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 (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.
DETAILED ACTION
The following Non-FINAL Office Action is in response to Request for Continued Examination filed on 1/5/2026.
Status of Claims
Claims 1-20 are currently pending.
Claims 1, 9-10, 18 are currently amended.
Claims 1-20 are currently under examination and have been rejected as follows.
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 MM/DD/YYYY has been entered.
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Response to Amendment
The previously pending rejections under 35 USC 101, will be maintained. The 101 rejection is updated in view of the amendments.
The previously pending rejections under 35 USC 103 are withdrawn in light of the amendments and Applicant’s arguments.
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Response to Arguments
Regarding Applicant’s remarks pertaining to 35 USC 101:
Step 2A Prong 1:
Applicant argues on page 10 of remarks 1/5/2026:
“The Office Action's characterization of the claim as directed to a "method of organizing human activity" does not withstand scrutiny when the claim is read as a whole and in light of the specification. The claim does not recite a high-level business practice such as budgeting, marketing, or contract negotiation. Rather, it recites a particularized computational technique implemented by a workforce capacity planning computer system that processes labor parameters
through a labor contract planning model using specified mathematical and algorithmic structures
namely, total inequality constraints, formulation of an MIP scenario keyed to opening and closing
decision variables, and a chronological greedy assignment procedure that assigns unassigned opened contracts to unassigned closed contracts in chronological order.”
Examiner respectfully disagrees. Examiner acknowledges the utilization of computer-based additional elements to carry out the functions of the claims; however, “workforce capacity planning” is clearly organizing human activity. More specifically, collecting labor parameters, determining contract types, determining a number of contracts needed, and creating and communicating a schedule fall within agreements in the form of contracts or legal obligations, and scheduling labor to account for attrition and efficiency is an enterprise level method of mitigating financial risk. Also, as amended, the independent claims include mixed integer programming and a greedy algorithm - mathematical optimization techniques which fall under the Mathematic Concepts abstract grouping.
Step 2A Prong 2:
Applicant argues on page 10 of remarks 1/5/2026:
“In Thales Visionix v. United States, the Federal Circuit held that mathematical relationships are not ineligible when claimed in a way that improves a technological system. As in Thales Visionix, where mathematical formulas were integrated to improve system accuracy, the present claims integrate total inequality constraints and greedy assignment to re-architect the MIP workload from a quadratic complexity of θ(T×W2) down to a linear complexity of θ(T×W).”
Examiner respectfully finds the argument unpersuasive. In Thales Visionix v. United States, the mathematical equations were used merely to tabulate position and orientation data gathered by sensors on a vehicle (aircraft) and object (helmet) relative to each other. The improvement to the technology was integrating the inertial sensor data of the helmet relative to the aircraft rather than to the much more stable earth, as previously designed, as opposed to simply improving computational efficiency.
Applicant argues on page 11 of remarks 1/5/2026:
“First, the claim improves the operation of the workforce capacity planning computer system by reconfiguring the MIP formulation through total inequality constraints and a chronological greedy assignment so that the computational complexity of generating the schedule drops from θ(T×W2) to θ(T×W) with respect to variables, constraints, and non-zeros, where T is the number of contract types and W is the planning period length. This reduction changes the required memory footprint, the number of solver iterations, and the time-to-solution, enabling schedules that previously could not be computed within practical time or resource limits on standard server hardware”.
Examiner respectfully finds the argument unpersuasive. The claim limitations appear to provide an improvement to the abstract idea itself and do not constitute an improvement to the technology as a whole. Examination of the claims as a whole and in terms of each claim’s limitations reveals that the claims are not directed to improving computer performance and do not recite such benefit. The claims are directed to solving a scheduling optimization problem and merely use a computer to improve the performance of that optimization (speed, iterations, resources used) as opposed to the performance of the computer itself. (See MPEP 2106.05(a)(II)(i); A commonplace business method or mathematical algorithm being applied on a general purpose computer, Versata Dev. Group, Inc. v. SAP Am., Inc., 793 F.3d 1306, 1334, 115 USPQ2d 1681, 1701 (Fed. Cir. 2015)).
