Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Notice to Applicant
2. 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 on 07/16/2026 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 07/16/2026 has been entered.
3. The following is a non-Final Office Action. In response to Examiner’s Final Action of 01/16/2026, Applicant, on 07/16/2026, amended Claims 1-3 and 8-20. Claims 4-7 are as previously presented.
Claims 1-20 are currently pending in this application and have been rejected below.
Response to Amendment
4. Applicant’s amendments and arguments are acknowledged.
5. The prior 35 USC §101 rejection of Claims maintained despite Applicant's amendments and arguments.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
6. 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.
7. Claims 1-20 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because, although they are drawn to statutory categories of system (machine) and method (process), they are also directed to a judicial exception (an abstract idea) without significantly more.
8. At Step 2A Prong One of the subject matter eligibility analysis, Claim 1 recites a customer contact ranked scheduling assistance system comprising: .. retrieve .. calendar data with customer scheduling data including a meeting deadline date for a plurality of customers, and a meeting frequency value in the .. calendar data indicating how often in a designated time period a customer meeting is scheduled to occur for each customer .., retrieve sales revenue for each of the plurality of customers..; .. retrieve a user's total annual recorded sales revenue and .. determine a current revenue percentage value representing a percentage of the user's annual recorded sales revenue that is attributable to each of the plurality of customers relative to the user's total annual recorded sales revenue and store the customer scheduling data, the meeting frequency value for each customer, and current revenue percentage value for each customer ..; .. identify the plurality of customers assigned to the user .. determine, from inputs of the customer scheduling data, the meeting frequency value for each customer, and current revenue percentage value for each customer of the plurality of customers assigned to the user, a past due percentage value for each customer assigned to the user by dividing a number of days determined to be elapsed since the meeting deadline date by a number of days in the meeting frequency value during the designated time period from the customer scheduling data for the user and multiplying the past due percentage value with the current revenue percentage value to determine a revenue-weighted criticality ranking for each of the plurality of customers assigned to the user; .. establish a ranked list of the plurality of customers assigned to the user that are ranked in an order of determined revenue-weighted criticality ranking for each customer assigned to the user and to generate a priority for .. triggering scheduling the plurality of customers assigned to the user on the user's .. calendar .. based on the ranked order of determined revenue- weighted criticality ranking; and .. the plurality of customers for that user, listed in order of the revenue-weighted criticality ranking from highest to lowest, which under Broadest Reasonable Interpretation in light of the Specification, is an abstract idea of Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity, particularly fundamental economic principles or practices (including mitigating risk); commercial or legal interactions (including agreements in the form of contracts; legal obligations; 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) because scheduling customer meetings in order of criticality based on revenue is a business practice for mitigating risk, involving commercial or legal interactions (including marketing or sales activities). Furthermore, it is also an abstract idea of Mental Processes - concepts performed in the human mind (including an observation, evaluation, judgment or opinion), because determining the meeting frequency value for each customer is a process that can be performed in the mind since it involves observation , evaluation and judgement. Claims 8 and 15 recite similar abstract ideas.
At Step 2A Prong Two of the analysis, the judicial exception (abstract idea) is not integrated into a practical application because independent Claims 1, 8 and 15, including additional elements such as A computing system executing computer readable code instructions, a hardware processor, a memory, and a power management unit supplying power to the hardware processor and the memory; the hardware processor executing computer readable code instructions of the customer contact ranked scheduling assistance system, automatically, from a user's electronic calendar application and from a sales revenue database, via a network interface device, electronic, execute an algorithm, a customer relations management (CRM) platform at a CRM database memory; execute machine readable code instructions of an algorithm, a display device displaying a graphical user interface (GUI), individually, and in combination, when viewed as a whole, are not an improvement to a computer or a technology, the claims do not apply the judicial exception with a particular machine, and the claims do not effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing. Generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use, as in the instant claims, is not indicative of integration into a practical application - see MPEP 2106.05(h); adding the words “apply it” (or an equivalent) with the judicial exception, or mere instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, or merely using a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea, as in the instant claims, is also not indicative of integration into a practical application - see MPEP 2106.05(f). Furthermore, displaying the automatically triggered scheduling upcoming meetings in order of the revenue-weighted criticality ranking on the user's electronic calendar application is adding insignificant extra-solution activity to the judicial exception - see MPEP 2106.05(g).
At Step 2B of the analysis, independent Claims 1, 8 and 15 do not include any additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception (abstract idea), because any such additional elements such as those listed above, individually or in combination, do not recite anything that is beyond conventional and routine activity or use of computers (as evidenced by Figure 11 of the Drawings and paragraphs 146-159 of the Specification in the instant Application, and court decisions such as buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d 1350, 1355, 112 USPQ2d 1093, 1096 (Fed. Cir. 2014) discussed at 2106.05(d) of the MPEP), do not effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing, nor do they apply the judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular field of use or technological environment. Adding the words “apply it” (or an equivalent) with the judicial exception, or mere instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, or merely using a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea (see MPEP 2106.05(f)), or generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use (see MPEP 2106.05(h)), as in the instant independent Claims, is not indicative of an inventive concept ("significantly more").
