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 .
DETAILED ACTION
The action is in response to claims dated 2/14/2024.
Claims pending in the case: 1-20
Priority
Applicant has claimed for foreign priority. Applicant is requested to kindly file the certified copies of the priority documents.
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.
Claim(s) 1-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception (i.e., an abstract idea) without significantly more.
Step1: determine whether the claim is directed to one of the four statutory categories of invention, i.e., process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter. If YES, proceed to Step 2A, broken into two prongs.
Step 2A, Prong 1: determine whether or not the claims recite a judicial exception (e.g., mathematical concepts, mental processes, certain methods of organizing human activity). If YES, the analysis proceeds to the second prong
Step 2A, Prong 2: determine whether or not the claims integrate the judicial exception into a practical application. If NOT, the analysis proceeds to determining whether the claim is a patent-eligible application of the exception (Step 2B).
Step 2B: If any element or combination of elements in the claim is sufficient to ensure that the claim integrates the judicial exception into a practical application, or else amounts to significantly more than the abstract idea itself.
Step 1 Analysis
According to the first part of the analysis, the instant case all claims are directed to one of the statutory categories of invention.
Step 2A Prong 1, Step 2A Prong 2, and Step 2B Analysis
Independent Claim 1 includes the following recitation of an abstract idea:
generating groups of feature values of the feature based on the mappings, each group of feature values being associated with a corresponding group of user IDs of the plurality of user IDs and with a corresponding user canonical ID of the plurality of the user canonical IDs (This is forming data groups and is practical to perform by the human mind under its broadest reasonable interpretation. This is a recitation of a mental process);
aggregating each group of feature values to calculate an aggregate feature value of the feature, each aggregate feature value associated with the corresponding user canonical ID (This calculation is practical to perform by the human mind under its broadest reasonable interpretation. This is a recitation of a mental process);
computing predictive traits associated with the plurality of user canonical IDs, the predictive traits comprising likelihoods of events or trait values associated with the user canonical IDs, the computation of the predictive traits using the aggregate feature values associated with the corresponding user canonical IDs (This is practical to perform by the human mind under its broadest reasonable interpretation. This is a recitation of a mental process);
Claim 1 recites the following additional elements, which, considered individually and as an ordered combination do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application:
one or more computer memories; one or more processors; and a set of instructions stored in the one or more computer memories that cause the one or more processors to perform operations (This is a recitation of generic computer components to be used in performing the abstract idea, which does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(f).);
accessing a structure specifying mappings between the plurality of user IDs and a plurality of user canonical IDs (This is accessing information and is insignificant extra-solution activity, which does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(g). Moreover, sending, receiving, storing and retrieving information is well-understood, routine, conventional as evidenced by the court cases cited at MPEP 2106.05(d), example i. Receiving or transmitting data and iv. Storing and retrieving information and MPEP 2106.05(g), example iv. Obtaining information about transactions using the Internet to verify credit card transactions) ;
causing display, at a user interface (UI) of a computing device, of the computed predictive traits (This is insignificant extra-solution activity, which does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. Moreover, displaying information for user interaction is well-understood, routine, conventional as evidenced by the court cases cited at MPEP 2106.05(a), x. An improved user interface for electronic devices that displays an application summary of unlaunched applications, where the particular data in the summary is selectable by a user to launch the respective application. Core Wireless Licensing S.A.R.L., v. LG Electronics, Inc., 880 F.3d 1356, 1362-63, 125 USPQ2d 1436, 1440-41 (Fed. Cir. 2018) and MPEP 2106.05(g), iii. Selecting information, based on types of information and availability of information in a power-grid environment, for collection, analysis and display, Electric Power Group, LLC v. Alstom S.A., 830 F.3d 1350, 1354-55, 119 USPQ2d 1739, 1742 (Fed. Cir. 2016)).
These claimed limitations therefore do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application.
The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. In this case, after considering all claim elements individually and as an ordered combination, it is determined that the claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for the reasons given above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application.
Therefore the claim is not patent eligible.
Independent Claims 12 and 20, are similar in scope as claim XX and therefore rejected under the same rationale. The additional elements of non-transitory computer-readable storage medium in claim 20 also do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea (This is a recitation of generic computer components to be used in performing the abstract idea, which does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(f).) .
The dependent claims recite at least the abstract idea identified above in the claim upon which it depends and recites the following additional elements which, considered individually and as an ordered combination with the additional elements from the claim upon which it depends, do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea.
Dependent claim 2-3, 8, 10 pertain to types of data used in the computation (This appears to be directed to the specification of data and a restriction to a particular type of data. This is an attempt to limit the abstract idea to a particular field of use or technological environment, which does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. See MPEP 2106.05(h).)
Dependent claim 4-7, 11 pertain to computation functions being a function known in the art (This is mathematical calculations based on information that falls into the mathematical concepts group of abstract ideas.)
These dependent claims therefore, do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application or amount to significantly more than the abstract idea
Dependent Claims 13-19, are similar in scope as claim 2-7 and 10 respectively and therefore rejected under the same rationale.
Hence these claims are rejected as being abstract.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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.
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) 1-20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Parmentier (US 12536555).
