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 action is in response to remarks received 09/18/2025.
Claims 5, 6, 9, 15, 16, and 19 have been cancelled.
Claims 1, 11 & 20 being intendent claims while claims 2-4, 7-8, 10, 12-14 and 17-18 are dependent.
Claims 1-4, 7-8, 10-14, 17-18 and 20 are currently pending and have been examined.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 09/18/2025 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
On page 12, Applicant argues like SME Example 42, the claims integrate any alleged abstract idea into a practical application; however, the Examiner respectfully disagrees. The additional elements in the claims do not recite any specific improvement over prior art systems. Sharing information in real time in a standardized format regardless of the format in which the information was input by the user does not indicate any specific technical improvement. Unlike Example 42, the current claims do not recite a specific technical process that yields a better training of neural networks, improved face detection capability or improved computer functionality. Rather than reciting a specific technical mechanism for improving a computer or technical process, the current claims are directed to automating a business process. Using generic computer components performing functions they are well-understood to perform (e.g., receiving data, transmitting data, processing data, …) does not recite indicate a practical application or any technical improvements over prior systems in the art. Example 42 is not analogous because the technical “how” is missing from the current claims. Here, the claims describe the additional elements at a high level of generality (e.gl. generic processing, generating output, updating records) without explaining how these components operate in a manner that is technologically unconventional, specific to a particular computer architecture or functionally improving a computing system. Because the instant claims lack a comparable technical solution, they do not rise to the level of a practical application under Step 2A, Prong Two. The instant claims recite performing the business process in real time without specifying any technological implementation details that improve the computer itself or any other technology. Performing steps in real time merely describes the intended speed or timing of execution on a general-purpose computer, which is exactly the type of activity that generic computer components are routinely configured to perform. As explained in MPEP 2106.05(f), simply causing a generic processor to execute an abstract idea more quickly or automatically does not constitute a technical improvement and does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application.
On page 17, the Applicant further argues that the claims recite an unconventional group payment transaction and therefore amount to significantly more than an abstract idea has been fully considered but is not persuasive. The alleged unconventionality relates to the business arrangement or payment scheme itself (i.e. the way participants in a group contribute, share, or settle payments). However, under the 101 analysis, the focus is not on whether the business rules differ from those traditional used; rather, the inquiry is whether the claims recite a technical solution or an improvement to computer functionally or another technology.
Here, the claims implement the group payment transaction arrangement using generic computer components performing their ordinary expected functions (such as receiving data, processing data, and transmitting data). As mentioned above, these functions are described at a high level, without any specific technical mechanism that improves the operation of the processor or any other component. As noted in MPEP 2106.05(f), merely using a computer as a tool to automate a business practice, even if the business practice is new or unconventional, does not constitute an improvement to computer technology.
Moreover, the claims do not recite the type of technological detail that supported eligibility in Example 42, where the claims required particular algorithmic steps that improved a neural network itself. In contrast, the instant claims recite only a new business rule for group split payment coordination, not a new technical way of executing such rules on a computer.
Accordingly, even if the group payment transaction concept is unconventional as a matter of business practice, the calms fail to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application and do not recite an inventive concept. The rejection under 35 USC § 101 is therefore maintained.
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 1-4, 7, 8, 10-14, 17, 18, and 20 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. The claims do fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because independent claim 1 is directed to a process; claim 11 is directed to a system; and claim 20 a computer program product comprising at least one non-transitory computer-readable medium; Step 1-yes.
