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 .
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d). The certified copy has been filed in parent Application No. JP2023-069620, filed on 04/20/2023.
Status of Claim
This action is in reply to the application filed on 9 of November 2023.
Claims 1-11 are currently pending and are rejected as described below.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-11 are objected to as being currently rejected as below, but would be allowable if the independent claims were amended in such a way as to overcome the 35 USC 101 rejection set forth in the action. The prior art of record most closely resembling the applicant’s claimed invention includes Muraishi (US 20230273755), Nakamura (US 20230177672), Anno (US 20210279013), and Ishizu (JP 6642335).
Muraishi teaches an inspection apparatus includes a display control unit configured to display information on a display unit, a setting unit configured to set one or more areas including an object to be inspected, and an inspection unit configured to inspect data read from the object included in the one or more areas set by the setting unit. The display control unit displays a graphic to enable recognition of an upper limit of data to be inspected by the inspection apparatus. When the setting unit sets one or more areas, the display control unit displays values based on an amount of data on the object included in the one or more areas set by the setting unit as a graph.
Nakamura teaches an information processing apparatus inspecting printed contents of a printed sheet, the information processing apparatus includes a recognition unit configured to recognize the printed contents printed on the sheet, an acquisition unit configured to acquire an attribute value from information recognized by the recognition unit, a specification unit configured to specify a time required for inspection of the printed contents of the sheet by using the attribute value acquired by the acquisition unit, and a notification unit configured to issue a notification to a user based on a result of comparison between the required time specified by the specification unit and a time limit for inspection of the printed contents.
Anno teaches a method for notifying an operator of necessity of implementation of an inspection to be manually performed by the operator. A method for controlling a job processing system that causes a job processing apparatus to execute a job, the method includes receiving required quality data, and notifying, based on the required quality data received in the receiving, a user that an output product output by executing the job needs to be inspected by an inspection apparatus.
Ishizu teaches a remote maintenance system and a remote maintenance method for remotely maintaining an image forming apparatus (MFP, Multifunction Peripheral).
None of the above prior art explicitly teaches the performance of an inspection based on workload and remaining days and adjust the inspection level accordingly, and these are the reasons which adequately reflect the Examiner's opinion as to why Claims 1-11 are allowable over the prior art of record, and are objected to as provided below.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
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 1-11 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception (i.e., a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea) without significantly more.
When considering subject matter eligibility under 35 U.S.C. 101, it must be determined whether the claim is directed to one of the four statutory categories of invention, i.e., process, machines, article of manufacture, or composition of matter. If the claim does fall within one of the statutory categories, it must then be determined whether the claim is directed to a judicial exception (i.e., law of nature, natural phenomenon, and abstract idea), and if so, it must additionally be determined whether the claim is a patent-eligible application of the exception.
The claims are then analyzed to determine whether the claims are directed to a judicial exception. MPEP §2106.04(a). In determining, whether the claims are directed to a judicial exception, the claims are analyzed to evaluate whether the claims recite a judicial exception (Prong One of Step 2A), and whether the claims recite additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application (Prong Two of Step 2A). See 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance (“PEG” 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 50-57 (Jan. 7, 2019)).
With respect to 2A Prong 1, claim 1 recites “a processor configured to: in a case where the number of remaining days until a delivery date of a printed matter by printing work for which an order is received is equal to or larger than a predetermined reference number of work days, set an inspection level for the printed matter to a predetermined first inspection level; in a case where the number of remaining days is smaller than the reference number of work days, set the inspection level for the printed matter by reducing the inspection level from the first inspection level to a second inspection level in which a work period is shorter than a work period of the first inspection level; and output the set second inspection level”. Claims 10 and 11 disclose similar limitations as Claim 1, and therefore recite an abstract idea.
More specifically, claims 1, 10, and 11 are directed to “Mental Processes” in particular “concepts performed in the human mind (including an observation, evaluation, judgment, opinion)” and “Certain Methods of Organizing Human Activity” in particular “commercial or legal interactions (including agreements in the form of contracts; legal obligations; advertising, marketing or sales activities or behaviors; business relations)”, as discussed in MPEP §2106.04(a)(2), and in the 2019-01-08 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance. Accordingly, the claims recite an abstract idea.
Dependent claims 2-9 further recite abstract idea(s) contained within the independent claims, and do not contribute to significant more or enable practical application. Thus, the dependent claims are rejected under 101 based on the same rationale as the independent claims.
Under Prong Two of Step 2A of the Alice/Mayo test, the examiner acknowledges that Claims 1, 10, and 11 recite additional elements yet the additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. In order for the judicial exception to be “integrated into a practical application”, an additional element or a combination of additional elements in the claim “will apply, rely on, or use the judicial exception in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception, such that the claim is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the judicial exception.” PEG, 84 Fed. Reg. 54 (Jan. 7, 2019). The courts have identified examples in which a judicial exception has not been integrated into a practical application when “an additional element does no more than generally link the use of a judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use.” PEG, 84 Fed. Reg. 55 (Jan. 7, 2019); MPEP § 2106.05(h). The claims are directed to an abstract idea.
In particular, claims 1, 10, and 11 recite additional elements boldened and underlined above. These are generic computer components recited as performing generic computer functions that are mere instructions to apply an exception, because it does no more than merely invoke computers or machinery as a tool to perform an existing process. Accordingly, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. The claim is directed to an abstract idea.
With respect to step 2B, claims 1, 10, and 11 do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the additional elements when considered both individually and as an ordered combination do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. The claim recites the additional elements described above. These are generic computer components recited as performing generic computer functions that are mere instructions to apply an exception, because it does no more than merely invoke computers or machinery as a tool to perform an existing process, as evidenced by at least in ¶34-35 “As shown in Fig. 2, the inspection level management device 10 that is an example of the inspection level management device includes a central processing unit (CPU; processor) 11, a read only memory (ROM) 12, a random access memory (RAM) 13, a storage 14, a user interface 15, and a communication interface 16. The configurations are communicably connected to each other via a bus 17. The CPU 11 is a central arithmetic processing unit, and executes various programs or controls each of the units. That is, the CPU 11 reads out a program from the ROM 12 or the storage 14 to execute the program using the RAM 13 as a work area. The CPU 11 controls each of the configurations described above and performs various types of arithmetic processing according to the program recorded in the ROM 12 or the storage 14. The CPU 11 is a processor of the present disclosure. The inspection level management device includes at least one processor.”.
Claims 2-9 do not disclose additional elements, further narrowing the abstract ideas of the independent claims and thus not practically integrated under prong 2A as part of a practical application or under 2B not significantly more for the same reasons and rationale as above.
After considering all claim elements, both individually and in combination, Examiner has determined that the claims are directed to the above abstract ideas and do not amount to significantly more. See Alice Corporation Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank International, No. 13–298.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MATHEUS R STIVALETTI whose telephone number is 571-272-5758. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F 8:30-5:30.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Rutao Wu can be reached on 571-272-6045. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-1822.
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/MATHEUS RIBEIRO STIVALETTI/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3623 6/3/2026
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