DETAILED ACTION
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 .
Response to Arguments
2. Applicant filed the amendment on 10/03/2025. Claims 1-20 are pending. Claims 4, 7, 10, 13, 16, and 20 are amended. Claims 1-20 are rejected. After careful consideration of applicant arguments, the examiner finds them to be not persuasive.
Specification
3. Objections to the specification are withdrawn.
Rejection under 35 USC § 101
4. Applicant’s arguments toward 35 U.S.C. § 101 rejection is not persuasive. Applicant is of the opinion that the amendments to claims overcome 35 U.S.C. § 101 rejections.
Examiner respectfully disagrees.
Amendments to independent claims do not address to rejections, thus rejections are sustained. Claims as a whole directed to analyzing insurance data which is grouped under “Certain methods of organizing human activity” (e.g., fundamental economic practices) and “Mathematical concepts – mathematical calculations”.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC §112
5. The rejections under 35 USC § 112(a) and § 112(b) are withdrawn.
Rejection under 35 USC § 102
6. The rejections of claims 7-18 under 35 USC § 102 are withdrawn.
Rejection under 35 USC § 103
7 Applicant’s argument that Peak et al. in combination with Adjaoute do not teach “analyzing performance of a target vehicle insurance carrier relative to a plurality of sample insurance carriers by comparing target vehicle insurance claim data of the target vehicle insurance carrier with a synthetic peer data set” is persuasive.
The rejections of claims 1-20 under 35 USC § 103 are withdrawn.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC §101
10. 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.
11. Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception (i.e., a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea) without significantly more.
12. In the instant case, claims 1, 7, and 13 are directed to a “method, system, and a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium for analyzing insurance data”.
13. Claim 1 recites “analyzing insurance data”. Specifically, claim recites “obtaining… vehicle insurance claim data from … to a plurality of sample insurance carriers in a plurality of geographic regions, the vehicle insurance claim data specifying a vehicle data, geographic data related to the vehicle data, and time data representing time periods during which the vehicle data was recorded; categorizing … the obtained vehicle insurance claim data into a plurality of strata; mapping … the categorized vehicle insurance claim data to corresponding geographic regions; aggregating … the categorized vehicle insurance claim data based on the mapped geographic regions; determining … a sampling threshold value based on one or more threshold rules; determining … that a number of samples in the aggregated vehicle insurance claim data meets the determined sampling threshold value; clustering … the aggregated vehicle insurance claim data into a plurality of clusters based on at least one of the vehicle data, the geographic data, and time data according to …; generating … by sampling the clustered aggregated vehicle insurance claim data; generating … on the plurality of component synthetic peer data sets; analyzing …performance of a target vehicle insurance carrier relative to the plurality of sample insurance carriers by comparing target vehicle insurance claim data of the target vehicle insurance carrier with the synthetic peer data set; and presenting … results of the comparison between the target vehicle insurance claim data and the synthetic peer data set in a graphical representation … provided to…”. Subject matter grouped under “Certain methods of organizing human activity” (e.g., fundamental economic practices), “Mathematical concepts – mathematical calculations”, and an abstract idea in prong one of step 2A (MPEP 2106.04(a)).
14. This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because, when analyzed under prong two of step 2A (MPEP 2106.04 II), the additional elements of the claim 1 such as “a processor of a computing device”, “a plurality of data source systems”, “a data clustering algorithm”, “generating, by the processor of the computing device, a plurality of component synthetic peer data sets”, “generating, by the processor of the computing device, a synthetic peer data set by applying a bootstrap aggregation machine learning algorithm”, “a graphical user interface”, and “a client computing device” represent the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and/or does no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. Therefore, the additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application as they do no more than represent a computer performing functions that correspond to (i.e., automate) the acts of analyzing insurance data. With respect to “obtaining, by a processor of a computing device, vehicle insurance claim data from a plurality of data source systems, the plurality data source systems corresponding to a plurality of sample insurance carriers in a plurality of geographic regions, the vehicle insurance claim data specifying a vehicle data, geographic data related to the vehicle data, and time data representing time periods during which the vehicle data was recorded” is simply transmitting data “[use] of a computer or other machinery in its ordinary capacity for economic or other tasks (e.g., to receive, store, or transmit data) … does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application or provide significantly more”, (MPEP 2106.05(f)(2)).
