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 .
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.
The Supreme Court has long held that “[l]aws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas are not patentable.” Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 134 S. Ct. 2347, 2354 (2014) (quoting Assoc. for Molecular Pathology v. Myriad Genetics, Inc., 133 S. Ct. 2107, 2116 (2013) (internal quotation marks omitted)). The “abstract ideas” category embodies the longstanding rule that an idea, by itself, is not patentable. Alice Corp., 134S. Ct. at 2355 (quoting Gottschalk v. Benson, 409 U.S. 63, 67 (1972).
In Alice, the Supreme Court sets forth an analytical “framework for distinguishing patents that claim laws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas [or mental processes ] from those that claim patent-eligible applications of those concepts.” Id. at 2355 (citing Mayo Collaborative Servs. v. Prometheus Labs., Inc., 132 S. Ct. 1289, 1296–97 (2012)). The first step in the analysis is to “determine whether the claims at issue are directed to one of those patent-ineligible concepts.” Id. If the claims are directed to a patent-ineligible concept, the second step in the analysis is to consider the elements of the claims “individually and ‘as an ordered combination’” to determine whether there are additional elements that “‘transform the nature of the claim’ into a patent-eligible application.” Id. (quoting Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1298, 1297). In other words, the second step is to “search for an ‘inventive concept’—i.e., an element or combination of elements that is ‘sufficient to ensure that the patent in practice amounts to significantly more than a patent upon the [ineligible concept] itself’”. Id. (brackets in original) (quoting Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 1294). The prohibition against patenting an abstract idea “‘cannot be circumvented by attempting to limit the use of the formula to a particular technological environment’ or adding ‘insignificant post-solution activity.’” Bilski v. Kappos, 561 U.S. 593, 610–11 (2010) (citation omitted).
Step 1: This part of the eligibility analysis evaluates whether the claim falls within any statutory category. See MPEP 2106.03. Independent Claim 1 recites the data processing system of evaluating responses provided by large language models to user product help inquiries, and thus is a system or apparatus. An apparatus is a statutory category of invention. Independent Claim 11 recites a method (a series of steps or acts) configured to execute a method similar to Claim 1. A method is a Statutory category of invention. Independent claim 18 recites a non-transitory computer readable medium similar to claims 1 and 11, and thus is statutory. Dependent claims 2-10, 12-17 and 19-20 are dependent on claims 1, 11 and 18, respectively, and therefore recite their respective statutory classes.
Step 2A, Prong One: This part of the eligibility analysis evaluates whether the claim recites a judicial exception. As explained in MPEP 2106.04, subsection II, a claim “recites” a judicial exception when the judicial exception is “set forth” or “described” in the claim. In applying the framework set out in Alice, examiner found Applicant’s claims 1, 11 and 18 are directed to a patent-ineligible abstract concept of evaluating responses provided by large language models to user product help inquiries. The steps of Applicant’s claims 1-20 are an abstract concept that would fall under the judicial exception of mental processes and mathematical concepts. Specifically, the claims recite the step of “receiving a product help inquiry provided via a user interface element of an application.” This claim limitation simply provides for receiving information which may be performed by a human in the mind or using pen and paper. Thus it is a mental process. Furthermore, the step of “generating a prompt, using a prompt generating engine, based on the product help inquiry for transmission as an input to a language model” recites steps that are directed to mental processes. Under the broadest reasonable interpretation, generating a prompt may simply involve using data transformation techniques to transform the received inquiry into a different form that can be input to a language model. Under broadest reasonable interpretation, such a transformation may be performed by a human using a set of rules to transform the data into a different form. Further, the claim recites “retrieving a response provided to the user query by the language model.” The claim does not place any limits on how the language model is applied. The language model may take the form of a human providing responses. Thus, under the broadest reasonable interpretation the claim elements are directed to mental processes. Further the claim recites “extracting an action path included in the response based on a context of the response, the action path comprising a sequence of terms included in the response, each term referring to an action for performing one or more tasks associated with the product help inquiry.” The claim does not place any limits on how the “extracting” is performed on the response. Under broadest reasonable interpretation, a verbal or textual response may be received and interpreted by a human to dissect each part of a response as multiple actions or tasks for the user to perform. Thus, the limitation recites a mental process. Furthermore, the limitation of “generating contextual embeddings for one or more terms of the extracted action path, the contextual embeddings taking a context of the product help inquiry into account,” does not appear to recite a mental process because generating contextual embeddings involves a process of data transformation of certain information into a high-dimensional vector that is typically produced through machine learning. However, the examiner finds that the claimed generating of contextual embeddings recites purely mathematical operations. The claim does not place any limits on how the context of the product help inquiry is taken “into account” to produce the contextual embeddings. Thus, the languages recites a mathematical concept. Further, the recitation “measuring a semantic similarity between the contextual embeddings for the extracted action path and embeddings generated for an expected response action path associated with the product help inquiry,” involves no more than a mathematical operation of data comparison. No limits are placed as to what kind of operations are used to produce the semantic similarity. Further, the claim recites “measuring a path coverage metric for the extracted action path.” The claim does not place any limits or even describes what kind of operations are involved in measuring the path coverage metric. Thus, the recited limitation appears to be no more than a mathematical concept. Finally, the step of “determining a total evaluation value for the extracted action path based on a weighted combination of one or more of the measured semantic similarity, path coverage metric, a path length metric or a path frequency metric” falls under the mathematical concepts grouping because, under broadest reasonable interpretation, the recited language simply involves a weighted combination of multiple metrics or values. The claims recite limitations that taken in combination, recite at least a series of mental processes and mathematical concepts, respectively. Regarding dependent claim 2, the claim recites a classification process and an identification of documentation, which under broadest reasonable interpretation, involves mental processes of interpreting language and finding relevant documentation. Regarding dependent claim 3, the claim involves extracting an expected response from the identified product documentation, which also recites a mental process of identifying relevant information from the documentation.
