DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Claims 1-20 are currently pending.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
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 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea under the grouping “mental processes” as outlined by the 2019 PEG without significantly more. The claims recite a system, method, and non-transitory computer readable medium, each directed to the steps of receiving depth data, receiving grayscale image data, determining one or more parameters, and determining a reliability of the depth data. In the determining limitations recited in claims 1, 11, and 20, there is nothing that precludes the steps from being performed in the mind. The steps of receiving the depth data and grayscale image data amount to insufficient extra-solution activity.
Thus, the claim steps of receiving depth data, receiving grayscale image data, determining one or more parameters, and determining a reliability of the depth data do not equate to more than the manipulation of mathematical data. Viewed as a whole, these claim elements do not provide meaningful limitations to transform the abstract idea into a patent eligible application of the abstract idea such that the claims amount to significantly more than the abstract idea itself.
If a claim limitation, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of the limitation in the mind but for the recitation of generic computer components, then it falls within the “Mental Process” grouping of abstract ideas. Accordingly, the claim recites an abstract idea. All the steps of the independent claims can be mentally performed by a human. Claims 2-10 and 12-19 do not add significantly more.
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application, because the claims are directed to an abstract idea of mental processes and do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception.
Conclusion
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/MARISA V CONLON/Examiner, Art Unit 3643