IPR defendant, you can also raise § 101 and § 112 defenses in a PGR-style framing if you are within a PGR window, or in litigation regardless.

Timing signals. The patent issued 2024-01-23. That means the PGR window under 35 U.S.C. § 321(c) closed on 2024-10-23 — post-grant review on § 101/§ 112/§ 102/§ 103 grounds is no longer available. IPR, by contrast, remains open indefinitely (one-year § 315(b) clock only if and when the patent owner serves an infringement complaint). There is no defensive aggregator (Unified Patents, RPX, etc.) visible in the chain on this patent, and no evidence of same-petitioner serial filings.

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Recommended next steps

• No PTAB activity exists — say so plainly. There is no FWD to link to, no disposition to quote, and no canceled claim to hand a plaintiff. Do not let an adversary imply otherwise: with zero AIA trials, no claim of 11,879,924 has been invalidated at the Board, so a demand letter citing claims 1–11 is not automatically sanction-bait — you would have to invalidate those claims yourself.
• If a complaint has been served on you, your § 315(b) one-year window to file an IPR has started. Commission an FTO/invalidity search now with an eye toward the two independent claim families — the lateral-scan/radial-measurement method (claim 1 family) and the compensated-antenna-pattern method (claim 8 family) — since a single well-built petition targeting both independents gives you the best leverage.
• Weigh the venue-strategy. Because there is no prior petition, you are not estopped, and you are also not competing with an existing petitioner's art. If you intend to rely on the same art in court, consider whether an IPR is even necessary, or whether a stay-and-litigate posture better preserves your § 101/§ 112 defenses that an IPR (limited to § 102/§ 103 on patents and printed publications) could not reach.
• Confirm the negative. Before relying on this memo, pull the live PTAB E2E docket by patent number and by assignee (Keysight Technologies) and re-run a CourtListener docket check for any CAFC appeal naming 11,879,924. If a petition was filed within the last ~90 days it may simply not be in the ODP ingest yet. Any newly surfaced proceeding number should be verified against the source before it is cited, and I have deliberately declined to invent one.

I'll research the assignment record for US 11,879,924. Let me run targeted searches.

Let me try more targeted searches on the assignment records and inventor/assignee details.

US Patent 11,879,924 — Ownership / Assignment Reconstruction

Source limitation up front: I hit my web-search budget before I could open the USPTO Assignment Center display page for this patent. The one assignment I can confirm comes from the Google Patents legal-events panel embedded in the authoritative full text ("2020-11-30 — Assigned to KEYSIGHT TECHNOLOGIES, INC. — ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST — Assignors: CAO, LI; JING, YA; WEN, Zhu; HERTEL, THORSTEN"). That panel does not expose the reel/frame or the correspondent of record. I could not retrieve the reel/frame number or the filing attorney/agent name for that recording, and I found no evidence of any second recording. Treat the absence of a reel/frame below as a retrieval gap, not as a statement that the record is unindexed. Verify directly at the Assignment Center (search "11879924" or app. 17/059,572).

Inventors

Pattern notes (and one caveat):

• All four inventors assigned their rights to the same original assignee on a single recorded instrument dated ~5 weeks after filing — the ordinary "employee inventors assign to employer" pattern. No evidence any inventor departed the assignee within 12 months of filing; I found no record of such departures and did not independently verify employment histories.
• Name-collision caveat: a third-party leaderboard (patentleaderboard.com) lists a "Li Cao" with 20 patents attributed to ZTE alongside 3 "Keysight Technologies" patents, including this one. "Li Cao" is a common name and that page appears to aggregate multiple individuals; I treat the ZTE attribution as a data artifact, not a finding about this inventor. Do not rely on it without corroboration.

Original assignee

Keysight Technologies, Inc. (headquarters listed in the patent record's assignment as Santa Rosa, CA; the corporate HQ is now Santa Rosa, CA). Keysight is an operating, publicly traded company (NYSE: KEYS), spun out of Agilent/HP in 2014. Its primary lines of business are electronic test & measurement equipment and software — network analyzers, signal generators, oscilloscopes, and 5G/mmWave OTA (over-the-air) RF test systems. The claims here read directly on Keysight's own product line: near-field OTA test chambers and the EIRP/EIS methods its instruments execute, so the assignee plausibly ships (and services) products embodying the claims. Current status: operating, not acquired/dissolved/in bankruptcy. No SEC 8-K or 10-K disclosure of a sale or divestiture of this patent was found.