Applicant argues on page 12 of remarks 1/5/2026:
“Second, the claim applies the improved method to produce a machine-actionable result.
The ‘schedule provisioning circuit’ transmits the contract schedule to a computing device that is ‘configured to . . . automatically generate and/or terminate’ the contracts…. Comparable to DDR Holdings, the claims here are rooted in computer technology to overcome a computer centric problem-scalability, memory, and runtime bottlenecks-rather than using a computer as a tool to perform a business method.”
Examiner respectfully disagrees. Examiner submits the eligibility analysis in DDR Holdings, LLC v. Hotels.com L.P. lacks similarity to the instant application because a) “the ’399 patent’s asserted claims do not recite a mathematical algorithm” (see p. 19 of the decision); b) the challenge addressed by the technology centered on retaining control of over the attention of a customer in the context of the internet; and c) the claimed solution was necessarily rooted in computer technology in order to overcome a problem (automatically generating hybrid webpages from different hosts while sustaining the “look and feel”) specifically arising in the realm of computer networks, contrasted with reducing computational complexity of an algorithm on a single computer.
Applicant argues on page 12 of remarks 1/5/2026:
“Third, the claimed chronological greedy assignment is not a mere invocation of generic optimization. It is a concrete, chronological assignment constraint that operates on ‘first unassigned opened’ and ‘first unassigned closed’ contracts, transforming how the solver matches temporal openings to closings to avoid quadratic enumeration of all potential pairings. This structural change yields a deterministically smaller constraint and variable set, which integrates the mathematics into a specialized computing method. McRO supports eligibility where specific ordered rules improve the performance and accuracy of an automated process.”
Examiner respectfully finds the argument unpersuasive. Examiner submits the invention in McRO allowed computers to produce accurate and realistic lip synchronization and facial expressions in animated characters that previously required human animation (see p. 22 of McRO v. Bandai federal appeal decision). In other words, the invention automated a human manual process as opposed to improving the performance and accuracy of an existing automated process. Claiming the improved speed or efficiency inherent with applying the abstract idea on a computer does not necessarily integrate a judicial exception into a practical application or provide an inventive concept (MPEP 2106.05(f)(2)).
Applicant argues on page 12 of remarks 1/5/2026:
“Fourth, the claim is narrowly tailored to a particular technical mechanism and does not preempt other workforce scheduling approaches, including traditional enumeration, stochastic or
heuristic solvers, or alternative constraint families.”
Examiner respectfully disagrees. Insofar as the claims narrow the concept of mixed-integer programming applied to workforce scheduling, they do so “using total inequality constraints for the opening and closing decision variables and performing a chronological greedy assignment of a first unassigned opened contract to a first unassigned closed contract”, which, as Examiner submitted previously, are abstract mathematical concepts difficult to view as particular technical mechanisms.
Step 2B:
Applicant argues on page 12 of remarks 1/5/2026:
“The ordered combination of claim elements… amounts to an unconventional arrangement that yields a specific, measurable improvement in computational complexity….
“Even if MIP solvers, inequality constraints, and greedy assignments were individually known, their particular coupling here to deduce implicit concrete contracts, reorganize the constraint set around opening/closing decision variables, and enforce chronological assignment to reduce the problem from quadratic to linear complexity is not shown to be routine or conventional in workforce capacity planning systems….
“The current record does not provide evidence that the specific total inequality constraint formulation linked to opening/closing decision variables and the chronological greedy assignment-applied to implicit contract type deduction-was conventional in the art, let alone that such an arrangement yielded a linear-complexity MIP schedule generation in terms of variables, constraints, and non zeros.”
