Appeal No. 2001-1185
Application No. 08/915,597 Page 2
BACKGROUND
Appellants' invention relates to a satellite communications
gateway management system. An understanding of the invention can
be derived from a reading of exemplary claim 1, which is
reproduced as follows:
1. A communication system wherein a user terminal can
communicate with a plurality of satellites;
wherein each of said plurality of satellites can communicate
with a plurality of earth stations;
wherein each of said plurality of earth stations is operable
to provide a gateway into a terrestrial communication system; and
wherein said user terminal is registered at a selected one
of said plurality of earth stations as its gateway station;
wherein said gateway station, in the event of being unable to
establish contact with said user terminal, is operative to select
and instruct another earth station to establish contact with said
user terminal to act as an alternative earth station and being
further operative to pass messages to and from said user terminal
through said alternative earth station while acting as said
gateway into said terrestrial communication system.
The prior art references of record relied upon by the
examiner in rejecting the appealed claims are:
Hatano et al. (Hatano) 5,355,511 Oct. 11, 1994
Azer 5,481,592 Jan. 2, 1996
Sowles et al. (Sowles) 5,561,836 Oct. 1, 1996
Claims 1, 3, 4, 6, 8, 10, 11, and 13 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Sowles in view of
Hatano.
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007