Assignment timeline

Only one recorded assignment is confirmed. No post-issuance assignment, security interest, merger, name change, release, or correction was found.

• 2020-10-22 (execution date not confirmed) / recorded 2020-11-30 — Reel NOT RETRIEVED
  • Conveyance: Assignment of Assignors' Interest (per Google Patents legal events: "ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS' INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS)")
  • Assignor: Zhu Wen; Ya Jing; Li Cao; Thorsten Hertel (all four, jointly)
  • Assignee: KEYSIGHT TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
  • Correspondent: Not retrieved — the Google Patents legal-events panel omits the recording correspondent. I could not confirm the attorney/firm of record, so I cannot run the repeat-correspondent check (Signal 3).
  • Context: Initial employment/ownership assignment — inventors convey rights to their employer shortly after the PCT-national-stage filing; not a fire-sale, reorg, securitization, or transfer-to-asserter.

If the Assignment Center shows no records beyond this one, that is itself the finding: the original operating-company assignee still owns the patent.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 11879924
    2020 : PCT CA 122906 filed Oct 22
         : Inventors assign to Keysight Nov 30
    2023 : Pre-grant pub US 20230258703A1
    2024 : Patent issued Jan 23
         : Still held by Keysight

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — Not present. No assignment to any "IP / Patents / Licensing / Holdings / Ventures" entity is recorded; the sole confirmed assignee is the operating company KEYSIGHT TECHNOLOGIES, INC. (2020-11-30 recording). No single-purpose Delaware/Texas LLC appears.

2. Known asserter in the chain — Not present. Neither the original nor any subsequent assignee matches the Acacia / Marathon / IV / IPNav / Wi-LAN / Conversant / Vringo / Pendrell / Round Rock / Spangenberg families, nor any entity I could surface via Unified Patents or RPX. Current owner is Keysight, which is not an NPE.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — Unclear (retrieval gap). Only one link exists, and I could not retrieve its correspondent, so there is no recurrence to measure. A single appearance would not be a finding in any case; this signal simply cannot be scored here. Action item: pull the reel/frame from Assignment Center to capture the recording attorney.

4. Cascading transfers — Not present. Only one assignment exists (2020), and it predates issuance; there is no chain of LLCs, let alone consecutive transfers within 24 months.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — Not present. No infringement suit naming US 11,879,924 was found (consistent with the earlier summary), so there is no litigation to anchor a 6-month pre-suit transfer. The single 2020 assignment is an inventor→employer conveyance six years before today's date.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — Not present. Keysight is solvent and operating; no Chapter 7/11 proceeding and no sale-in-bankruptcy of this patent was found.

7. Privateering — Not present. No transfer from Keysight to a third-party assertion vehicle; ownership remains with the original operating company.

8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — Not present. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT Network, Unified Patents, or OIN; it terminates at Keysight.

Cross-checks performed: Google Patents legal events (in the authoritative text) show only filing, assignment, publication, and grant events — no later reassignment. No IPR/PGR against this patent and no CAFC docket naming it were found (the 2026 Keysight CAFC activity concerns unrelated Centripetal Networks patents, per the prior section). SEC filings were not searched line-by-line beyond the absence of any divestiture disclosure.

Verdict

Insufficient data (only the original assignment). The paper record contains exactly one recorded conveyance — the 2020-11-30 inventor→Keysight assignment of assignors' interest — and no post-issuance transfer, so every affirmative NPE signal is not present and ownership sits with the original operating-company assignee, Keysight Technologies, Inc. The "insufficient data" label reflects the thin record and my inability to retrieve the reel/frame and correspondent, not any suspicion of an NPE chain: on the evidence available, this is an intact, non-asserted, operating-company-owned patent. Verify and complete the record at the USPTO Assignment Center: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (also indexed at https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html) — search patent number 11879924 or application 17/059,572 to capture the reel/frame and the correspondent of record.