Examiner respectfully disagrees. The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because per above, the additional computer-based elements merely apply the already recited abstract idea and link use of abstract idea (workforce optimization algorithm) to a field of use or technological environment (workforce management system), per MPEP 2106.05 (h). Specifically, Examiner follows the guidelines of MPEP 2106.05(d) II 2nd bullet point and caries over the analysis and conclusions reached on the MPEP 2106.05(f) and (h) tests to Step 2B, and submits that for the same reasons as articulated above, said computer-based additional elements also do not provide significantly more when considering MPEP 2106.05(f) and/or (h) as sufficient option(s) of evidence, without the need to rely on the well-understood, routine and conventional test. However, in arguendo, further evidence would be required to demonstrate conventionality of the additional, computer-based elements, Examiner would further rely on MPEP 2106.05(d) guidelines to demonstrate that said additional elements are also well-understood, routine, conventional. In such case, Examiner would rely as evidence on Applicant specification ¶ [0164]-[0168] describing well known computer-based elements such as processors, circuits, networks, general-purpose computers, mobile devices, virtual machines, etc. comprising the embodiments.
Applicant argues on page 13 of remarks 1/5/2026:
“The structural transformation of the optimization problem and the corresponding resource savings are not merely faster math for its own sake, which SAP v. InvestPic cautions against; instead, they are specific architectural changes that improve the computer's ability to perform schedule generation at scale and enable automated actions that were previously infeasible due to computational limits.”
Examiner respectfully finds the argument unpersuasive. Examiner submits the asserted architectural changes recited in the claims are to an optimization algorithm, specifically the integration of a greedy algorithm, inequality constraints, and an MIP scenario keyed to opening and closing decision variables. The improvements claimed appear to be focused on improving upon existing algorithms/models, specifically the “traditional Enumeration Approach” (Applicant specification ¶ [0002] among others) as opposed to improvement in computer technology itself. Merely adding computer functionality to increase the speed or efficiency of the process does not confer patent eligibility on an otherwise abstract idea (see 2019 Revised Guidance at 55. See also Trading Techs. Int’l, Inc. v. IBG LLC, 921 F.3d 1084, 1090 (Fed. Cir. 2019), an invention which makes the trader faster and more efficient, not the computer, thus falling short of a technical solution to a technical problem).
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Regarding Applicant’s remarks pertaining to 35 USC 103:
The previously pending rejections under 35 USC 103 are withdrawn in light of the amendments and Applicant’s arguments. Applicant’s arguments pages 14-18, filed 1/5/2026, with respect to the art rejection have been fully considered and are persuasive; the rejection under 35 USC 103 has been withdrawn. No art rejection has been put forth in the rejection for the reason found in the “Allowable subject matter over the prior art” section found below.
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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 an abstract idea without significantly more.
Claims 1-9 are directed to a method or process which is a statutory category.
Claims 10-17 are directed to a non-transitory computer-readable medium or article of manufacture which is a statutory category.
Claims 18-20 are directed to an apparatus or machine which is a statutory category.
Step 2A Prong One: The claims recite, describe, or set forth a judicial exception of an abstract idea (see MPEP 2106.04(a)). Specifically, the claims recite, describe or set forth commercial or legal interactions (including agreements in the form of contracts or legal obligations) including: “interpreting… one or more labor system input parameters”, “determining… based at least in part on the one or more labor system input parameters and a labor contract planning model, a plurality of implicit concrete contract type values defined by opening and closing decision variables”, “determining… a number of contracts corresponding to the implicit concrete contract type value”, “generating… a contract schedule that includes: a plurality of number-of-open-contracts to date pairings representing openings of new contracts within a planning period, and a plurality of number-of- closed-contracts to date pairings”, and “transmitting… the contract schedule”. Further, the claims recite, describe, or set forth mitigating risk, including: “productive hours are calculated based on attrition rate and efficiency factors associated with the contracts”.
