Telecommunications – Transmitter and receiver at same station – Radiotelephone equipment detail
Reexamination Certificate
2000-02-24
2003-07-08
Maung, Nay (Department: 2744)
Telecommunications
Transmitter and receiver at same station
Radiotelephone equipment detail
C455S426100, C455S520000, C379S156000, C379S230000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06591114
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is generally directed to a telecommunication network and, more particularly, to a fixed cellular communications system that incorporates the use of a private branch exchange (PBX) or key system.
The use of telecommunication networks for business and personal purposes is typically regarded as a necessity of modern living. Use of these networks has increased exponentially over the past few decades. Today, telecommunication networks include, among other things, two major types of conventional telephone systems.
The first of these two conventional telephone systems shall be referred to herein as a landline telephone system. Landline telephone systems are the conventional wire-based systems that are found in most homes or businesses. Because these systems are wirebased, to develop such systems, the telephone service provider must acquire rights of way and establish a network infrastructure, which are costly endeavors. These telephone systems are typically regarded as being fixed in that the mobility of a telephone set connected to the system is limited to a relatively short range.
The second of these two conventional telephone systems shall be referred to herein as a cellular telephone system. Cellular telephone systems are the conventional wireless systems that have become increasingly popular among telephone service subscribers. The primary advantage of using these systems is that they permit mobility of the telephone handset, which allows the user to be reached even when he is located away from the home or office. The telephone handsets for cellular telephone systems are typically either connected to a cellular transceiver unit mounted in the trunk of an automobile or are portable, hand-held units that include a cellular transceiver in a common housing and can travel with a subscriber in his or her pocket or bag.
While the popularity of cellular telephone systems has increased, the expense associated with the use of such systems has steadily decreased, particularly when taking into account the standard rate of inflation. The use of cellular systems, however, is still generally more expensive than the use of conventional landline telephone systems. Cellular service providers, which often are not associated and/or affiliated with landline service providers, could establish and market billing plans that provide incentives for telephone subscribers to place mobile-to-mobile (cellular-to-cellular) telephone calls as opposed to mobile-to-landline and/or landline-to-mobile telephone calls. In many cases, the cost for a cellular-to-cellular call is priced at only about twenty-five percent (25%) of the cost for a similar cellular-to-landline call. The cost of mobile-to-mobile calls is less expensive because it is unnecessary to route such calls through the central office of a landline telephone service provider. Accordingly, the landline service provider does not charge the cellular service provider a service fee for utilizing its central office. To the contrary, mobile-to-landline and/or landline-to-mobile telephone calls are routed through the central office of a landline service provider, which charges a service fee for utilization of its central office. That fee is ultimately passed through and billed to the cellular telephone service subscriber.
In today's marketplace, many firms conduct business by having some employees at a main office and having other employees in motor vehicles out in the field who travel from work site to work site. For present purposes, those employees out in the field will be referred to as “mobile employees” and those employees in the main office will be referred to as “fixed employees”.
One example of such a firm is a cable television company. Typically, cable television companies employ servicemen or technicians who drive to a job site, perform a service (such as installation or repair of cable television service at that site) and then drive to the next job site. These servicemen are mobile employees.
In other examples, some firms have employees who continually roam. For instance, with respect to a taxi cab service company, drivers (mobile employees) travel from location to location in order to transport passengers, while dispatchers (fixed employees) remain at the firm's main office and communicate with the drivers. The drivers do not actually stop at a work site to perform a job. Rather, they pick up passengers and transport them to a requested site. It will be appreciated that these examples are nowhere near exhaustive of the firms that have both mobile and fixed employees. It will further be appreciated that in the vast majority of these firms the mobile employees contact fixed employees working at the main office several times during each working day, and vice versa.
In these firms, it is impractical for the mobile employees to stop what they are doing each and every time they desire to place a telephone call to a fixed employee at the firm's office. In particular, for each time a mobile employee is required to contact a fixed employee at the firm's office, it would take too long and be too disruptive for the mobile employee to drive his/her motor vehicle off the road, park the vehicle, exit from its passenger compartment, approach a coin-actuated telephone, insert the appropriate currency, and dial the office telephone number. Further, it is beneficial if the mobile employees can be reached easily at any time. Accordingly, use of a wireless form of communication by mobile employees provides significant benefits, some of which are noted above. A cellular telephone with transceiver is typically the most practical and desirable form of communication.
Given the billing plans offered by many cellular telephone providers, where cellular-to-cellular calls can be completed for a cost substantially less than the cost of similar cellular-to-landline calls, if a firm's mobile employees use cellular transceivers to place outgoing and receive incoming telephone calls, it makes sense for the fixed employees to communicate with the mobile employees by using cellular transceivers as well. In that way, the firm's overhead and operating costs can be reduced.
In prior art telephone systems, it is known to use a fixed cellular communications system to provide for mobile-to-mobile calls. An example of a fixed cellular communications system can be found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,922,517, issued to West, Jr. et al., the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference. Fixed cellular communications systems typically incorporate an interface unit that encodes signals received from a landline telephone unit and decodes signals received from a remote cellular telephone unit. These interface units typically include, among other possible things, a cellular transceiver, logic circuitry and a power supply. The interface unit, when combined with the landline telephone unit, permits the landline telephone unit to function as if it were a cellular telephone unit. Under such circumstances, outgoing calls transmitted to a remote cellular telephone unit and incoming calls received from a remote cellular telephone unit are made on a mobile-to-mobile basis.
In light of these prior art fixed cellular communication systems, business firms could incorporate a landline telephone unit and an interface unit for every fixed employee so that calls made to and received from the mobile employees would be made on a mobile
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to-mobile basis and the firm could take advantage of any applicable cost effective billing plans. Use of an external telephone line for every fixed employee, however, is impractical, especially for those business firms that have a relatively large number of fixed employees.
It will be appreciated that business firms often employ a private branch exchange (PBX) and/or a key system unit (KSU) for their telephone service. These systems allow for the switching of calls between the fixed employees on local lines, while simultaneously allowing the fixed employees to share external lines (known a
Cook Alex McFarron Manzo Cummings & Mehler, Ltd.
Qualicom Systems, Inc.
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