Regarding dependent claim 4, the claim involves examining product knowledge dataset, which also recites a mental process.
Regarding dependent claim 5, the claim involves comparing the path coverage metric to a threshold to determine accuracy of the response, which recites a mathematical concept. Regarding dependent claim 6, the claim involves “providing a notification to the application.” This limitation recites a mental process because a human can provide notifications that a response cannot be provided.
Regarding dependent claim 7, the claim describes that the contextual embeddings are a type of word representation that captures the context. The recitation does not place any limits on how meaning is captured or how the word is represented, therefore under broadest reasonable interpretation, this is simply a mental process. Regarding dependent claim 8, the claim recites a description of the total evaluation value which is simply a mathematical concept.
Regarding dependent claim 9, the claim recites that the language model is a large language model, which is a mental process. Regarding dependent claim 10, the claim recites “the path coverage metric is compared to a threshold value”, which is a mathematical concept. Regarding dependent claims 12-17 and 19-20, the claims further recite mental processes and mathematical algorithms. The recitation does not place any limits on the recited finetuning which involves a mental process.
Step 2A, Prong Two: This part of the eligibility analysis evaluates whether the claim as a whole integrates the recited judicial exception into a practical application of the exception. This evaluation is performed by (1) identifying whether there are any additional elements recited in the claim beyond the judicial exception, and (2) evaluating those additional elements individually and in combination to determine whether the claim as a whole integrates the exception into a practical application. See MPEP 2106.04(d). Furthermore, independent Claim 5 further recites “a processor; and a memory in communication with the processor, the memory comprising executable instructions…” as an additional element beyond the judicial exception. However, these additional elements do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea because the additional elements constitute a generic computer environment. Alice, 134 S. Ct. at 2357. The Claims need meaningful limitations that go beyond generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment. Therefore, the steps are all abstract and the Claim as a whole is abstract. “[S]imply appending generic computer functionality to lend speed or efficiency to the performance of an otherwise abstract concept does not meaningfully limit claim scope for purposes of patent eligibility.” CLS Bank, 2013 U.S. App. LEXIS 9493, at *29 (citing Bancorp, 687 F.3d at 1278, and Dealertrack, Inc. v. Huber, 674 F.3d 1315, 1333-34 (Fed. Cir. 2012) (finding that the claimed computer-aided clearinghouse process is a patent-ineligible abstract idea)); SiRF Tech., Inc. v. Int'l Trade Comm'n, 601 F.3d 1319, 1333 (Fed. Cir. 2010) (“In order for the addition of a machine to impose a meaningful limit on the scope of a claim, it must play a significant part in permitting the claimed method to be performed, rather than function solely as an obvious mechanism for permitting a solution to be achieved more quickly, i.e., through the utilization of a computer for performing calculations.”). Additionally, dependent claims 2-10, 12-17 and 19-20 do not provide any additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application. The claims simply describe further mental processes and mathematical algorithms without significantly more.
Step 2B: This part of the eligibility analysis evaluates whether the claim as a whole amounts to significantly more than the recited exception, i.e., whether any additional element, or combination of additional elements, adds an inventive concept to the claim. See MPEP 2106.05.
At step 2A, prong two, the additional elements of the “processor” and “memory” were found to be a generic computer environment. At Step 2B, the re-evaluation of the insignificant extra-solution activity consideration takes into account whether or not the extra-solution activity is well understood, routine, and conventional in the field. See MPEP 2106.05(g). Here, the processor and memory are recited in purely conventional and routine way such that the functionality is generic. Therefore, this limitation remains a generic computer environment even upon reconsideration and does not amount to significantly more. Even when considered in combination, these additional elements represent mere instructions to apply an exception and insignificant extra-solution activity, and therefore do not provide an inventive concept. Additionally, dependent claims 2-10, 12-17 and 19-20 do not add an inventive concept.
In conclusion, Examiner notes that none of recited steps in Applicant's claims 1-20 refer to a specific machine by reciting structural limitations of any apparatus or to any specific operations that would cause a machine to be the mechanism to perform these steps. Although the claims may be processed by a computing system having a processor, the computing system is merely a general purpose computing system. Therefore, all of the claims 1-20 are abstract.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. The prior art made of record and not relied upon includes: Shalmashi (US PG Pub 20240241902) describes systems and methods are disclosed herein efficient analysis of a (new) trouble report (TR) and providing a list of candidate answers. In one embodiment, a method performed by a computing device comprises obtaining a query from a trouble report, the query comprising text. The method further comprises pre-processing the query to provide a pre-processed query and applying the pre-processed query to a first representation-based model to provide a representation of the pre-processed query. The method further comprises computing similarity metrics between the representation of the pre-processed query and representations of pre-processed answers of existing, previously processed, trouble reports and creating an initial list of candidate answers based on the similarity metrics. The initial list of candidate answers comprises candidate answers selected from among answers of the existing trouble reports based on the similarity metrics (Shalmashi; Abstract).
Pean (US PG Pub 20240394176) describes a computer-implemented method, computer program product and computing system for: providing evaluation content to a target chatbot, wherein the evaluation content includes a plurality of inquiries and a plurality of anticipated responses; processing the plurality of inquiries on the target chatbot; receiving a plurality of generated responses from the target chatbot in response to the plurality of inquiries; and comparing the plurality of generated responses received from the target chatbot to the plurality of anticipated responses included within the evaluation content (Pean; Abstract).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Rodrigo A Chavez whose telephone number is (571)270-0139. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday 9-6 ET.
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/RODRIGO A CHAVEZ/Examiner, Art Unit 2658
/RICHEMOND DORVIL/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2658