Regarding Claim 1, Parmentier teaches, A system comprising: one or more computer memories; one or more processors; and a set of instructions stored in the one or more computer memories that cause the one or more processors to perform operations (Parmentier: col 3 lines 38-58), the operations comprising:
accessing a feature associated with a plurality of user identities (IDs) (Parmentier: col 12 lines 34-42: access transactions features of amount, time etc. associated with a plurality of user ids associated with different accounts);
accessing a structure specifying mappings between the plurality of user IDs and a plurality of user canonical IDs (Parmentier: col 12 line 59- col 13 line 12: mapping user to the plurality of user accounts (structure); col 5 lines 46-49: different transaction accounts (username / user IDs) with different login credentials (canonical IDs));
generating groups of feature values of the feature based on the mappings, each group of feature values being associated with a corresponding group of user IDs of the plurality of user IDs and with a corresponding user canonical ID of the plurality of the user canonical IDs (Parmentier: col 7 lines 20-28: grouping feature values);
aggregating each group of feature values to calculate an aggregate feature value of the feature, each aggregate feature value associated with the corresponding user canonical ID (Parmentier: col 7 lines 33-35: a similarity score calculated; col 8 lines 4-17: compute parameter representing an aggregate);
computing predictive traits associated with the plurality of user canonical IDs, the predictive traits comprising likelihoods of events or trait values associated with the user canonical IDs, the computation of the predictive traits using the aggregate feature values associated with the corresponding user canonical IDs (Parmentier: col 6 lines 5-11: predict transactions (events or trait) to deduce a net ledger value at a future data); and
causing display, at a user interface (UI) of a computing device, of the computed predictive traits (Parmentier: col 16 lines 35-53: interface to display prediction).
In absence of specifics the examiner finds that the various accounts associated with usernames and authentication information read on plurality of user IDs and canonical user IDs. Thus the limitations as claimed are found to be obvious over the teachings in Parmentier as explained above.
Regarding Claim 2, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 1 above and, wherein the feature has a feature type, the feature type being one of at least raw count-based type, exponentially decaying count-based type, rate-based type, time-since-last-event type, time-since-first-event type, average-duration-between-events type, or number-of-events type (Parmentier: col 2 lines 29-35: transaction event time and amount).
Regarding Claim 3, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 1 above and, wherein the feature is a trait feature based on a trait associated with one of more user IDs of the plurality of user IDs (Parmentier: col 6 lines 5-11: predict transactions (events or trait) to deduce a net ledger value at a future data).
Regarding Claim 4, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 2 above and, wherein aggregating each group of feature values of the feature comprises using an aggregation computation associated with the feature type (Parmentier: col 13 lines 12-16: aggregate sets by similarity).
Regarding Claim 5, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 4 above and, wherein the feature type is the raw count-based feature type, and the aggregation computation uses a sum function (Parmentier: col 4 lines 42-65, col 10 lines 31-58: feature type of number of transactions used to compute net ledger value by a sum function).
It is to be noted that given all the relevant data that may be used, a user may choose to use in the analysis, count, sum, rate of increase, decrease or other forms of computation using the data to achieve the same goal. The mere mention of a function in this claim does not add to the claimed function of determining a trait based on available data.
Regarding Claim 6, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 4 above and, wherein the feature type is the exponentially decaying count-based type, and the aggregation computation uses a sum function (Parmentier: col 4 lines 42-65: feature type of number of transactions used to compute net ledger value by a function. It is obvious that the feature of transaction data may be a rate or increase or decrease and thus a decaying function ma be a feature type).
It is to be noted that given all the relevant data that may be used, a user may choose to use in the analysis, count, sum, rate of increase, decrease or other forms of computation using the data to achieve the same goal. The mere mention of a function in this claim does not add to the claimed function of determining a trait based on available data.
Regarding Claim 7, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 4 above and, wherein the feature type is the rate-based type (Parmentier: col 9 lines 46-54: feature of spending pattern (rate of expense)), and the aggregation computation combines partial information used to compute the group of feature values (Parmentier: col 4 lines 42-65: net value computation. Col 14 lines 45-50: Computation uses partial information based on similarity).
Regarding Claim 8, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 4 above and, wherein the feature type is the time-since-last-event type, and the aggregation computation uses a min function (Parmentier: col 2 lines 29-61: transaction features; It is obvious that the feature of transaction data may be a min function).
It is to be noted that given all the relevant data that may be used, a user may choose to use in the analysis, count, sum, min, max, rate of increase, decrease or other forms of computation using the data to achieve the same goal. The mere mention of a function in this claim does not add to the claimed function of determining a trait based on available data.
Regarding Claim 9, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 4 above and, wherein the feature type is the time-since-first-event type, and the aggregation computation uses a max function (Parmentier: col 2 lines 29-61: transaction features It is obvious that the feature of transaction data may be a max function).
It is to be noted that given all the relevant data that may be used, a user may choose to use in the analysis, count, sum, min, max, rate of increase, decrease or other forms of computation using the data to achieve the same goal. The mere mention of a function in this claim does not add to the claimed function of determining a trait based on available data.
Regarding Claim 10, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 4 above and, wherein the feature type is the average-duration-between-events type, and the aggregation computation uses at least one of a feature of the time-since-first-event type, a feature of the time-since-last-event type, and a feature of the number-of-events type (Parmentier: col 4 lines 42-65, Col 14 lines 45-50: aggregation using transaction information).
Regarding Claim 11, Parmentier teaches the invention as claimed in claim 3 above and, wherein an aggregation computation uses a priority function to select among values in the group of feature values for the trait feature (Parmentier: col 2 lines 45-54: prediction considers similar events - prioritize by similarity).
Regarding Claim(s) 12 and 20, this/these claim(s) is/are similar in scope as claim(s) 1. Therefore, this/these claim(s) is/are rejected under the same rationale.
Regarding Claim(s) 13-19, this/these claim(s) is/are similar in scope as claim(s) 2-7, 10 respectively. Therefore, this/these claim(s) is/are rejected under the same rationale.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure in attached 892.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MANDRITA BRAHMACHARI whose telephone number is (571)272-9735. The examiner can normally be reached Monday to Friday, 11 am to 8 pm EST.
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, Tamara Kyle can be reached at 571 272 4241. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Mandrita Brahmachari/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2144
Prosecution Insights