Under Step 2A, Prong 1, representative claim 1 recites a series of steps for processing group payment transactions, i.e. sales activities or behaviors, and thus grouped as “Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity”. The claim as a whole and the limitations in combination recite this abstract idea. Specifically, the limitations of representative claim 1, stripped of all additional elements, recite the abstract idea as follows:
A computer-implemented method comprising:
Issuing a group payment credential to a payment group comprising a plurality of users comprising a first user and at least one second user, each user comprising an individual payment credential, the group payment credential configured to initiate electronic payment transactions of the payment group;
receiving a group payment request initiated using the group payment credential, the group payment request associated with a payment transaction having a transaction amount;
in response to receiving the group payment request, identifying payment device data associated with the individual payment credentials of each user in the payment group;
determining the first individual payment credential from the individual payment credential based on the payment device data associated with the individual payment credentials and transaction data associated with the payment transaction;
generating a processing request comprising the first individual payment credential;
transmitting the processing request to the first issuer;
authorizing the first issuer, the transaction amount of the payment transaction;
for each of the at least one second user:
generating an apportionment authorization request comprising the at least one second individual payment credential;
transmitting the apportionment authorization request to the at least one second issuer; and
authorizing the apportionment request for the corresponding apportioned portion of the transaction amount; and
automatically settling the payment transaction by:
automatically settling the transaction amount by debiting the transaction amount from a payment account associated with the first individual payment credential; and
automatically settling each of the corresponding apportioned portions of the transaction amount by automatically debiting the corresponding apportioned portion from a payment account associated with the at least one second individual payment credential and automatically crediting the corresponding apportioned portion to the payment account associated with the first individual payment credential.
The claimed limitations, identified above, recite a process that, under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers performance of a commercial or legal interaction, but for the recitation of generic computer components. There is nothing in the claim element which takes the steps out of the methods of organizing human activity abstract idea grouping. Thus, claims 1, 11 & 20 recite an abstract idea.
Under step 2A, Prong 2, this judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particular, the claim only recites using generic, commercially available, off-the-shelf computing devices, i.e. processors suitably programmed communicating over a generic network, to perform the steps of issuing, receiving, identifying, determining, generating, settling and transmitting data. The computer components are recited at a high-level of generality (i.e.as generic processors with memory suitably programmed communication information over a generic network, see at least paragraphs 78-89 & 152-155 of the specifications) such that it amounts no more than adding the words “apply it” (or an equivalent) with the judicial exception, or mere instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, or merely uses computer as a tool to perform the abstract idea, see MPEP 2106.05(f) and generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use, see MPEP 2106.05(h). Furthermore, the steps for receiving and transmitting data are considered adding insignificant extra-solution activity to the judicial exception, see MPEP 2106.05(g). Accordingly, the additional elements claimed do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. Claims 1, 11 & 20 are directed to an abstract idea.
Under step 2B, the claim does not include additional elements, i.e. processor, that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. As discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional elements of using generic computer processors with memory suitably programmed communicating over a generic network to perform the limitation steps amounts no more than adding the words “apply it” (or an equivalent) with the judicial exception, or mere instructions to implement an abstract idea on a computer, or merely uses a computer as a tool to perform the abstract idea, see MPEP 2106.05(f) and generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use, see MPEP 2106.05 (h). Furthermore, the steps for receiving and transmitting data are considered adding insignificant extra-solution activity to the judicial exception, see MPEP 2106.05(g). Mere instructions to apply an exception using generic computer components interacting in a conventional manner cannot provide an inventive concept. Claims 1, 11 & 20 are not patent eligible.
Applicant has leveraged generic computing elements to perform the abstract idea of without significantly more. The dependent claims 2-4, 7-8, 10, 12-14 and 17-18 when analyzed as a whole an in an ordered combination are held to be patent ineligible under 35 USC 101 because the additional recited limitations fail to establish that the claims are not directed to an abstract idea. The additional recited limitations in the dependent claims only refine the abstract idea. Further refinement of an abstract idea does not convert an abstract idea into something concrete.
The claims merely amount to the application or instructions to apply the abstract idea (i.e. a series for processing group payment transactions) on one or more computers, and are considered to amount to nothing more than requiring a generic computer system (e.g. processors suitably programmed and communicating over a network) to merely carry out the abstract idea itself. As such, the claims, when considered as a whole, are nothing more than the instruction to implement the abstract idea (i.e. a series for processing group payment transactions) in a particular, albeit well-understood, routine and conventional technological environment.
Accordingly, the Examiner concludes that there are no meaningful limitations in the claims that transform the judicial exception into a patent eligible application such that the claims amount to significantly more than the judicial exception itself or integrate the judicial exception into a practical application.
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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/T.P.K./Examiner, Art Unit 3696
/MATTHEW S GART/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3696
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