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 .
DETAILED ACTION
Status of Claims
Claim(s) 8-12, 14-18 have been examined.
Claim(s) 1-7, 13 have been canceled.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim(s) 8-12, 14-18 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Johnson (US 2014/0122203) in view of Miltonberger (US 2006/0010252) in further view of Soto (US 2011/0004533).
Referring to Claim 8, Johnson teaches a method for supporting product purchase from overseas, comprising:
receiving a request for a purchase support module which supports overseas purchase of a product of an electronic commerce EC site from a user terminal (see Johnson ¶0025, a shopping cart object which is a bookmarklet in the user’s browser and receives a user click for activation);
wherein the purchase support module is configured to send purchase information input for purchasing a certain product to a proxy server of an operator performing substitute purchase of a product of the EC site, different from the server providing the EC site (see Johnson ¶0036, the shopping cart object sends the purchase request to the shopping cart server, which acts as a proxy server which completes the purchase with the ecommerce site on behalf of the customer), when (a) the country of the location is included in the deliverable countries of the operator performing substitute purchase and (b) an intention to purchase the certain product is indicated (see Johnson ¶0030 and Fig. 4-5).
Johnson does not teach discerning a country of a location from which the user terminal made access to send the country of the location to the user terminal. However, Miltonberger teaches discerning the country of the location (see Miltonberger ¶¶0061,66,70, the system checks the user’s IP address and confirms they are from an allowed country, otherwise the request is rejected). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of invention to combine these references because it would reduce fraud and the results would be predictable. Specifically, fraud would be reduced because users from countries with a lot of fraud could be blocked. In addition, the results would be predictable because Johnson would continue to teach a system supporting product purchase, except that now there would be added security by the country discernment check as taught by Miltonberger. This is a predictable result of the combination.
The combination does not explicitly teach generating the purchase support module which is adapted to the EC site by using setting information of the EC site and then sending the purchase support module to the user terminal. However, Soto teaches generating a purchase support module (see Soto ¶¶0043,153, a VSA is generated which is a web store represented as a contained application) which is adapted to an EC site by using setting information of the EC site (see Soto ¶0095, the VSA is linked directly back to the merchant and market site) and then sending the purchase support module to a user terminal (see Soto ¶0148, the VSA can be distributed to one or more devices such as a smart phone).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of invention to combine these references because the results would be predictable. Specifically, the combination would continue to teach a purchase support module which would facilitate the purchase of products except that now that purchase support module would be generated and adapted to the EC site by using setting information of the EC site and send to the user terminal according to the teachings of Soto. This is a predictable result of the combination.
Referring to Claim 9, the combination teaches the method according to claim 8, wherein the purchase support module is further configured to send the purchase information only when (c) the country of the location is not included in the prohibited countries of the EC site (see Miltonberger ¶0061, a rule instructs the application to deny the user’s request if it is determined that the user is in a restricted country or a country determined to be particularly susceptible to fraud; ¶0071, the list of disallowed locations is supplied by, and is specific to, that site’s application which sells the product in question).
Referring to Claim 10, the combination teaches the method according to claim 8, wherein the purchase support module is further configured to send the purchase information only when (c) the country of the location is not included in the prohibited countries of the certain product (see Miltonberger ¶0061, a rule instructs the application to deny the user’s request if it is determined that the user is in a restricted country or a country determined to be particularly susceptible to fraud; ¶0071, the list of disallowed locations is supplied by, and is specific to, that site’s application which sells the product in question).
Referring to Claims 11-17, these claims are similar to claims 8-10 and are therefore rejected under the same reasons and rationale. As for claim 17 which recites multiple servers, these are taught in Johnson Fig. 5.
Referring to Claim 18, the combination teaches a system for supporting product purchases from overseas, comprising: a user terminal and the apparatus according to claim 14 (see claim 14).
Response to Arguments
In regards to the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant’s amendments have overcome those rejections.
In regards to the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 101, the applicant respectfully argues on page 7 of the remarks that the claims cannot be characterized as a commercial or legal interaction because the limitation of “generating a software module” is software engineering and not a commercial interaction. The examiner agrees that the limitation in question is not part of the abstract idea, but that does not preclude other elements in the claim from comprising the abstract idea. For this reason, the applicant’s arguments are not persuasive.
In regards to the rejections under 35 U.S.C. 101, the applicant respectfully argues on page 8-9 of the remarks that the claims recite an improvement to technology, namely how major system upgrades are needed for EC sites to support cross-border selling on their own and so the claimed improvement is “maintaining setting information for each EC site and generating a purchase support module adapted to that particular site based on its setting information.” The examiner disagrees that this is an improvement technology or a technical field. The applicant is simply identifying the configuration a particular site needs and then using that configuration when the site is contacted, which is not an improvement to technology or a technical field. For this reason, the applicant’s arguments are not persuasive.
In regards to the applicant’s arguments regarding the prior art rejections, these arguments are moot as a new rejection has been made because of the amended limitations.
For these reasons, the applicant’s arguments are not persuasive.
Conclusion
Additional prior art relevant to the application but not relied upon include:
Perrochon (US 2007/0299736) teaches distributed commerce with virtual shopping carts.
Reference U (see PTO-892) teaches cross border e-commerce.
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). 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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MATTHEW E ZIMMERMAN whose telephone number is (571)270-5278. The examiner can normally be reached 8-4pm M-T, 8-12pm W.
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, Jeff Smith can be reached at (571)272-6763. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/MATTHEW E ZIMMERMAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3688
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