Further still, the claims recite, describe, or set forth mathematical concepts, including “formulating a mixed-integer programming (MIP) scenario using total inequality constraints for the opening and closing decision variables and performing a chronological greedy assignment of a first unassigned opened contract to a first unassigned closed contract”, and “wherein the use of the total inequality constraints and the chronological greedy assignment reduces a computational complexity of the generating from θ(T×W2) to θ(T×W) in terms of variables, constraints, and non-zeros, wherein Tis a number of different contract types and Wis a length of a planning period”.
Collecting labor parameters, determining contract types, determining a number of contracts needed, and creating and communicating a schedule fall within agreements in the form of contracts or legal obligations, which are commercial or legal interactions; and scheduling labor to account for attrition and efficiency falls within mitigating risk as it pertains to fundamental economic principles; each under the larger abstract grouping of Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity (MPEP 2106.04(a)(2) II). Furthermore, formulating a mixed integer programming scenario with constraints, decision variables, and greedy algorithm falls within the abstract grouping of Mathematical Concepts (MPEP 2106.04(a)(2) I). Accordingly, the claims recite an abstract idea.
Step 2A Prong Two: Independent claims 1, 10, 18 recite the following additional elements: “labor parameter circuit”, “contract type identifier circuit”, “contract scheduling circuit”, “schedule provisioning circuit”, “computing device”, “non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions”, “processor”, and “apparatus”. The capabilities of these additional elements include interpreting input parameters, determining contract types and number of contracts, formulating a mixed-integer programming scenario, performing a greedy algorithm, generating a contract schedule, calculating production hours based on attrition and efficiency, and transmitting the schedule. The additional elements are recited at a high level of generality (i.e. as a generic computer performing functions of collecting, calculating, organizing, and presenting data, etc.) such that they amount to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using generic computer components. Therefore, these functions can be viewed as not meaningfully different than a business method or mathematical algorithm being applied on a general-purpose computer as tested per MPEP 2106.05(f)(2)(i). The claims are directed to an abstract idea and the judicial exception does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application.
Step 2B: According to MPEP 2106.05(f)(1), considering whether the claim recites only the idea of a solution or outcome i.e., the claims fail to recite the technological details of how the actual technological solution to the actual technological problem is accomplished. The recitation of claim limitations that attempt to cover an entrepreneurial and thus abstract solution to an entrepreneurial problem with no technological details on how the technological result is accomplished and no description of the mechanism for accomplishing the result do not provide significantly more than the judicial exception.
Dependent claims 2-9, 11-17, 19-20 do not appear to provide any additional computer-based elements, let alone for such additional computer-based elements to integrate the abstract idea into practical application (Step 2A prong two) or providing significantly more (Step 2B). Further, dependent claims 2-9, 11-17, 19-20 merely incorporate the additional elements recited in claims 1, 10, 18 along with further narrowing of the abstract idea of claims 1, 10, 18 along with their execution of the abstract idea. Specifically, dependent claims narrow the “labor parameter circuit”, “contract type identifier circuit”, “contract scheduling circuit”, “schedule provisioning circuit”, “non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions”, “processor”, and “apparatus” to capabilities such as determine, correspond to, comprise, generate, and solve various forms of data such as contract types, event dates, contract agreements, supply and demand, PTO policies, schedules, PTO formulas, MIP scenarios, etc. which, when evaluated per MPEP 2106.05(f)(2) represent mere invocation of computers to perform existing processes. Therefore, the additional elements recited in the claimed invention individually and in combination fail to integrate a judicial exception into a practical application (Step 2A prong two) and for the same reasons they also fail to provide significantly more (Step 2B). Thus, claims 1-20 are reasoned to be patent ineligible.
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Allowable subject matter over the prior art
Claims 1-20 are allowable over the prior art in light of the amendments. However, these claims remain rejected under 35 USC 101.
