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
This Office Action is in response to the amendment filed on May 12, 2026. Claims 17-19 have been cancelled. Claims 21-23 have been newly added. Thus, claims 1-16 and 20-23 are pending. Claims 1, 11 and 20 are independent.
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers submitted under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d), which papers have been placed of record in the file.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDSs) submitted on February 12, 2026 and July 23, 2026 have been considered. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. The Forms PTO-1449 are signed and attached hereto.
Response to Arguments
Applicants’ arguments have been fully considered with respect to the rejection under 35 USC § 102. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, the rejection under 35 USC § 101 is not persuasive.
Applicants presented arguments that the claims, as amended and presented herein, cannot be grouped as certain methods of organizing human activity as alleged in the Office Action, because the claimed features do not recite "fundamental economic principles or practices," "commercial or legal interactions," or "managing personal behavior or relationships or interactions between people."
The claims aggregate reports, evaluate them, assign a code, judge how confident to be in that code, and adjust it up or down. This claim exemplifies the kind of observation, evaluation, and judgment a human runway safety officer or air traffic controller performs. The claims recite the outcome of that evaluation. Claims reciting the results of analysis is a mental process abstract idea. The process happening “in real-time” and involves “multiple data sources” is quantitative distinction from what a human mind does.
Applicants’ arguments that the “runway condition model” is “machine learning-based” appears nowhere in the claims itself. The claim recites a generic “runway condition model and not a machine learning model.
Additionally, downgrading and upgrading a code based on a numerical score is a mathematical/numeral comparison and adjustment operations in which a mathematical relationship between the confidence score and the resulting code.
In Example 40, the claim was found eligible because the collecting step was tied to a specifical technical improvement in how data was collected which is a specific technique that solved a specific technical program. Example 40’s eligibility turned on the specificity of the data collection technique itself and not on the fact that the collected data was later used for a particular purpose.
Applicant argues that the invention provides “actionable runway condition information” and facilitates “proactive risk migration against runway overruns and veer-offs.” Downgrading or upgrading a code to be "more appropriate" or "safer" is an improvement to the accuracy of the abstract judgment, not to underlying computer or sensor technology.
Applicant argues the user-interface "provides a specific, practical application" by presenting adjusted codes "for each section," but merely displaying the output of an abstract determination. Claim 1 recites "causing rendering of a user interface based...on the...section...corresponding to the adjusted runway condition code". The claim recites no novel display technique, no change to how a computer renders graphics, and no technical GUI innovation; it is functionally identical to the ineligible display limitations in Electric Power Group and Interval Licensing.
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 therefore, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-3, 5-13 and 15, 16, 20 - 23 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter.
101 Analysis – Step 1
Claims 1 and 20 are directed to a method (i.e., a process); and claim 11 is a system. Therefore, claims 1 is within at least one of the four statutory categories.
101 Analysis – Step 2A, Prong I
Regarding Prong I of the Step 2A analysis in the 2019 PEG, the claims are to be analyzed to determine whether they recite subject matter that falls within one of the follow groups of abstract ideas: a) mathematical concepts, b) certain methods of organizing human activity, and/or c) mental processes.
Independent claim 1 includes limitations that recite an abstract idea (emphasized below) and will be used as a representative claim for the remainder of the 101 rejection.
Claim 1 recites:
1. A computer-implemented method, the computer-implemented method comprising:
receiving runway data associated with a runway;
receiving runway condition data associated with a plurality of sections of the runway, wherein the runway condition data is aggregated from a plurality of runway condition data sources, and
wherein the runway condition data indicates a surface condition associated with at least one section of the plurality of sections of the runway;
generating, based at least in part on inputting the runway condition data into a runway condition model, runway section condition output data for the at least one section;
determining, by the runway condition model and based at least in part on the runway section condition output data, a runway condition code for the at least one section;
generating, by the runway condition model, a confidence score associated with the runway condition code;
generating, by the runway condition model, an adjusted runway condition code for the at least one section based at least in part on the confidence score, wherein the adjusted runway condition code is generated by downgrading or upgrading the runway condition code based at least in part on the confidence score; and
causing rendering of a user interface based at least in part on the at least one section of the plurality of sections of the runway corresponding to the adjusted runway condition code.
