DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 04/30/2026 has been entered.
Status of Claims
Claims 1, 3-6, 9-12, and 14-20 are pending and examined herein per Applicant’s 04/30/2026 filing. Claims 1, 3-6, 9-12, and 15-17 are amended. Claim 2, 7, 8, 13, and 14 were previously canceled. No claims are newly canceled, withdrawn, or added.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 04/23/2026, 02/24/2026, and 03/25/2025 were in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed with respect to the 35 USC 101 rejection of the previous Office Action have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. Applicant argues:
Applicant respectfully submits that pending claims are not directed to hedging, insurance, or mitigating risk, and therefore are not directed to fundamental economic practice or principles under MPEP. Remarks p. 10.
Respectfully, the Office disagrees with and declines to follow Applicant’s narrow view of the abstract category of a fundamental economic practice or principles. The MPEP provides example of other concepts that have been considered fundamental economic practice or principles by the courts. see MPEP 2106.04(a)(2)(II)(A). For examples rules for conducting a wagering game, In re Smith, 815 F.3d 816, 818-19, 118 USPQ2d 1245, 1247 (Fed. Cir. 2016), offer-based price optimization OIP Techs., Inc. v. Amazon.com, Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1362–63, 115 USPQ2d 1090, 1092-93 (Fed. Cir. 2015), payment processing Inventor Holdings, LLC v. Bed Bath Beyond, 876 F.3d 1372, 1378-79, 125 USPQ2d 1019, 1023 (Fed. Cir. 2017), placing an order based on displayed market information, Trading Technologies Int’l, Inc. v. IBG LLC, 921 F.3d 1084, 1092, 2019 USPQ2d 138290 (Fed. Cir. 2019), etc.
Further that same section of the MPEP provides “courts have used the phrases "fundamental economic practices" or "fundamental economic principles" to describe concepts relating to the economy and commerce” and the “term "fundamental" is not used in the sense of necessarily being "old" or "well-known"” Id. The Office maintains based on the guidance of the MPEP the rejection of the previous Office action as updated below is properly made without the impressible expanding the bounds of the abstract category of a fundamental economic practice or principles. The rejection is maintained as presented below.
The Advisory Action’s characterization improperly strips the claims of their technical character, and courts have cautioned against describing claims “a high level of abstraction.” Remarks p. 11.
Respectfully the Office disagrees with Applicant’s position. The claims have been given their broadest reasonable interpretation in light of the specification. See MPEP 2111. The entirety of independent claim 1 was analyzed in the rejection, where elements found to be abstract, when the claim was considered as a whole and in part, were highlighted in bold italics. Nothing was stripped from the claims. The rejection is maintained as presented below.
Claim 1 reflects technical improvements described in the specification, and respectfully submits that the Claim 1 is patent eligible. Remarks p. 12.
Respectfully the Office disagrees with Applicant’s position. The analysis for patent eligibility is not whether the claims reflects technical improvements described in the specification. The rejection of the previous Office action was made in accordance with the Supreme Court’s Alice/Mayo test, see MPEP 2106. The rejection is maintained as presented below.
Claim 1 provides practical solution that are implemented through hardware, and therefore integrate any alleged judicial exception into a practical application. Remarks p. 12.
Respectfully the Office disagrees with Applicant’s position. The hardware required by the claimed invention is general and generic rather than a special purpose machine in light of the specification. Where the specification provides “ headset has a microphone for voice data entry and an ear speaker” Spec. [6]. It also provides, “voice-directed mobile terminal 10 may be a wearable device . . . descriptive term "terminal" is not limiting and may include any similar computer, device, machine, smartphone, smartwatch, indicia reader, combination, or system” Spec [43]. Finally the specification provides, “It will be appreciated by a person of ordinary skill in the art that the server computer 20 may be one or, more typically, a plurality of computers having software stored thereon,” Spec [48].
The rejection is maintained as presented below.
The absence of §§ 102, 103, and 112 rejections demonstrates that pending claims are sufficiently specific and bounded, and that pending claims are not so broad or abstract as to warrant the § 101 rejections. Remarks p. 13.
Respectfully the Office disagrees with Applicant’s position. The analysis for patent eligibility is not whether the claims are overly broad. The rejection of the previous Office action was made in accordance with the Supreme Court’s Alice/Mayo test, see MPEP 2106. The rejection is maintained as presented below.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1, 3-6, 9-12, and 14-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea (i.e. certain methods of organizing human activity) without practical application or significantly more when the elements are considered individually and as an ordered combination.
Step 1: Is the claimed invention to a process, machine, manufacture or composition of matter?
Yes, the claims fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject. Claims 1, 3-6, 9-12, and 14-16 are to system (device) and claims 17-20 are to a method (process).
Step 2A, prong 1: Does the claim recite an abstract idea, law or nature, or natural phenomenon?
Yes, the claims are found to recite an abstract idea. Specifically, the abstract idea of certain methods of organizing human activity. Where certain methods of organizing human activity include fundamental economic principles or practices (including hedging, insurance, mitigating risk); commercial or legal interactions (including agreements in the form of contracts; legal obligations; advertising, marketing or sales activities or behaviors; business relations); managing personal behavior or relationships or interactions between people (including social activities, teaching, and following rules or instructions) (see MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2), subsection II).