The closest prior art to the invention includes Sager et al. US 20220292433 A1, System and method of schedule optimization for long-range staff-planning; Anderson US 20200167717 A1, Systems and methods for outputting resource allocation records; Seetharaman et al. US 20070061183 A1, Systems and methods for performing long-term simulation; Putcha et al. US 20190295204 A1, Systems and methods for transportation staffing; and Vanamala US 20170116577 A1, Method and system for management of human resource scheduling rules and programs. None of the prior art of record, taken individually or in combination, teach or suggest the claimed invention as detailed in the independent claims, specifically:
“wherein the use of the total inequality constraints and the chronological greedy assignment reduces a computational complexity of the generating from θ(T×W2) to θ(T×W) in terms of variables, constraints, and non-zeros, wherein T is a number of different contract types and W is a length of a planning period”.
The reason to withdraw the 35 USC 103 rejection of claims 1-20 in the instant application is because the prior art of record fails to teach the overall combination as claimed. Therefore, it would not have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to modify the prior art to meet the combination above without unequivocal hindsight and one of ordinary skill would have no reason to do so. Upon further searching the examiner could not identify any prior art to teach these limitations. The prior art on record, alone or in combination, neither anticipates, reasonably teaches, not renders obvious the Applicant’s claimed invention.
Examiner reminds Applicant that novelty (35 USC 102) and non-obviousness (35 USC 103) still pertain to features that are mostly abstract that do not render the claims patent eligible (35 USC 101). The novel and non-obviousness rationale above do not necessarily render the claims patent eligible. See for example MPEP 2106.04 I ¶5, 3rd sentence citing Mayo, 566 U.S. 71, 101 USPQ2d at 1965); Flook, 437 U.S. at 591-92, 198 USPQ2d at 198 "the novelty of the mathematical algorithm is not a determining factor at all”.
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Conclusion
The following art is made of record and considered pertinent to Applicant’s disclosure:
Laperi; Erian et al. US 20070179829 A1, Method and apparatus for workflow scheduling and forecasting.
Sotozaki; Yui US 20150262104 A1, Resource planning method and system.
An; Lianjun et al. US 20090182598 A1, Method and system for planning of services workforce staffing using hiring, contracting and cross-training.
Moran; Brian K. et al. US 20210319390 A1, Labor management software system.
Anderson; Matthew W. et al. US 20210049530 A1, System with capacity and resource allocation display to facilitate update of electronic record information.
Dar Mousa; Nosaiba et al. US 20200175456 A1, Cognitive framework for dynamic employee/resource allocation in a manufacturing environment.
Aykin; Turgut US 7725339 B1, Contact center scheduling using integer programming.
Vasnani; Kanchan et al. US 20250094933 A1, System and method of digital schedule processing.
Dommarajukrishnamaraju, Nagaraju AU 2021107096 A4, System and method for change order management in integrated enterprise environment for construction companies.
Rahimi; Sohrab et al. US 20250094896 A1, Artificial Intelligence System for Forward Looking Scheduling.
WELLS; Robert Frances US 20110184771 A1, Implementation resource project management.
Vogel, Eric S. et al. US 20040162748 A1, Generating a resource allocation action plan.
Segev; Wasserkrug Eliezer et al. US 20110077994 A1, Optimization of workforce scheduling and capacity planning.
Gordenker; Miles et al. US 20220245551 A1, Adjustable work-flow capacity planning.
O'Keeffe; Paul J. US 20110093307 A1, System for providing a workforce planning tool.
Kipling, Debbie US 20020103687 A1, System and method for ordering contract workers.
Vogel, Eric S. et al. US 20040162753 A1, Resource allocation management and planning.
Santos; Cipriano A. et al. US 20110202382 A1, Workforce planning.
Kintner; Hallie J. et al. US 6732079 B1, Method of determining the best mix of regular and contract employees.
Beaumont, Nicholas. "Scheduling staff using mixed integer programming." European journal of operational research 98.3 (1997): 473-484.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0377221797000556
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/REED M. BOND/Examiner, Art Unit 3624 March 17, 2026
/HAMZEH OBAID/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3624 March 19, 2026