DETAILED ACTION
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 .
Status of Claims
Claims 1-20 have been examined.
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 a judicial exception (i.e., a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea) without significantly more.
In the instance case, claims 1-11 are directed to a system, claims 12-19 are directed to a method and claim 20 directed to non-transitory computer readable media. Therefore, these claims fall within the four statutory categories of invention.
The claims are directed to determining energy need and how to offset or compensate which is an abstract idea. Claims recite “determining…an estimated environmental impact profile…; transmitting…to perform a plurality of operations…; updating the estimated environmental impact profile…; and transmitting…to transfer…based on the estimated environmental impact profile…” which is grouped within the “certain methods of organizing human activity” grouping of abstract ideas in prong one of step 2A of the Alice/Mayo test (MPEP 2106) because the claims involve a series of steps of determining an estimated environmental impact profile (i.e. energy usage), transmitting instructions to perform operations, updating the energy usage and transmitting the instructions to offset energy usage which is a process that deals with commercial interactions such as business relations. Accordingly, the claims recite an abstract idea (See MPEP 2106.05).
This judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because, when analyzed under prong two of step 2A of the Alice/Mayo test (See MPEP 2106), the additional elements of the claims such as, processor, non transitory media, communication interface, storage system, smart contract, blockchain and database system, merely use a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea. Specifically, processor, non transitory media, communication interface, storage system, smart contract, blockchain and database system perform the steps of determining an estimated environmental impact profile (i.e. energy usage), transmitting instructions to perform operations, updating the energy usage and transmitting the instructions to offset energy usage. The use of a processor/computer as a tool to implement the abstract idea does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it requires no more than a computer performing functions that correspond to acts required to carry out the abstract idea. The additional elements do not involve improvements to the functioning of a computer, or to any other technology or technical field (MPEP 2106.05(a)), the claims do not apply or use the abstract idea to effect a particular treatment or prophylaxis for a disease or medical condition (Vanda Memo), the claims do not apply the abstract idea with, or by use of, a particular machine (MPEP 2106.05(b)), the claims do not effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing (MPEP 2106.05(c)), and the claims do not apply or use the abstract idea in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the abstract idea to a particular technological environment, such that the claim as a whole is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception (MPEP 2106.05(e) and Vanda Memo). Therefore, the claims do not, for example, purport to improve the functioning of a computer. Nor do they effect an improvement in any other technology or technical field. Accordingly, the additional elements do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea, and the claims are directed to an abstract idea.
The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because, when analyzed under step 2B of the Alice/Mayo test (See MPEP 2106), the additional elements of processor, non transitory media, communication interface, storage system, smart contract, blockchain and database system, to perform the steps amounts to no more than using a computer or processor to automate and/or implement the abstract idea of a transaction processing. As discussed above, taking the claim elements separately, processor, non transitory media, communication interface, storage system, smart contract, blockchain and database system perform the steps of determining an estimated environmental impact profile (i.e. energy usage), transmitting instructions to perform operations, updating the energy usage and transmitting the instructions to offset energy usage. These functions correspond to the actions required to perform the abstract idea. Viewed as a whole, the combination of elements recited in the claims merely recite the concept of determining energy need and how to offset or compensate. Therefore, the use of these additional elements does no more than employ the computer as a tool to automate and/or implement the abstract idea. The use of a computer or processor to merely automate and/or implement the abstract idea cannot provide significantly more than the abstract idea itself (MPEP 2106.05(I)(A)(f) & (h)). Therefore, the claim is not patent eligible.
Dependent claim further describes the abstract idea of determining energy need and how to offset or compensate. Claims 2-3 and 13-14 describing the estimated environmental impact and updated estimate which is part of the abstract idea. Claims 4-6 and 15-17 describing the token and determining the current token value based on the environmental impact which is part of the abstract idea of determining energy need and how to offset or compensate. Claims 7-11 and 18-19 describing data storage and authentication which is part of the abstract idea. The dependent claim does not include additional elements that integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or that provide significantly more than the abstract idea. Therefore, the dependent claim is also not patent eligible.
Conclusion
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/ZESHAN QAYYUM/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3697