At Step 2A Prong One, dependent Claims 2-7, 9-14 and 16-20 incorporate (and therefore recite) the abstract idea noted in the independent claims from which they depend, and recite extensions of the abstract idea.
At Step 2A Prong Two, dependent Claims 2-5, 9-11, 14 and 16-20 do not include any additional elements beyond those included in the list above with respect to the independent Claims from which they depend. These dependent claims therefore do not integrate the judicial exception (abstract idea) into a practical application for the same reasons as stated above at Step 2A Prong Two for the independent claims.
At Step 2A Prong Two for dependent Claims 6, 7, 12 and 13, the judicial exception (abstract idea) is not integrated into a practical application because these dependent claims, including additional elements such as those listed above for the independent claims and a plurality of dataset fieldnames, an email message, individually, and in combination, when viewed as a whole, are not an improvement to a computer or a technology, the claims do not apply the judicial exception with a particular machine, and the claims do not effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing. Generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use, as in the instant claims, is not indicative of integration into a practical application - see MPEP 2106.05(h); adding the words “apply it” (or an equivalent) with the judicial exception, or mere instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, or merely using a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea, as in the instant claims, is also not indicative of integration into a practical application - see MPEP 2106.05(f).
At Step 2B, dependent Claims 2-5, 9-11, 14 and 16-20 do not include any additional elements beyond those included in the list above with respect to the independent Claims from which they depend. These dependent claims therefore do not recite anything that is sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for the same reasons as stated above at Step 2B for the independent claims.
At Step 2B, dependent Claims 6, 7, 12 and 13 do not include any additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception (abstract idea), because any such additional elements such as those listed above for the independent claims and a plurality of dataset fieldnames, an email message, individually or in combination, do not recite anything that is beyond conventional and routine activity or use of computers (as evidenced by Figure 11 of the Drawings and paragraphs 146-159 of the Specification in the instant Application, and court decisions such as buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d 1350, 1355, 112 USPQ2d 1093, 1096 (Fed. Cir. 2014) discussed at 2106.05(d) of the MPEP), do not effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing, nor do they apply the judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular field of use or technological environment. Adding the words “apply it” (or an equivalent) with the judicial exception, or mere instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, or merely using a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea (see MPEP 2106.05(f)), or generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use (see MPEP 2106.05(h)), as in the instant claims, is not indicative of an inventive concept ("significantly more").
Therefore, Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 as being directed to non-eligible subject matter. See Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank International, 573__ U.S. 2014.
Response to Arguments
9. Applicant's arguments filed 07/16/2026 have been fully considered, but they are found not persuasive with regard to the 35 U.S.C. 101 rejection, which has therefore been maintained.
10. Applicant argues (at pp.14-16) that, at Step 2A Prong Two of the subject matter eligibility analysis, the independent claims incorporate a particular machine ("particularized machine for executing machine readable code instructions” using “combinations of one or more of the above algorithmic determinations") as an additional element and are thus not directed to the judicial exception (by integrating the judicial exception into a practical application).
Examiner respectfully disagrees. Applicant notes at p.15 of the remarks that “as amended, independent claims 1, 8 and 15 describe a complicated and innovative computer algorithm”, which is none-the-less an abstract idea, as explained in detail at paragraph 8 above in this office action; the additional (computer) elements are merely used as a tool to implement the abstract idea, and therefore do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application (see in particular MPEP 2106.05(f)(1)). See also MPEP 2106.05(b)(1) (“It is important to note that a general purpose computer that applies a judicial exception, such as an abstract idea, by use of conventional computer functions does not qualify as a particular machine”).
Examiner also notes that, with regard to 35 U.S.C. 101, novelty does not necessarily equate with patent-eligibility, as pointed out by the Court in Ultramercial, Inc. v. Hulu, LLC, 772 F.3d 709, 714-15 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (“According to Ultramercial, abstract ideas remain patent-eligible under § 101 as long as they are new ideas, not previously well known, and not routine activity. ... We do not agree with Ultramercial that the addition of merely novel or non-routine components to the claimed idea necessarily turns an abstraction into something concrete.").
Conclusion
11. The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure.
Zaranyik et al. (US Patent Publication 20220382775 A1) describes a method and system for easy retrieval of information associated with the customer or group of related customers to be used to develop marketing campaigns and business development strategies that would be predicted to be effective for the customer or group of customers.
12. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SARJIT S BAINS whose telephone number is (571)270-0317. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9:30am-6:00pm.
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/SARJIT S BAINS/Examiner, Art Unit 3623 /RUTAO WU/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3623
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