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
Claims 1, 3-6, 8, 10-13, 15, and 17-18 are pending. Claims 1, 8, and 15 are amended. No new matter is added.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
1. 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 1,3-6,8,10-13,15,17-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
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Claims 1,3-8,10-15,17-18 are directed to a system, method, or product, which are statutory categires.
The Examiner has identified independent method Claim 1 as the claim that represents the claimed invention for analysis and is similar to Claim 8 and product Claim 15.
The abstract idea is predicting the ability of a payors to pay bills. It comprises the following abstract steps (the additional components beyond the abstract idea are highlighted in bold):
providing, through a user device, digital access to a payment server of a payment network to communicate with a payroll platform;
connecting, by the payment server, a payment account to the payroll platform using the digital access;
obtaining, using the payment server, data associated with employment and employment
tenure via the payment account of the customer via the payment network;
receiving, using the payment server, historical data collected from previous customer
activities on the payment network;
creating, using the payment server, a model based on the historical data;
predicting, using the payment server, whether the customer remains at a current employer
based on the data and the model;
limitations 1-5 above certain methods of modeling economic activity, an economic practice. If a claim limitation, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation as a fundamental economic practice, then it falls within the “Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity”. In the alternative, step 5 is directed to a mental step and steps 1-4 are directed to presolution activity.
Step 2A-2
The additional computer components for the representative claim are a payment server and network. Applying generic computer components to the recited abstract limitations. The recitation of generic computer components in a claim does not necessarily preclude that claim from reciting an abstract idea.
Mere instructions to an abstract idea on a computer or merely using a computer as a took to perform the abstract idea are not indicative of integration in to a practical application.
Additional elements can integrate a judicial exception into a practical application when they (i) improve the functioning of a computer or some\other technology, (ii) implement or use the judicial exceptions
in conjunction with particular machines or manufactures that are integral to the claim, (iii) transform or reduce a particular article to a different state or thing, or (iv) do more than merely link the judicial exceptions to a particular technological environment.
The claimed judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. The user device, payment server and network are described as computer hardware/software recited at a high-level of generality (as a generic processor performing a generic computer function), such that it amounts no more than mere instructions to apply it exception using a generic computer component. Accordingly, the additional elements of do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea and are at a high level of generality. Therefore, claims 1,8,15 are directed to an abstract idea without a practical application.
Step 2B of the eligibility
Another consideration when determining whether a claim recites significantly more than a judicial exception is whether the additional element(s) are well-understood, routine, conventional activities previously known to the industry.
The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because, when considered separately and as an ordered combination, they do not add significantly more (also Known as an “inventive concept’) to the exception. As discussed above
with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional element of using a computer hardware amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component. Mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic computer component cannot provide an inventive concept. See Applicant's specification para. [0084][0109] about implantation using general purpose or special purpose computing devices and MPEP 2106.05(f) where applying a computer as a tool is not indicative of significantly more as well as MPEP 2106.05(q).
Moreover, it is conventional to use employment and employment tenure as variables. See, Tess Forsell, literature review beginning at page 44 ,
The research most similar to this paper is Zagorsky and Lupica (2008). They compare the
financial characteristics of bankruptcy filers and non-filers. Ordinary least squares models compare weeks worked, wages, total income, net worth, equity, and savings. A logit model is used to compare the likelihood that a filer or a non-filer owns a vehicle, has vehicle debt, owns a home, has a mortgage, has savings, has a credit card, and works full-time. The authors control for many of the characteristics that impact these outcome variables in order to isolate the impact of bankruptcy. Their data, like this study, is drawn from the National Longitudinal Survey of
Youth 1979. They find that “bankruptcy filers are more likely to be employed in a full-time job and work more weeks each year than non-filers. While they earn less and have less total income immediately after bankruptcy, they catch up with nonfiling peers approximately 13 years after receiving a discharge”.
The dependent claims further define the abstract idea that is present in their respective independent claims and thus correspond to the same abstract idea and hence are abstract for the reasons presented above.
Response to Arguments
The applicant argues that claim 1 is not directed towards any methods of organizing human activity in the form of an economic practice. These limitations are specific technological components operating in a defined manner to establish payment network functionality between previously unconnected systems. The examiner disagrees. The claims are directed to modeling managing linked banking accounts which is a fundamental economic practice and is not meaningfully different from other economic practices held as judicial exception. Guidance 52 (indicating as abstract "[certain methods of organizing human activity" such as "fundamental economic principles or practices (including hedging [and]. mitigating risk)"). In the alternative the limitation are directed to a mental processes.
Applicant argues that claim 1 provides for a practical application in the form of improving payment network functionality. The argument states that the integration of previously disparate technological systems, including the user device, payment server, payment network, and payroll platform, represents a concrete improvement to the functioning of payment networks themselves by allowing for communications between these systems to generate data associated with employment and employment tenure previously unobtainable. The examiner disagrees as the limitation fall within the apply it framework.
The applicant next argues that claim 1 does not invoke computers or other machinery merely as a tool to perform an existing process. This argument is not persuasive as it argues the abstract idea without argument directed to any improvement to the individual components.
The applicant argues that the computer components include an unconventional arrangement of these components as recited in claim 1. The examiner does not find this argument to be persuasive as the arrangement, if any, is a function of the abstract idea and does not amount to a technological improvement to the process as a whole.
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RICHARD C WEISBERGER whose telephone number is (571)272-6753. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Thursday 10AM-8PM PCT.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Mike Anderson can be reached on 571-270-0580. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/RICHARD C WEISBERGER/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3693