I'll search the USPTO and related patent databases for the specific patent number and its citation records.

The initial searches returned mostly unrelated documents. Let me target the patent's front-page citation data directly.

I found the citation lists. Let me retrieve the complete front-page citation list (US patent citations, foreign citations, and cited-by) for the patent.

Prior-Art / Citation Analysis — US 11,879,924 B2

Note on process: I hit the tool step-limit partway through this task, so the analysis below is built only on the citation data I was able to retrieve (primarily the "Referenced Cited" list on Justia's page for the patent and the "Patent Citations" list on the Google Patents page for the PCT family member WO 2022/082634 A1). Where I could not verify a reference's full text, I say so rather than assert a § 102 conclusion as fact. I did not auto-correct any identifier — inventor surnames, dates, and numbers are reproduced literally as they appear in the retrieved records (including the "Hyunh" spelling, which I flag as a probable typo for "Huynh" in the source but have not changed).

I build on the prior sections' bibliographic data (app. US 17/059,572; PCT/CN2020/122906; effective filing/priority 2020-10-22; granted 2024-01-23) without repeating it.

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1. What the search actually returned (and its limits)

Two distinct "citation" lists exist for this family, and they are not identical:

(A) US "References Cited" list — surfaced via Justia (https://patents.justia.com/patent/11879924). It lists 15 U.S. patent documents and at least two CN documents, then the excerpt was truncated ("…"), so the foreign/non-patent portion is incomplete.

(B) PCT/ISR "Patent Citations (4)" list — surfaced via Google Patents on the family member https://patents.google.com/patent/WO2022082634A1/en. This is the international-search-era list and contains references that do not appear on the US front page (WO 2003/019722 A1, CN 107255756 A, CN 110133386 A).

Both are treated below as prior art "of record" in the family.

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2. U.S. patent documents cited (list A)

3. Foreign patent documents cited (list A — truncated)

4. Family ISR citations (list B — WO 2022/082634 A1)

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5. Honest § 102 assessment

1. No single retrieved reference appears to anticipate claim 1 or claim 8 as a whole. The claimed inventions are defined by a specific combination — multiple near-field test distances with known inter-distance intervals (d₁, Δd₁, Δd₂), an integral of a power-vs-distance derivative modeled as ∂p/∂d = a·d⁻² + Δ(d) (Eq. 2), and simultaneous solution of Eqs. (1)–(5) for the three unknowns (d₁, a, EIRP(d_f)/EIS(d_f)) — and, for the rotational-search claims, an offset-error loop with linear-fitting/zero-crossing selection (claims 9–11). The cited art is predominantly quiet-zone / OTA-test-method art (Derat, Abadie, Rowell, Olgaard) or near-field phased-array measurement art (CN 103344847, CN 107255756, WO 2003/019722). These are far stronger as § 103 obviousness candidates in combination than as § 102 anticipation references.

2. The strongest § 102-theory candidates (subject to full-text verification I could not complete):

   • Claims 1–7 — US 10,707,976 (Derat) and US 10,768,216 (Abadie et al.), both pre-filing-date U.S. patents, for the near-field OTA measurement/quiet-zone framework; and US 2020/0358538 (Olgaard et al.) / US 11,057,119 / US 11,057,120 (Jing et al.) for the beam/OTA aspects.
   • Claims 8–11 — US 2018/0109335 (Rowell et al.) and US 2019/0335346 (Abadie et al.) for quiet-zone antenna-pattern measurement, if either discloses per-radius gain/path-loss compensation.
   • Claim 18 (known-offset/"gray box" variant) — US 2019/0335346 and US 10,707,976 for "known location of the antenna aperture in the quiet zone" reasoning; note this is also the subject of the separately-surfaced US 10,914,774 (Rohde & Schwarz; Rowell/Derat/Abadie, "Measurement method and system for increasing the effective size of a quiet zone"), which appeared in search but was not confirmed as a cite of record on US 11,879,924.

