Telecommunications – Transmitter and receiver at separate stations – Having measuring – testing – or monitoring of system or part
Reexamination Certificate
2000-09-01
2004-06-01
Vuong, Quochien B. (Department: 2685)
Telecommunications
Transmitter and receiver at separate stations
Having measuring, testing, or monitoring of system or part
C455S405000, C455S423000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06745011
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to wireless devices and networks, and in particular, to systems and related methods for measuring wireless device and wireless network usage and performance metrics.
2. Description of the Related Art
Traditionally, consumers have used wireless devices for basic telephony with limited use of basic one-way text messaging features and enterprise based data applications. The recent growth in the wireless industry along with the popularity of the internet has led to a natural convergence of the two. This new combined communications application and set of services including applications such as wireless web microbrowsing, web clipping applications, one-way and two-way text messaging, are commonly referred to in the industry as wireless data, wireless internet, or wireless web services: Mobile telephone handsets, pagers, and personal digital assistants (PDAs), for example, all now have wireless data capabilities and are commonly referred to in the industry as wireless devices.
Wireless data is an enhancement to traditional wireless services provided by cellular, PCS, SMR, and paging network operators. The Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) is a key enabler of wireless data—with wireless device users now able to browse internet sites, purchase goods and services, send and receive email, have a broad array of internet content pushed to their wireless devices, and access corporate and personal information using their wireless devices. Today in the United States carriers have rolled these wireless data services out over networks such as circuit-switched and CDPD, but these and other services will soon be provided over faster, more advanced wireless network technologies, for example High Data Rate [HDR], General Packet Radio Service [GPRS], Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution [EDGE], 1XRTT, CDMA2000, and Wideband CDMA [W-CDMA].
Wireless data industry participants such as service providers, advertisers, content providers and electronic and mobile commerce companies have a need for information on consumer activity and usage of wireless data. First, for example, there exists a need to collect information on the activity and usage behavior of wireless data users. Consumer usage, audience, and purchase information statistics are staples in most developed industries. There is a need to rapidly make these information streams available to all participants of this new and not well understood industry in order to expedite the development of more effective service and product offerings—thereby improving the satisfaction level of users, accelerating the overall growth of the industry, and saving industry participants time and money by avoiding uninformed strategies and initiatives. Second, for example, there is a need to make available to the wireless industry a continuous, real-time set of independent and unbiased network and device performance data. Not only is there a need by network operators and device manufacturers to benchmark the performance of their own networks and devices specifically as it relates to wireless data and more traditional wireless voice applications, but also there is a need to provide to sellers, advertisers, and content providers objective data on the level of service customers are receiving from wireless network and device partners. Third, for example, there is a need to integrate these information streams together, thereby providing industry participants an improved understanding of how wireless network service levels and device performance characteristics (and changes in them) impact wireless data user behavior. For instance, there is a need by electronic and mobile commerce companies to quantify “lost revenue” resulting from a failed wireless transaction due to poor network performance.
Usage, Audience, and Purchase Information
While the popularity of wireless telephony and WAP-based data services is surging, there has been no reliable system for measuring wireless data user behavior. Today, competitive marketing information on the wireless data industry is obtained primarily through consumer surveys, the accuracy of which are unreliable and often in question by the industry.
As a result, there is an acute demand for a more accurate service that monitors user activity and usage of wireless data. Wireless network operators, wireless device manufacturers, advertisers, and content providers are all looking for more accurate and detailed information to be able to better understand the behavior, experiences, and needs of wireless data users. Limited data presently exists on even the most basic of questions regarding wireless data users—the numbers and demographics of users; what wireless devices and networks they use; when, how often, for how long, and from what location they access the wireless internet; what sites they visit; what transactions they execute; what advertisements they view/redeem, etc. As the industry advances and matures and users of wireless data become more sophisticated, the ability to track user behavior over time will also become particularly important. Services exist in the wired internet and other industries that provide this type of consumer usage, audience rating, and purchase data.
Creating a system and method to effectively and accurately collect wireless data consumer usage and activity information poses a number of challenges over the wired internet industry. For instance, challenges typically confronted where wireless devices are involved include restricted memory capacity, power limitations, limited processing power, multiple proprietary operating systems with limited interfaces, and the like. Furthermore, there is a need to accommodate activity relating to different wireless network protocols, each designed according to its own specifications. Moreover, there is a need to track activity across a range of data applications and protocols including for example WAP, web clipping applications, HTML, WML, and XML browsers.
As the wireless data industry prepares for the expected flood of new wireless data users, there exists a strong market need for improved wireless data consumer usage and activity information.
Network/Device Performance Information
A strong market need exists for a system to monitor the performance of wireless data networks and wireless devices. At present, there is no industry standard for “Quality of Service” (QOS) data on the performance of wireless data networks. Currently, network operators generally conduct proprietary drive test network benchmarking activities solely for their own internal use. Network operators generally do not make this information available to external parties, such as dotcoms, internet content partners, wireless data application services providers, wireless advertisers, wireless electronic commerce companies, etc. Even if such information were made available to other industry participants outside the network operator's organization, the information would not be sufficient because of the proprietary nature and varying approaches for data collection across network operators, lack of a standard schedule for data collection, and biases resulting from rating the performance of a network provider's own network versus that of its competitors.
Consequently, there is a need for a more robust and real-time method of monitoring the data performance of wireless networks. Network operators are inexperienced in providing data services, and they are keenly interested in information that will help them understand how their networks stack up in supplying wireless data services and where, when, and how to optimize their networks. Carrier interest in objective QOS data has been further heightened by recent federal mandates for E911 service capabilities—carriers can no longer tolerate coverage gaps and prolonged problems in their service areas. Objective information on the performance of network operators is also of great interest to other wireless industry participants who are lookin
Hendrickson Keith
Maguy William
Prehn Paul
Stamos Nick
Su Annie
Morrison & Foerster / LLP
Telephia, Inc.
Vuong Quochien B.
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