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 .
Response to Amendment
The amendment filed 7/08/2026 has been entered. Claims 1, 4-14, 17-22 are pending
Response to Arguments
Applicants’ arguments, see ‘Allowable Subject Matter’, filed 7/08/2026, with respect to claim 1 have been fully considered and are persuasive. The rejection of claim 1 has been withdrawn.
Applicant's arguments, see ‘Rejection under 35 U.S.C. 101’, filed 7/08/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. The Examiner respectfully disagrees. Claims 14 and 19 are manipulating the digitized radar signal which is manipulating data. A human can look at a graph of local maxima, as from an Excel sheet of the data, and find a minimum of the local maxima. Plotting the data with pen or paper or with a computer, as with Excel, is within human capability. Additionally, with the delay time and the speed of light a human can calculate range of that signal. Both calculations are covered under the MPEP as mental processes using an aid in digitizing and suppressing the signal, MPEP 2106.04(a)(2)(III), “The courts do not distinguish between mental processes that are performed entirely in the human mind and mental processes that require a human to use a physical aid (e.g., pen and paper or a slide rule) to perform the claim limitation. See, e.g., Benson, 409 U.S. at 67, 65, 175 USPQ at 674-75, 674 (noting that the claimed "conversion of [binary-coded decimal] numerals to pure binary numerals can be done mentally," i.e., "as a person would do it by head and hand."); Synopsys, Inc. v. Mentor Graphics Corp., 839 F.3d 1138, 1139, 120 USPQ2d 1473, 1474 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (holding that claims to a mental process of "translating a functional description of a logic circuit into a hardware component description of the logic circuit" are directed to an abstract idea, because the claims "read on an individual performing the claimed steps mentally or with pencil and paper"). Mental processes performed by humans with the assistance of physical aids such as pens or paper are explained further below with respect to point B.
Nor do the courts distinguish between claims that recite mental processes performed by humans and claims that recite mental processes performed on a computer. As the Federal Circuit has explained, "[c]ourts have examined claims that required the use of a computer and still found that the underlying, patent-ineligible invention could be performed via pen and paper or in a person’s mind." Versata Dev. Group v. SAP Am., Inc., 793 F.3d 1306, 1335, 115 USPQ2d 1681, 1702 (Fed. Cir. 2015). See also Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Symantec Corp., 838 F.3d 1307, 1318, 120 USPQ2d 1353, 1360 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (‘‘[W]ith the exception of generic computer-implemented steps, there is nothing in the claims themselves that foreclose them from being performed by a human, mentally or with pen and paper.’’); Mortgage Grader, Inc. v. First Choice Loan Servs. Inc., 811 F.3d 1314, 1324, 117 USPQ2d 1693, 1699 (Fed. Cir. 2016) (holding that computer-implemented method for "anonymous loan shopping" was an abstract idea because it could be "performed by humans without a computer"). Mental processes recited in claims that require computers are explained further below with respect to point C.” Claims 14 and 19 do not integrate into the practical application of an improvement as with claim 1. In claim 1 the range estimates from the cleaned signal/data are communicated to the vehicular system for its use; claims 14 and 19 simply clean the signal/data but it is not used. Claims 14 and 19 have incomplete solutions to the technical problem. Additionally, as stated in the previous rejection, claims 14 and 19 are also abstract ideas in that they are part of the mathematical concepts group. As mathematical concepts, the limitations do not possess a practical application for the same reasons stated above.
Applicant’s arguments, see ‘Rejection of Claim 19 over Melzer and Bonta’, filed 7/08/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 19 under 35 U.S.C 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. However, claim 19 is still rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101.
Applicant’s arguments, see ‘Rejection of Claim 20 over Melzer, Bonta, and Meissner’, filed 7/08/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 19 under 35 U.S.C 103 have been fully considered and are persuasive. However, claim 19 is still rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101.
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 14,17-18 and 19-22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
Regarding claims 14 and 19
Step 1: Claims 14-18 are directed to an apparatus, which is a machine; and claims 19-22 are directed to a processor, which is a machine. Therefore, the claims fall within one of the four statutory categories.
Step 2A Prong 1: Claims 14 and 19 recite the limitations of taking a radar signal, determining a threshold, suppressing signal and identifying a range of a target. These series of steps is a process that, under the broadest reasonable interpretation, covers limitations that can be performed in the human mind using mathematical calculations/formulas on a piece of paper, these steps are observations, evaluations, judgments, and/or opinions, which fall into the mental process group and the mathematical concepts group of abstract ideas. Nothing in the claim precludes them from being performed in the human mind, with or without the aid of physical aid such as pen and paper (See MPEP 2016.04(a) and MPEP 2106.04 (III) B and 2019 PEG )
Step 2A Prong 2: The judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application because the claim does not recite any additional elements that amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. Claims 14 and 19 recite receiving a radar signal and producing a frequency data set from digitized samples, these are routine steps are discussed at a high level of generality. A radar processor has been claimed however it is not a particular machine as a processor is a generic machine. A person could receive the data and input it into a program such as Excel or create their own table of data with pen and paper. The steps of receiving a signal and producing a data set amounts to mere data gathering/data manipulation and data inputs and does not add more than insignificant extra solution activity to the abstract idea. A vehicle control system, for example, needs to be provided with the modified range data in order to implement an improvement. For at least the above reasons the receiving and producing limitations do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application.
Step 2B: The claim does not provide an inventive concept because as recited in the paragraphs above, the claim recites the limitations of receiving a radar signal and producing a frequency data set, an insignificant extra-solution activity that does not amount to an inventive concept. The use of digitized data does not make the limitations other than abstract. Moreover, the limitations do not reflect an improvement that can be implemented or include the use of a particular machine. Therefore, the claims are not eligible under 35 U.S.C. 101.
The claims 15-18, which depend on claim 14; and claims 20-22, which depend on claim 19, similarly only recite the abstract ideas through mental processes and/or mathematical concepts as they produce data sets, apply algorithms, and identify results but do not use the results to implement an improvement. As such, they are also not eligible under 35 USC 101.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1, 4-13 are allowed.
The following is an examiner’s statement of reasons for allowance: Claim 1 now recites a limitation previously considered allowable in the last office action. Claim 1 now recites the limitation of setting the minimum, or lowest, local maxima from a plurality of local maxima as the threshold. The closest pertinent analogous art is Hameed 2022 which recites finding the local maxima but does not set the lowest one to the threshold. Primary reference Melzer (US 20190113600 A1) and secondary reference Bonta (US 5245347 A) also do not disclose this limitation. Moreover, even assuming arguendo that the features of the claims exist individually, the combination of features as claimed would not have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art because any combination of the evidence obtained to reach the combination of features as claimed would require a substantial reconstruction of Applicant’s claimed invention relying on improper hindsight bias. As such, claim 1 is allowable and all dependent claims are also allowable.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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/PETER DAVON DOZE/Examiner, Art Unit 3648
/OLUMIDE AJIBADE AKONAI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3648
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