3. Statutory-date framing (effective filing date = 2020-10-22): items published on/before 2020-10-22 qualify under § 102(a)(1); items published after that date (US 11,057,119; US 11,057,120; US 11,108,475; US 2020/0358538) can only qualify under § 102(a)(2) if their effective filing date precedes 2020-10-22 and they name "another inventor." Items #3 and #4 (Jing et al.) share an inventor surname with a named inventor of this patent (Ya Jing), so their status as 102(a)(2) art hinges on the precise inventive-entity comparison — an issue I cannot resolve from the retrieved data.

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6. Contradiction to flag with the earlier sections

The prior summary characterized the known-offset "gray box" variant as independent claim 12 (inferred from dependent claim 13). The granted claim set surfaced this session recites that variant as independent claim 18 ("placing the DUT in a quiet zone … the AUT comprises an antenna array with an array phase center that is offset from the geometric center of the DUT by a known offset distance"). This is consistent with claim renumbering between the pre-grant publication US 2023/0258703 A1 and the granted US 11,879,924 B2. The earlier "claim 12" characterization should be treated as pertaining to the pre-grant publication, not the patent as granted.

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7. Uncertainty statement

• I could not complete full-text verification of any cited reference within the available steps, so every § 102 mapping above is a candidate/analyst hypothesis, not a certified anticipation finding. Inventors/assignees marked with "~" and the descriptions of items 5–15 are inferred and flagged.
• The foreign and non-patent citation lists are incomplete — list A was truncated after "CN 106443210 A," and I did not retrieve any non-patent-literature (NPL) citations, which are common in this art (e.g., the AMTA/IEEE references seen on the related R&S patent).
• I did not retrieve the patent's forward citations ("Cited By"), which are relevant to later-art and validity analysis but are not "patent citations for 11879924" in the backward-citation sense asked here.
• Recommended next step to make this defensible: pull the USPTO PatentCenter/Patent Full-Text (PatFT) front page for 11,879,924 for the verbatim, untruncated "References Cited" (U.S., Foreign, and Other Publications) and the examiner's applied-art face, then verify each reference's disclosure against claims 1–18.

I'll verify the key references' actual disclosures before constructing the § 103 combinations, since obviousness rationales must be grounded in what each reference teaches.

Good grounding. Let me verify the beam-lock art and the remaining cited references, since claims 1 and 8's beam-selection and distance-extrapolation limitations need specific support.

I've hit the tool step-limit, so this analysis is built on (a) the authoritative full text provided, (b) the previously-generated Prior Art section, and (c) the reference content I was able to verify in the searches above. Where I could not verify a reference's disclosure, I say so.

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Obviousness Analysis of US 11,879,924 B2 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

A. Framework and level of ordinary skill

The obviousness inquiry under Graham v. John Deere / KSR Int'l v. Teleflex requires: (1) the scope and content of the prior art; (2) the differences between the prior art and the claims; (3) the level of ordinary skill; and (4) objective indicia of non-obviousness. Critically, a claim is obvious if the differences would have been "predictable" uses of prior-art elements according to known methods, or a combination of familiar elements according to known methods yielding no more than expected results. KSR, 550 U.S. 398, 417 (2007).

PHOSITA (proposed): a person with a B.S. in electrical engineering or physics (or equivalent) and about 3–5 years of experience in RF/antenna measurement and OTA testing of wireless devices, familiar with anechoic test chambers, near-field/far-field boundaries (Fraunhofer distance), probe antennas, beam-forming/codebook beam selection, and 3GPP OTA conformance testing (TS 38.101 / TS 38.104 for EIRP/EIS/TRP/TIS). This is a mature, well-populated art with heavy R&S/Keysight/NI patenting, which lowers the bar for finding a motivation to combine.

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B. Reference inventory and verified status

Cumulative-art point: the field is dense. Every element of the asserted claims traces to a known OTA/near-field technique.

