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 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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 10/16/2025 has been entered.
3. The following is a non-Final Office Action. In response to Examiner’s Final Action of 07/16/2025, Applicant amended Claims 1, 3, 5, 10, 12, 14, 19 and 20. Claims 2, 6-9, 11 and 15-18 are as originally or previously presented; and Claims 4 and 13 were previously canceled.
Claims 1-3, 5-12 and 14-20 are 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.
6. The prior 35 USC §103 rejection of Claims withdrawn in light of Applicant's amendments and arguments.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
7. 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.
8. Claims 1-3, 5-12 and 14-20 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because, although they are drawn to statutory categories of method (process), system (machine) or medium (manufacture), they are also directed to a judicial exception (an abstract idea) without significantly more.
9. At Step 2A Prong One of the subject matter eligibility analysis, Claim 1 recites A method of providing feedback to a contact center agent, comprising: selecting a contact center agent from a plurality of contact center agents; performing an evaluation of the agent, wherein the evaluation comprises: selecting one or more agent skills from a plurality of agent skills assigned to the call center agent; identifying one or more key performance targets for the agent; assigning key performance indicator (KPI) values to the plurality of key performance targets for the agent; assigning a pursuit targeted to one or more of the key performance targets, wherein the pursuit comprises one or more objectives to motivate and evaluate the agent, and wherein a completion of the pursuits is measured based on weights assigned to a change score, a completion score, and a speed score for the user; measuring the KPI values for the key performance targets for the agent after the completion of the pursuit; calculating a pursuit effectiveness score to the pursuit based on the weights, wherein the pursuit effectiveness score is calculated based on a weighted average of a change score representing a change in KPI values from before and after completion of the pursuit, a completion score representing a degree of completion of the pursuit, and a speed score representing the speed with which the pursuit was completed; determining one or more scoring thresholds; calculating contributions of the key performance targets to the pursuit effectiveness score; identifying an additional agent skill for the agent based on the contributions; replicating an additional pursuit targeted to one of key performance targets for the additional agent skill identified; assigning the agent additional training based on the pursuit effectiveness score, the one or more scoring thresholds, and the additional pursuit; and modifying the pursuit assigned to the agent based on the additional training, wherein the modifying includes adjusting the weights assigned to the change score, the completion score, and the speed score for the user, which is an abstract idea of Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity – 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), because selecting a contact center agent is a business process for mitigating economic risk, and involves business relations and managing interactions between people; furthermore, it is also an abstract idea of Mental Processes – concepts performed in the human mind (including an observation, evaluation, judgment, opinion), because performing an evaluation of the agent is a process that, under broadest reasonable interpretation, can be performed in the mind, since it involves observation, evaluation, judgment or opinion. Claims 10 and 19 recite the same abstract idea.
At Step 2A Prong Two of the analysis for independent Claim 1, the judicial exception (abstract idea) is not integrated into a practical application because independent Claim 1 does not include additional elements, and is therefore directed to the abstract idea.
At Step 2A Prong Two of the analysis for independent Claims 10 and 19, the judicial exception (abstract idea) is not integrated into a practical application because these independent Claims, including additional elements such as a processor and computer readable medium operably coupled thereto, the computer readable medium comprising a plurality of instructions stored in association therewith that are accessible to, and executable by, the processor, A non-transitory computer-readable medium having stored thereon computer-readable instructions, 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). Independent Claims 10 and 19 are therefore also directed to the abstract idea.
At Step 2B of the analysis for independent Claim 1, the Claim does not include additional elements and therefore does not amount to significantly more than the judicial exception (abstract idea).
At Step 2B of the analysis for independent Claims 10 and 19, the independent Claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception (abstract idea), because these 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 Figures 1, 6 of the Drawings and paragraphs 30-33 and 74-78 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").
At Step 2A Prong One, dependent Claims 2, 3, 5-9, 11, 12, 14-18 and 20 incorporate (and therefore recite) the abstract idea noted in independent Claims from which they depend, and further recite extensions of that abstract idea.
At Step 2A Prong Two for dependent Claims 2, 3 and 5-9, the judicial exception (abstract idea) is not integrated into a practical application because these Claims do not include additional elements and are therefore directed to the abstract idea
At Step 2A Prong Two, dependent Claims 11, 12, 14-18 and 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 from which they depend.
At Step 2B, dependent Claims 2, 3 and 5-9 do not include additional elements and therefore do not amount to significantly more than the judicial exception (abstract idea).
At Step 2B, dependent Claims 11, 12, 14-18 and 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 from which they depend.
Therefore, Claims 1-3, 5-12 and 14-20 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
10. Applicant's arguments filed 10/16/2025 have been fully considered; they are found persuasive with regard to the 35 U.S.C. 103 rejection, which has therefore been withdrawn, but they are found not persuasive with regard to the 35 U.S.C. 101 rejection.
11. Examiner agrees with Applicant that the claims are statutory, at Step 1 of the subject matter analysis, as explained above at paragraph 8 of this office action. Nevertheless, at Step 2A Prong One of the analysis, the claim language recites an abstract idea (see paragraph 9 of the this office action, above).
12. Applicant argues (at pp. 9-11) that the amended claim language integrates the judicial exception (abstract idea) into a practical application at Step 2A Prong Two of the subject matter eligibility analysis because “The claims provide specific improvements in technology .. that improves over the prior systems”.
Examiner respectfully disagrees. As explained in detail at paragraph 9 above in this Office Action, the Claims recite an abstract idea (falling under the abstract idea groupings of Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity and also of Mental Processes) at Step 2A Prong One; at Step 2A Prong Two, the use of a computer system simply as a tool to implement the abstract idea is not sufficient to integrate the judicial exception into a practical application - see MPEP 2106.05(f); the Claims are therefore directed to the judicial exception, and are thus ineligible for patent under 35 U.S.C. 101.
13. Applicant also argues that “the features recited in the claims provide a system to more intelligently assign an agent a pursuit for completion, as well as track and determine the agent's progress toward completion of this pursuit”, and thus these features integrate the abstract idea into a practical application at Step 2A Prong Two.
Examiner respectfully disagrees, and notes that these features are part of the abstract idea and not additional (technology) elements at Step 2A Prong Two of the analysis. Examiner also notes that an improvement in the abstract idea alone does not overcome 35 U.S.C. 101. As noted at MPEP 2106.04(I), “The Supreme Court’s decisions make it clear that judicial exceptions need not be old or long-prevalent, and that even newly discovered or novel judicial exceptions are still exceptions. .. Flook, 437 U.S. at 591-92, 198 USPQ2d at 198 ("the novelty of the mathematical algorithm is not a determining factor at all")“.
Conclusion
14. The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure.
Dwyer et al. (US Patent Publication 20190245973 A1) describes a contact center agent coaching tool.
15. 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