15. When analyzed under step 2B (MPEP 2106.04 II), the claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception itself. Viewed as a whole, the combination of elements recited in the claims merely describe the concept of analyzing insurance data using computer technology (e.g., the processor). Therefore, the use of these additional elements does no more than employ a computer as a tool to automate and/or implement the abstract idea, which cannot provide significantly more than the abstract idea itself (MPEP 2106.05(I)(A)(f) & (h)).
16. Hence, claim 1 is not patent eligible.
17. Claims 7 and 13 also recite “analyzing insurance data”. Subject matter grouped under “Certain methods of organizing human activity” (e.g., fundamental economic practices), “Mathematical concepts – mathematical calculations”, and an abstract idea in prong one of step 2A (MPEP 2106.04(a)).
18. As in the case of claim 1, the judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because when analyzed under prong two of step 2A (MPEP 2106.04 II), the additional elements of the claims 7 and 13 such as “a processor”, “memory”, “a plurality of data source systems”, “a data clustering algorithm”, “generating a plurality of component synthetic peer data sets”, “generating a synthetic peer data set by applying a bootstrap aggregation machine learning algorithm”, “a graphical user interface”, “a client computing device”, and “a non-transitory machine-readable storage medium” represent the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and/or does no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. Therefore, the additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application as they do no more than represent a computer performing functions that correspond to (i.e., automate) the acts of analyzing insurance data. With respect to “obtaining vehicle insurance claim data from a plurality of data source systems, the plurality data source systems corresponding to a plurality of sample insurance carriers in a plurality of geographic regions, the vehicle insurance claim data specifying a vehicle data, geographic data related to the vehicle data, and time data representing time periods during which the vehicle data was recorded” is simply transmitting data “[use] of a computer or other machinery in its ordinary capacity for economic or other tasks (e.g., to receive, store, or transmit data) … does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application or provide significantly more”, (MPEP 2106.05(f)(2)).
19. When analyzed under step 2B (MPEP 2106.04 II), the claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception itself. Viewed as a whole, the combination of elements recited in the claims merely describe the concept of analyzing insurance data using computer technology (e.g., the processor). Therefore, the use of these additional elements does no more than employ a computer as a tool to automate and/or implement the abstract idea, which cannot provide significantly more than the abstract idea itself (MPEP 2106.05(I)(A)(f) & (h)).
20. Hence, claims 7 and 13 are not patent eligible.
21. Dependent claim 2 further describes the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as recites “wherein the categorizing … the obtained vehicle insurance claim data is based on one or more data categorizing rules”. The additional element such as “the computing device” represents the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and does no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. And, therefore, do not improve the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field.
Dependent claim 3 further describes the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as recites “performing … data validation to the generated …”. The additional elements such as “the computing device” and “synthetic peer data sets” represent the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and do no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. And, therefore, do not improve the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field.
Dependent claim 4 further describes the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as recites “integrating … with … executing … and wherein the vehicle insurance claim data is obtained through …”. The additional elements such as “the computing device”, “an insurance claim application”, and “the plurality of data sources systems” represent the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and do no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. And, therefore, do not improve the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field.
Dependent claim 5 further describes the abstract idea of mathematical calculations as recites “generating … a subset of vehicle insurance data from the obtained vehicle insurance claim data by removing invalid vehicle insurance data and vehicle insurance data including one or more null values”. The additional element such as “the computing device” represents the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and does no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. And, therefore, do not improve the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field.
Dependent claims 6, 12, and 18 further describe the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as each recites “wherein the strata including a vehicle data stratum, a geographic data stratum, and a time data stratum”.
Dependent claims 8 and 14 further describe the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as each recites “wherein the categorizing the obtained vehicle insurance claim data is based on one or more data categorizing rules”.