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C. Claim architecture (per the prior sections)

• Claim 1 family (lateral-scan / radial-distance, unknown offset): scan laterally → find beam peak → measure at multiple radial near-field distances separated by known intervals → model ∂p/∂d = a·d⁻² + Δ(d) → solve Eqs. (1)–(5) for three unknowns (d₁, a, EIRP(d_f)/EIS(d_f)) → derive lateral + radial offset.
• Claim 8 family (rotational peak search, unknown offset): measure patterns at multiple radii → determine actual offset → compensate for probe-gain and path-loss differences → derive beam-peak directions → derive far-field EIRP/EIS. Claims 9–11 add the loop/min-Δx search, the compensation detail, and linear fitting.
• Claim 18 (known-offset / "gray box"): uses a known array offset. (Note: prior section flagged this as claim 12 in the pre-grant publication — see Contradictions below.)
• Beam-lock embodiment (FIGS. 3A–4): establish far-field OTA link so AUT forms best beam → lock it → measure in near-field on the same beam.

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D. Combination 1 — Claim 1 (and claims 2–7)

Primary: US 10,914,774 B2 (R&S). Secondary: US 10,707,976 (Derat). Tertiary: Derat AMTA/IET publications (path-loss law).

Claim chart

Motivation to combine (KSR)

1. Common problem, same field. Both R&S references address the identical real-world problem the patent recites: a DUT measured in a quiet zone whose antenna aperture is not at the quiet-zone center, which corrupts power-based metrics. US 10,914,774 states the goal is "measurement errors can be reduced" and "an accurate measurement can especially be achieved despite the measurement being performed outside the center of the quiet zone."
2. Known technique to improve a known method. Taking measurements at multiple distances and extrapolating to the far field is the oldest trick in near-field work; Derat's own printed publications supply the governing physics (power falls off with range length and converges to FF EIRP). Adding a second/third radial distance to US 10,914,774's "move the DUT radially" teaching is a predictable variation.
3. Beam lock is a known, separately patented improvement. US 10,707,976 expressly claims transmitting beamforming commands "allowing the device under test to lock the beamforming alignment" to simplify near-field measurement. A PHOSITA seeking a stable multi-distance measurement (same beam at every distance) would obviously borrow this.
4. Design need / cost. The patent's own stated motivation — avoid large far-field chambers and their path loss — is the same incentive that drove the R&S quiet-zone-extension work; both sides of the industry (R&S and Keysight) were solving it, so cross-combination is natural.
5. Predictable result. Because path loss ∝ 1/d² is a fundamental, well-known relationship, the result of measuring at three known-interval distances and solving algebraically is entirely expected (solving 3 equations in 3 unknowns is routine).

Assessment: Claim 1 is likely obvious as a combination of US 10,914,774 + US 10,707,976 + the Derat printed publications. The § 103 case is strongest on the method steps; the weakest point is whether the specific three-unknown simultaneous-solve is explicitly suggested (see § J).

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E. Combination 2 — Claim 8 (and claims 9–11)

Primary: US 10,914,774 B2. Secondary: standard probe-pattern / near-field correction; Derat publications. Tertiary: US 10,707,976 (beam-lock/near-field framework).

Claim chart

Motivation to combine

• US 10,914,774 already teaches every substantive step of claim 8 except the explicit "probe-pattern/point-loss compensation curve" formalism — and it teaches the concept of correction factors for quiet-zone amplitude/phase and for measuring outside the quiet-zone center.
• Probe correction is a bedrock, textbook practice in near-field measurement (the probe's own gain pattern distorts the measurement unless corrected). A PHOSITA measuring antenna patterns at several radii would inevitably correct for both the probe's off-boresight gain and the differing path loss — this is routine, predictable application of known measurement-correction technique.
• Claim 9 (iterative loop: assume offset → compensate → estimate → Δx → pick minimum |Δx|) is a brute-force grid search, and claim 11 (linear fitting of beam peaks and taking the intersection with the AUT plane) is standard geometric source localization/triangulation (as used in GPS/radar). In re Gram / KSR: routine optimization and obvious mathematical implementation.

Assessment: Claim 8 is likely obvious, arguably more strongly than claim 1, because US 10,914,774's claim 5/15 teaches the unknown-antenna-location determination directly. Claims 9–11 are likely obvious as routine optimization/known localization math.

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F. Combination 3 — Claim 18 (known-offset / "gray box")

Primary: US 10,914,774 B2. Secondary: US 10,707,976.

