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 .
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 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.
Introduction
Claims 21-40 are pending and have been examined in this Office Action.
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 04/17/2026 has been entered.
Examiner’s Note
Examiner has cited particular paragraphs / columns and line numbers or figures in the references as applied to the claims below for the convenience of the applicant. Although the specified citations are representative of the teachings in the art and are applied to the specific limitations within the individual claim, other passages and figures may apply as well. It is respectfully requested from the applicant, in preparing the responses, to fully consider the references in their entirety as potentially teaching all or part of the claimed invention, as well as the context of the passage as taught by the prior art or disclosed by the examiner. Applicant is reminded that the Examiner is entitled to give the broadest reasonable interpretation to the language of the claims. Furthermore, the Examiner is not limited to Applicants' definition which is not specifically set forth in the disclosure.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 21-26, 29, 30, 33, 35, 36, and 40 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) as anticipated by 2017/0098377 to Marco et al.
As per claim 21, Marco discloses A computer-implemented method comprising:
receiving, at one or more servers from a passenger computing device associated with a passenger of a transportation system, a transportation request (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 17, 38, 40, and 41);
determining, via the one or more servers, that the transportation request corresponds to an event and an event location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 38, 40, and 41);
monitoring global positioning system (GPS) data corresponding to the passenger computing device to determine a location of the passenger computing device and movement of the passenger computing device (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40);
determining, based on monitoring the GPS data, an updated location of the passenger computing device indicating that the passenger computing device has arrived at the event location corresponding to the event (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40);
updating a pickup location associated with the transportation request based on the updated location of the passenger computing device so that the pickup location corresponds to the updated location of the passenger computing device at the event location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 43); and
in response to determining the updated location indicating that the passenger computing device has arrived at the event location corresponding to the event (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40):
providing, via the one or more servers for display to a user interface of the passenger computing device, a notification regarding the transportation request and the updated pickup location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40);
pairing, via the one or more servers and from among a plurality of driver computing devices associated with the transportation system, a driver computing device with the passenger computing device (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 41); and
navigating the driver computing device to the updated pickup location to fulfill the transportation request to transport the passenger from the event location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 69).
As per claim 22, Marco discloses wherein updating the pickup location associated with the transportation request further comprises updating, in response to determining the updated location indicating that the passenger computing device has arrived at the event location corresponding to the event, the pickup location associated with the transportation request based on the updated location of the passenger computing device (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40 and 43).
As per claim 23, Marco discloses further comprising generating, based on determining that the transportation request corresponds to the event and the event location, a scheduled entry for the transportation request (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 38 and 41).
As per claim 24, Marco discloses further comprising updating, in response to determining the updated location indicating that the passenger computing device has arrived at the event location corresponding to the event, the scheduled entry for the transportation request based on the updated pickup location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40 and 43).
As per claim 25, Marco discloses wherein determining that the transportation request corresponds to the event comprises identifying event information for the event within the transportation request (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 38 and 41).
As per claim 26, Marco discloses wherein determining that the transportation request corresponds to the event comprises: identifying event information within a digital file of the passenger computing device; and determining a likelihood that the passenger is going to attend the event based on the event information within the digital file (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 38-40 and 44-46).
As per claims 29, 35, and 40, Marco discloses further comprising selecting the driver computing device, via the one or more servers, from among the plurality of driver computing devices associated with the transportation system by reserving, based on a time of the event, the driver computing device by temporarily limiting transportation requests transmitted to the driver computing device (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 81 and 82).
As per claim 30, Marco discloses a non-transitory computer readable medium comprising instructions that, when executed by at least one processor (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 18 and 24), cause a computing device to:
receive, from a passenger computing device associated with a passenger of a transportation system, a transportation request (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 17, 38, 40, and 41);
determining that the transportation request corresponds to an event and an event location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 38, 40, and 41);
monitor GPS data corresponding to the passenger computing device, to determine a location of the passenger computing device and movement of the passenger computing device (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40);
determine, based on monitoring the GPS data, an updated location of the passenger computing device indicating that the passenger computing device has arrived at the event location corresponding to the event (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40);
update a pickup location associated with transportation request based on the updated location of the passenger computing device so that the pickup location corresponds to the updated location of the passenger computing device at the event location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 43); and
in response to determining the updated location indicating that the passenger computing device has arrived at the event location corresponding to the event (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40):
provide, for display to a user interface of the passenger computing device, a notification regarding the transportation request and the updated pickup location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 40);
pair, from among a plurality of driver computing devices associated with the transportation system, a driver computing device with the passenger computing device (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 41); and
navigate the driver computing device to the updated pickup location to fulfill the transportation request to transport the passenger from the event location (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 69).