Claim 1 (as a representative claim) recites the following, where the limitations found to contain elements of the abstract idea are in bold italics:
1. (Currently Amended) A system, comprising:
a plurality of voice-directed mobile terminals for facilitating voice communications between a plurality of users and the plurality of voice-directed mobile terminals, wherein each of the plurality of users is assigned a task in a warehouse region of multiple warehouse regions; and
a computer in communication with the plurality of voice-directed mobile terminals over a communication link, the computer configured to transmit an instruction to each of the plurality of voice-directed mobile terminals to assign a work assignment to each user and is further configured to:
generate voice communication data based at least in part on recording the voice communications between a first user of the plurality of users and a first voice-directed mobile terminal of the plurality of voice-directed mobile terminals with corresponding timestamps that indicate when the voice communications occurred;
determine an activity assessment time interval associated with at least one of a user sign-on activity, a sign-off activity, a user begin break activity, or a user return from break activity;
generate user productivity patterns data associated with the first user based at least in part on extracting a portion of the voice communication data based on the corresponding timestamp and activity assessment time interval;
generate, in real time, a first work rate for the first user based on the user productivity patterns data and a number of tasks in the warehouse region that are completed in a predetermined time interval,
generate, in real time, a plurality of additional work rates for additional users in other warehouse regions of the multiple warehouse regions based on additional user productivity patterns data associated with the additional users operating in the other warehouse regions and an additional number of tasks in the other warehouse regions that are completed in the predetermined time interval;
determine, in real time, an amount of work remaining in the multiple warehouse regions;
determine, in real time, current requirements of users in the multiple warehouse regions based on the user productivity patterns data, the additional user productivity patterns data, the first work rate, the plurality of additional work rates, the amount of work remaining in the multiple warehouse regions, and an expected time at which the number of tasks are to be completed in the multiple warehouse regions;
generate, in real time, a recommendation on a visual display of a computing device comprising one or more instructions to re-allocate one or more users from one warehouse region to another warehouse region based on the current requirements of users in the multiple warehouse regions; and
transmit instructions to voice directed mobile terminals associated with the one or more users corresponding to assignment of task in the other warehouse regions, wherein the assignment of tasks in the other warehouse regions is indicative of transferring of the one or more users to the other warehouse region such that the task in the warehouse region and the other warehouse region end at the same time.
Applicant’s claims are directed toward worker management, which is a fundamental economic practice. Every business with workers must manage their workers’ time and efforts with respect to a product produces or service provided. The claimed invention uses information received via the voice commands to determine productivity patterns and work rates by invoking the computer as a tool, akin to a calculator. The information determined based on the collected voice commands, timestamps, and time intervals are the used to make recommendations – similar to the way a calculator outputs an answer to the enter information.
It is noted the Court in Enfish held that merely invoking a computer as a tool does not improve the functioning of a computer, see MPEP 2106.05(a). Where the computer’s processor allows for the example processing large amounts of data. However this improvement comes solely from the capabilities of the processor rather than the claimed invention; therefore the invention does not improve the computer. Merely adding generic computer components to perform the method is not sufficient. Thus, the claim must include more than mere instructions to perform the method on a generic component or machinery to qualify as an improvement to an existing technology, see MPEP 2106.05(a).
The information calculated productivity patterns and work rates is then used to determine where and what task are to be performed by the workers. Where the recommendations are a type of instruction directing the workers within the warehouse. The Office finds this to be the managing of personal behavior, thereby an abstract idea.
Step 2A, prong 2: Does the claim recite additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application?
No, the claimed invention does not recite additional elements that integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. Where a practical application is described as integrating the abstract idea by applying it, relying on it, or using the abstract idea in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on it such that the claim is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize it, see October 2019: Subject Matter Eligibility at p. 11. The identified judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particular, the claims recites the additional limitations see non-bold-italicized elements above. The receiving, recording, generating and transmitting elements are determined to be insignificant extra solution activity.
Where 2106.05(g) MPEP states, “term "extra-solution activity" can be understood as activities incidental to the primary process or product that are merely a nominal or tangential addition to the claim. Extra-solution activity includes both pre-solution and post-solution activity. An example of pre-solution activity is a step of gathering data for use in a claimed process, e.g., a step of obtaining information about credit card transactions, which is recited as part of a claimed process of analyzing and manipulating the gathered information by a series of steps in order to detect whether the transactions were fraudulent. An example of post-solution activity is an element that is not integrated into the claim as a whole, e.g., a printer that is used to output a report of fraudulent transactions, which is recited in a claim to a computer programmed to analyze and manipulate information about credit card transactions in order to detect whether the transactions were fraudulent.”
The Office finds that merely including instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, or merely using a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea; adding insignificant extra solution activity to the judicial exception; or only generally linking the use of the abstract idea to a particular technological environment or field is not sufficient to integrate the judicial exception into a practical application.
Step 2B: Does the claim recite additional elements that amount to significantly more than the abstract idea?