US 10,914,774 claim 3 is essentially a verbatim map of the known-offset case: "when the amplitude or phase distribution of the quiet zone and the antenna radiating aperture location on the device under test are known, applying the respective correction factor … for a desired set of positions of the antenna radiating aperture in the quiet zone." Claim 4 supplies the "constant distance of the center of the antenna aperture from the center of the quiet zone" assumption. Combined with US 10,707,976's beam-lock + near-field-measurement framework, claim 18's "known offset → compensate → derive far-field EIRP/EIS" is strongly obvious and may even be anticipated by US 10,914,774 claim 3 in the EIRP context.

Motivation: the reference itself states that knowing the aperture location lets you apply stored correction factors — precisely the patent's gray-box shortcut. Any PHOSITA would use a known offset rather than re-derive it.

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G. Combination 4 — Beam-lock embodiment (FIGS. 3A–4), if separately claimed

If any claim recites: (a) establish an OTA connection with a far-field probe so the AUT forms a beam in the desired direction; (b) lock the beam; (c) perform a near-field measurement on the locked beam — then the combination is:

• US 10,707,976 B1 (Derat/R&S) — establishes a far-field connection, "transmit[s] beamforming commands to the device under test thereby allowing the device under test to lock the beamforming alignment at a particular direction," and then performs near-field measurement/transformation. This is a near-exact anticipation (§ 102) of that embodiment (and therefore also renders it obvious).
• US 11,381,322 / US 2021/0258084 (Abadie/R&S) — adds RRC connection → best-beam selection → uplink-beam lock → measurement, and far-field via reflector.
• US 2022/0393775 A1 — beam-lock fixing over the air → max-EIRP measurement → derive TRP from known antenna characteristics.

Motivation: both R&S references are direct, same-field answers to the same problem (measuring the right beam without hunting for a test mode), and US 10,707,976 even supplies the near-field/far-field justification. Combining them is a textbook "known technique improving a similar device."

Caveat: US 10,707,976 (granted 2020-07-07) predates the effective filing date, so it is § 102(a)(1) art. US 11,381,322 (filed 2021-01-21) is post-filing unless it claims earlier priority — verify its effective filing date before relying on it under § 102(a)(1); it can otherwise only be § 102(a)(2) art if effectively filed before 2020-10-22.

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H. Dependent claims (13–17 and others)

I do not have verbatim text for all dependents. Based on the specification, the remaining dependents appear to recite: (i) probe-antenna movement between locations, (ii) the processor/display architecture (FIG. 2), and (iii) the two-vs-three-radius variants. These add only conventional implementation detail — printing/displaying results, a general-purpose processor with memory, movable prober — all of which are disclosed or trivially obvious. The processor/memory/display recitations of FIG. 2 are the standard "general-purpose computer" disclosure and, on this record, carry little independent patentable weight.

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I. Why the combinations satisfy the KSR "motivation" requirement

A defensible petition/defense would plead these rationales expressly:

1. Identical field of endeavor and identical problem — over-the-air EIRP/EIS of an offset AUT in a quiet zone; all refs are OTA/antenna-measurement art.
2. The references themselves motivate the combination — US 10,914,774 expressly aims to fix "measurement errors" when the radiating aperture is outside the center of the quiet zone and to determine an unknown antenna location; that is the patent's problem statement.
3. Known technique used to improve a known method — beam-lock (US 10,707,976) applied to repeatable multi-distance near-field measurement.
4. Predictable variation — adding a radial distance or a lateral scan is a designer's choice with predictable results; inverse-square path loss is fundamental.
5. Design incentive / cost reduction — smaller chambers, better link budget (the patent's own stated motivation; also US 2020/0358538's link-budget discussion).
6. Same-assignee family — the R&S references cross-cite each other (US 10,914,774 cites US 10,768,216 (Abadie)); combining is "a combination of familiar elements … yielding predictable results."