Dependent claims 9 and 15 further describe the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as each recites “wherein the instructions further cause … to perform data validation to the …”. The additional elements such as “the processor” and “the synthetic peer data set” represent the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and do no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. And, therefore, do not improve the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field.
Dependent claims 10 and 16 further describe the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as each recites “wherein the instructions further cause … to integrate with … executing … and wherein the vehicle insurance claim data is obtained through …”. The additional elements such as “the processor”, “an insurance claim application”, and “the plurality of data source systems” represent the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and do no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. And, therefore, do not improve the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field.
Dependent claim 11 further describes the abstract idea of mathematical calculations as recites “generating … a subset of vehicle insurance data from the obtained vehicle insurance claim data by removing invalid vehicle insurance data and vehicle insurance data including one or more null values”. The additional element such as “the computing device” represents the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and does no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. And, therefore, do not improve the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field.
Dependent claim 17 further describes the abstract idea of mathematical calculations as recites “wherein the instructions further cause … to generate a subset of vehicle insurance data from the obtained vehicle insurance claim data by removing invalid vehicle insurance data and vehicle insurance data including one or more null values”. The additional element such as “the processor” represents the use of a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea and does no more than generally link the abstract idea to a particular field of use. And, therefore, do not improve the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field.
Dependent claim 19 further describes the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as recites “wherein the synthetic peer data set comprises characteristics of vehicle insurance claim data distribution matching characteristics of vehicle insurance claim data distribution of the target vehicle insurance carrier”.
Dependent claim 20 further describes the abstract idea of analyzing insurance data as recites “wherein analyzing performance of the target vehicle insurance carrier relative to the plurality of sample insurance carriers further comprises comparing performance for the target vehicle insurance carrier and a corresponding synthetic peer represented in the synthetic peer dataset for the vehicle data, geographic data, and a time period represented in the time data”.
Conclusion
22. The claims as a whole do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself. This is because the claims do not affect an improvement to another technology or technical field; the claims do not amount to an improvement to the functioning of a computer system itself; and the claims do not move beyond a general link of the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment.
23. Accordingly, there are no meaningful limitations in the claims that transform the judicial exception into a patent eligible application such that the claims amount to significantly more than the judicial exception itself.
Conclusion
24. The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
US20160078367A1 – Adjaoute – Discloses a method that improves the training of predictive models, wherein the trained predictive models make better predictions, and can classify transactions with reduced levels of false positives and false negative.
US20110161116A1 – Peak et al. – Discloses insurance systems, methods and devices for storing, updating and providing access to loss risk score data, and for retrieving the loss risk score data.
US20180018590A1 – Szeto et al. – Discloses a machine learning system for generating deterministic sets of proxy data, by using a seed for a pseudo random number.
US20210358046A1 – Roll – Discloses a system and methods for automatically providing consumers with insurance policies that offer superior rates and/or product features on a continuing basis.
US20140039937A1 – Murphy – Discloses a system and method for the capture, storage and usage of specific insurance underwriting and/or loss validation data includes a handheld mobile computer device containing one or more master forms in which insurance data is entered into the handheld device, normally at the location of the insured home along with an electronic signature of the insured and a geocode and time/date stamp.
US20130317860A1 – Schumann, Jr. – Discloses an insurance quotation management system for administering and managing insurance quotations through a graphical user interface, wherein the system is configured to interface with third party data to provide insurance quotations based on input from a predictive model and data which may include social network information.
US20160004685A1 – Tawade – Discloses a method and apparatus for retrieving and presenting insurance data from a legacy insurance data archiving system receives insurance data originating from legacy data storage of the legacy insurance data archiving system.
25. THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
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.
26. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to AMANULLA ABDULLAEV whose telephone number is (571)272-4367. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 9:30AM -4:30PM ET.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Donlon Ryan D. can be reached at 571-270-3602. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/AMANULLA ABDULLAEV/ Examiner, Art Unit 3692
/RYAN D DONLON/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3692