As per claim 33, Marco discloses cause the computing device to determine that the transportation request corresponds to the event by identifying event information for the event within the transportation request (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 38).
As per claim 36, Marco discloses a system (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 18 and 24) for performing the actions of the readable medium of claims 30. Therefore, claim 36 is rejected using the same citations and reasoning as applied to claim 30.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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) 32 and 38 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Marco.
As per claims 32 and 38, Marco discloses monitor a digital event information source corresponding to a time of the event (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 46); and
upon detecting a change to the time of the event (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 102),
Marco discloses upon detecting a change to the time of the event, providing alerts to drivers (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 102), but does not explicitly disclose transmit a notification to the passenger computing device regarding the change to the time. However, Marco discloses allowing passengers to request a ride at a time relative to completion of the event (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 41) and providing real-time updates to the passenger (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 19). Therefore, at the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art that to provide notifications to passengers computing device regarding the time change. Marco discloses adjusting the driver time of arrival based on updates of the event and providing real-time updates of the driver to the passenger. Therefore, the system would provide real-time updates to the passenger based on the event updates. Further, it would be obvious to provide updates to the passenger to keep them informed, which would provide a better user experience.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
Claim(s) 27, 28, 31, 34, 37, and 39 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Marco in view of U.S. Patent Application Publication 2017/0147951 to Meyer et al.
As per claim 27, Marco discloses storing information about past events (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 62 and 63), but does not explicitly disclose accessing previous transportation requests and historical location data associated with the passenger; and determining a likelihood that the passenger is going to attend the event based on the previous transportation requests and the historical location data.
However, the above feature(s) are taught by Marco (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 39, 40, and 72). At the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have incorporated the teachings of Meyer into the invention of Marco with a reasonable expectation of success with the motivation of using a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way with predictable results. Predicting the passenger is going to attend an event, provides better anticipation of vehicle demands to allow the vehicle service to better plan the load and provide a better user experience by reminding the user or making a reservation automatically, resulting in less stress similar to that discussed in paragraph(s) 52 of Meyer.
As per claims 28, 34, and 39, Marco does not explicitly disclose further comprising determining, via the one or more servers, that the transportation request corresponds to the event and the event location based on a destination location of the transportation request from the passenger computing device.
However, the above feature(s) are taught by Meyer (Meyer; At least paragraph(s) 13 and 39-44). At the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have incorporated the teachings of Meyer into the invention of Marco with a reasonable expectation of success with the motivation of using a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way with predictable results. Meyer teaches using various past, present, and future contextual information to determine current events and future events. Knowing a future location can help predict a current event.
As per claims 31 and 37, Marco discloses predicting transportation requests associated with event (Marco; At least paragraph(s) 47), but does not explicitly disclose upon determining that the transportation request corresponds to the event, transmit a digital notification to the passenger computing device to confirm that the event is associated with the transportation request; and associate the event with the transportation request in response to receiving an indication of a user interaction with the digital notification from the passenger computing device.
However, the above feature(s) are taught by Meyer (Meyer; At least paragraph(s) 89). At the time of filing, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have incorporated the teachings of Meyer into the invention of Marco with a reasonable expectation of success with the motivation of using a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way with predictable results. Confirming information about the trip ensures that the ride is needed and that all of data is correct, resulting in less chance of wasted time and fuel for the driver.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. See PTO-892. The prior art shows the state of the art.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DAVID P MERLINO whose telephone number is (571)272-8362. The examiner can normally be reached M-Th 5:30am-3:00pm F 5:30-9:00 am ET.
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/David P. Merlino/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3665
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