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J. Rebuttal — the strongest non-obviousness positions

Be candid: no retrieved reference appears to expressly teach the specific three-unknown solve (∂p/∂d = a·d⁻² + Δ(d), Eqs. (1)–(5)) for claims 1–7, nor the zero-crossing-point/grid-search with linear fitting for claims 9–11. The patent owner would argue:

• Different problems — R&S's US 10,914,774 is about enlarging/compensating the quiet zone, not about extrapolating a multi-distance near-field measurement to a far-field EIRP; the artisan might not look to it for the extrapolation model.
• Mathematical specificity — the reciprocal-distance model and the number of measurement points (three) solve a system the references do not pose; a court could find this a "specific algorithm," not a mere automation.
• Prosecution/allowance — the patent issued over several R&S/OTA references of record, which supports (weakly) that the examiner saw the field and still allowed. (But neither US 10,914,774 nor US 11,381,322 was confirmed as of record — see Prior Art § 7 — so this argument is weaker than it appears.)
• Secondary considerations — no evidence of commercial success/industry praise with nexus has surfaced (no litigation, no PTAB—all claims UNTESTED, per the Strategic section).

Counter-rebuttal: each of these is a § 102 strength, not a § 103 shield. The claims' novelty rests on choosing where to take measurements and what algebra to apply — the "familiar elements according to known methods" that KSR holds obvious, particularly where the result (a far-field EIRP estimate) is exactly what the measurement was always trying to obtain. Expect the fight to center on whether the extrapolation model is an inventive algorithm or routine math — which also implicates § 101, out of scope here but relevant to overall validity risk.

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K. Contradictions and caveats to carry forward

1. Contradiction flagged (build on, do not repeat): the Prior Art section already caught that the "known-offset" claim is claim 18 in the granted patent but claim 12 in the pre-grant publication US 2023/0258703 A1. This analysis uses claim 18 for the granted claim set and agrees the earlier "claim 12" label pertains to the publication.
2. Identifier discrepancy to verify: the Prior Art section lists US 10,707,976 B2 (Derat). The live search returned US 10,707,976 B1 (app. 16/542,410, granted 2020-07-07, R&S). I have not auto-corrected the prior-section citation; treat the kind code as unverified and confirm against the front page.
3. Verified vs. unverified: I verified the disclosure of US 10,914,774 (full claim set), US 10,707,976 (abstract/summary), US 11,381,322, US 2022/0393775 A1, and the Derat AMTA/IET path-loss publications. I did not verify US 10,768,216, US 2018/0109335, US 2019/0335346, US 11,057,119/120, or the CN/WO references. Any § 102/§ 103 mapping to the unverified references is an analyst hypothesis, not a certified reading.
4. § 102(a)(2) caution: US 11,057,119 / US 11,057,120 (Jing et al.) share an inventor surname with a named inventor (Ya Jing). Their status as § 102(a)(2) art depends on precise inventorship and effective-filing-date comparison, which I cannot resolve here. Likewise US 11,381,322 (filed 2021-01-21) is post-filing unless it claims earlier priority — verify.
5. Status: all claims remain UNTESTED (no IPR/PGR, no litigation; PGR window closed 2024-10-23; IPR open). Any § 103 ground must be built from scratch — there is no FWD to cite.
6. Full-text limitation: I hit the tool step-limit before completing verification of the remaining references and the verbatim text of claims 2–7 and 13–17. These gaps are retrieval limits, not negative findings.

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Bottom line

On the record available, each asserted claim family is vulnerable to a § 103 challenge, and the strongest single reference is US 10,914,774 B2 (R&S) — it expressly teaches measuring a DUT at multiple locations with a boresight beam, comparing peak-value differences to determine an unknown antenna location, applying correction factors for quiet-zone amplitude/phase variation, and moving the DUT radially (i.e., offset determination + compensation). Combined with US 10,707,976 (beam-lock + near-field measurement framework) and the Derat AMTA/IET publications (power-vs-distance convergence to far-field EIRP), claims 1 and 8, their dependents, claim 18, and the beam-lock embodiment are all likely obvious, with the sole genuinely contestable point being whether the specific multi-distance extrapolation algorithm and the min-Δx/linear-fit search constitute an inventive algorithm rather than routine optimization — a question that also raises § 101 exposure.