No, the claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception, when considered individually and as part of the ordered combination.
Where 2106.05(d)(I)(2) of the MPEP states, “A factual determination is required to support a conclusion that an additional element (or combination of additional elements) is well-understood, routine, conventional activity. Berkheimer v. HP, Inc., 881 F.3d 1360, 1368, 125 USPQ2d 1649, 1654 (Fed. Cir. 2018). However, this does not mean that a prior art search is necessary to resolve this inquiry. Instead, examiners should rely on what the courts have recognized, or those in the art would recognize, as elements that are well-understood, routine, conventional activity in the relevant field when making the required determination. For example, in many instances, the specification of the application may indicate that additional elements are well-known or conventional. See, e.g., Intellectual Ventures v. Symantec, 838 F.3d at 1317; 120 USPQ2d at 1359 ("The written description is particularly useful in determining what is well-known or conventional"); Internet Patents Corp. v. Active Network, Inc., 790 F.3d 1343, 1348, 115 USPQ2d 1414, 1418 (Fed. Cir. 2015) (relying on specification’s description of additional elements as "well-known", "common" and "conventional"); TLI Communications LLC v. AV Auto. LLC, 823 F.3d 607, 614, 118 USPQ2d 1744, 1748 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (Specification described additional elements as "either performing basic computer functions such as sending and receiving data, or performing functions ‘known’ in the art.").” The Office adds storing data for example to a database regardless of its content is a basic computer function.
These limitations do NOT offer an improvement to another technology or technical field; improvements to the functioning of the computer itself; apply the judicial exception with, or by use of, a particular machine; effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing; add a specific limitation other than what is well-understood, routine and conventional in the field, or add unconventional steps that confine the claim to a particular useful application; or other meaningful limitations beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment. Therefore, these additional limitations when considered individually or in combination do not provide an inventive concept that can transform the abstract idea into patent eligible subject matter.
The other independent claims recite similar limitations and are rejected for the same reasoning given above.
The dependent claims do not further limit the claimed invention in such a way as to direct the claimed invention to statutory subject matter. Nonetheless the dependent claims are briefly addressed.
Claim 3 further define the content of the visual display which is found to be insignificant extra solution activity as well as abstract. The courts have found that information regardless of its content falls within the realm of abstract ideas. (Elec. Power Grp. v. Alstom (Fed. Cir. 2015-1778, 8/1/2016)).
Claims 4 and 19 adds an alert which is found to be insignificant extra solution activity as well as abstract. Parker v. Flook, 437 U.S. 584, 590, 198 USPQ 193, 197 (1978).
Claim 5 adds classify the user productivity patterns to the claimed invention this element is found to add to the identified abstract idea of certain methods of organizing human activity without significantly more or practical application.
Claims 6, 12, and 16 adds and defines a reporting feature to the claimed invention which is found to be insignificant extra solution activity as well as abstract. The courts have found that information regardless of its content falls within the realm of abstract ideas. (Elec. Power Grp. v. Alstom (Fed. Cir. 2015-1778, 8/1/2016)).
Claim 9 adds extraction feature to the claimed invention which is found to be insignificant extra solution activity a step of data gathering.
Claim 10 adds a flagging feature to the claimed invention this element is found to add to the identified abstract idea of certain methods of organizing human activity without significantly more or practical application.
Claim 12 further defines current requirements this element is found to add to the identified abstract idea of certain methods of organizing human activity without significantly more or practical application.
Claim 18 further adds a step of implanting worker resource decisions which is found to be a step of “apply it” that does not transform the abstract idea in to patent eligible subject matter.
Claim 20 adds a step of recommendation extraction feature to the claimed invention which is found to be insignificant extra solution activity a step of outputting.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Deodhar et al (US 2014/0058801 A1) teaches system and method for automatically measuring, analyzing and improving exact work effort of white collar employees, without requiring manual intervention or configuration, is described. The system captures all the work effort put on by the users. Systems and methods have been described to track the daily time spent by employees, irrespective of whether the time is spent on one or more computing devices, or away from any computing system while in meetings, discussions, calls, lab work, outside travel, and remote visits.
Beauchamp et al (US 11,635,884 B1) teaches personalized graphical user interfaces within a collaboration environment are described herein. Exemplary implementations may: manage environment state information maintaining a collaboration environment; manage homepage information defining personalized graphical user interfaces of the collaboration environment; effectuate presentation of the personalized graphical user interfaces on computing platforms associated with the users upon instantiation of the collaboration environment by the users via the computing platforms; and/or perform other operations.
Hendrickson et al (US 11,817,078 B2) teaches central computer system thereby directs multiple users and verifies completion of their tasks. To direct the user's actions, information received by each mobile device from the central computer system is translated into speech or voice instructions for the corresponding user. Typically, to receive the voice instructions, the user wears a headset coupled with the mobile device.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to FOLASHADE ANDERSON whose telephone number is (571)270-3331. The examiner can normally be reached Monday to Thursday 12:00 P.M. to 6:00 P.M. CST.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Rutao Wu can be reached at (571) 272-6045. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/FOLASHADE ANDERSON/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3623
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