The examiner submits that the foregoing bolded limitations constitute a “mathematical concept” because under its broadest reasonable interpretation, the claim covers gathering and analyzing data, such as taking a value, evaluating a second value, and adjusting the first value up or down accordingly. As a result, the claims recite generic rules for manipulating data and therefore recites at least one abstract idea.
101 Analysis – Step 2A, Prong II
Regarding Prong II of the Step 2A analysis in the 2019 PEG, the claims are to be analyzed to determine whether the claim, as a whole, integrates the abstract into a practical application. As noted in the 2019 PEG, it must be determined whether any additional elements in the claim beyond the abstract idea integrate the exception into a practical application in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception. The courts have indicated that additional elements merely using a computer to implement an abstract idea, adding insignificant extra solution activity, or generally linking use of a judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use do not integrate a judicial exception into a “practical application.”
In the present case, the additional limitations beyond the above-noted abstract idea are as follows (where the underlined portions are the “additional limitations” while the bolded portions continue to represent the “abstract idea”):
1. A computer-implemented method, the computer-implemented method comprising:
receiving runway data associated with a runway;
receiving runway condition data associated with a plurality of sections of the runway, wherein the runway condition data is aggregated from a plurality of runway condition data sources, and
wherein the runway condition data indicates a surface condition associated with at least one section of the plurality of sections of the runway;
generating, based at least in part on inputting the runway condition data into a runway condition model, runway section condition output data for the at least one section;
determining, by the runway condition model and based at least in part on the runway section condition output data, a runway condition code for the at least one section;
generating, by the runway condition model, a confidence score associated with the runway condition code;
generating, by the runway condition model, an adjusted runway condition code for the at least one section based at least in part on the confidence score, wherein the adjusted runway condition code is generated by downgrading or upgrading the runway condition code based at least in part on the confidence score; and
causing rendering of a user interface based at least in part on the at least one section of the plurality of sections of the runway corresponding to the adjusted runway condition code.
For the following reason, the examiner submits that the above identified additional limitations do not integrate the above-noted abstract idea into a practical application.
Regarding the additional limitations of “causing rendering of a user interface” is insignificant post-solution activity. The recitation of the claim merely displays the output of the abstract determination.
Thus, taken alone, the additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. Further, looking at the additional limitations as an ordered combination or as a whole, the limitations add nothing that is not already present when looking at the elements taken individually. For instance, there is no indication that the additional elements, when considered as a whole, reflect an improvement in the functioning of a computer or an improvement to another technology or technical field, apply or use the above-noted judicial exception to effect a particular treatment or prophylaxis for a disease or medical condition, implement/use the above-noted judicial exception with a particular machine or manufacture that is integral to the claim, effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing, or apply or use the judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment, such that the claim as a whole is not more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception (MPEP § 2106.05). Accordingly, the additional limitations do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
101 Analysis – Step 2B
Regarding Step 2B of the Revised Guidance, representative independent claim 1 does not include additional elements (considered both individually and as an ordered combination) that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for the same reasons to those discussed above with respect to determining that the claim does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application.
Dependent claims 2, 3 and 5-10 do not recite any further limitations that cause the claims to be patent eligible. Rather, the limitations of dependent claims are directed toward additional aspects of the judicial exception and/or well-understood, routine and conventional additional elements that do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application. Therefore, dependent claims 2, 3 and 5-10 are not patent eligible under the same rationale as provided for in the rejection of independent claim 1.
Applicants’ claims 4 and 14 recite additional elements that provide significantly more than the recited judicial exception. The use of one or more computers to implement the above recited abstract ideas, with nothing more, is a well-understood, routine and conventional activity.
Therefore, claims 1-3 and 5-10 are ineligible under 35 USC §101. Claims 11-13 and 15, 16, 20-23 are ineligible under 35 USC §101 for at least the same reasons as claims 1-3 and 5-10.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 4 and 14 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DEMETRA R SMITH-STEWART whose telephone number is (571)270-3965. The examiner can normally be reached 10am - 6pm.
Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Peter Nolan can be reached at 571-270-7016. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
/DEMETRA R SMITH-STEWART/Examiner, Art Unit 3661
/PETER D NOLAN/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3661
Prosecution Insights