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 .
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.
the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. Claims 1-20 do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because transitory forms of signal transmission (often referred to as "signals per se"), such as a propagating electrical or electromagnetic signal or carrier wave are not statutory, (see MPEP 2106.03). Claim 11 recites “a carrier … wherein the carrier is one of an electronic signal, optical signal, radio signal, or computer-readable storage medium. Applicant’s Specification similarly recites “There is further disclosed a carrier containing the computer program according to the disclosure herein, the carrier is one of an electronic signal, optical signal, radio signal or computer readable storage medium”. A non-transitory computer-readable medium is not required by the claims or the specification, thus leaving the option of an embodiment using only a carrier signal which is not statutory under 101. MPEP 2106.03 states: “a transitory signal, while physical and real, does not possess concrete structure that would qualify as a device or part under the definition of a machine, is not a tangible article or commodity under the definition of a manufacture (even though it is man-made and physical in that it exists in the real world and has tangible causes and effects), and is not composed of matter such that it would qualify as a composition of matter. Nuijten, 500 F.3d at 1356-1357, 84 USPQ2d at 1501-03. As such, a transitory, propagating signal does not fall within any statutory category”.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 Knight et al., US 20040186783 A1.
1. (Currently Amended) A computer-implemented method for reducing waste in a retail store, (see Knight, ¶ 13)(a device and method for browsing and selecting an item that uses the inventory status of the item to direct the consumer towards an item that is advantageous for the business to sell immediately. It would further be advantageous to provide a system and method whereby the real time status of the inventory were used to identify and promote slow moving items or items currently in inventory that have a limited shelf life so that the inventory carrying costs are minimized and profit maximized), the method comprising:
obtaining inventory-data of a plurality of products in a retail store, each product being associated with an expiration period below a threshold, (see Knight, ¶ 16)(determining an expiration time of at least one item of the first group of items using the first computer system);
determining a priority scheme for said plurality of products, the priority scheme being based upon at least one parameter, (see Knight, ¶ 63)(The recommendation list may be sorted by multiplying the ranking indicia (i.e. priority scheme parameters) of the all the search results and sorting based on the resultant ranking index);
determining at least one product from said priority scheme having a highest priority order, (see Knight, ¶ 61)(A ranking index may be compiled from the inventory status search 814. For example, slow selling movies may be ranked higher than those for which no inventory is available or those movies that have little inventory available);
providing information to control a display entity located in said retail store to display graphics emphasizing said at least one product from said priority scheme having the highest priority order, (see Knight, ¶ 14)(Based on the ranked list of choices, the system and method presents one or more of the choices to the consumer through a ranked list, highlighting, promoting, or otherwise accentuating one or more choices); and
updating the priority scheme upon receiving, point-of-sale, POS, data associated with the plurality of products, from a POS terminal, (see Knight, ¶ 16)(providing a graphical interface on a computerized point of sale terminal; determining an expiration time of at least one item of the first group of items using the first computer system, the determining an expiration time comprising communicating with an inventory tracking system; determining that the at least one item is suitable for promotion based at least in part on the expiration time; creating a graphical representation of the first list of potential choices comprising enhancing the at least one item; and displaying the graphical representation of the first list of potential choices on the graphical interface).
The following features, i.e. “reducing waste” is not expressly disclosed in the Knight reference, but they are strongly suggested in the reference because the reference discloses promoting the sale of items based upon their expiration date. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention to modify Knight to match the claim language, since the modifications would require neither undue experimentation nor risk of unexpected results. “Reducing waste” would be considered by one of ordinary skill in the art to be an obvious intended use of the invention disclosed by Knight because reducing waste increases profit.
This rationale is applied to all claims below by reference herein.
2. (Currently Amended) The computer-implemented method according to claim 2, wherein the at least one parameter comprises one or more retail-store related parameters and/or one or more product-related parameters; wherein the retail-store related parameters comprises at least one of weather data, customer traffic or opening-hours; wherein product-related parameters comprises at least one of a sales forecast, price, discount, sales history data, price-elasticity and remaining inventory quantity of each product, (see Knight, ¶ 65)(The retailer may offer an instant promotion of a slow selling item such as giving an instant 50% discount for the purchase of the slow selling item. Such a decision may be based on the inventory history of the item, i.e sales history data, but may also include the customer's purchase history, i.e customer traffic).
3. (Currently Amended) The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein the step of determining at least one product from said priority scheme having a highest priority order is based upon an additional-sales forecast parameter determined for each product; the additional-sales forecast parameter determining an additional sales expected from a product, by having said product being graphically emphasized on said display entity during a time period, (see Knight, ¶ 14)(the system and method presents one or more of the choices to the consumer through a ranked list, highlighting, promoting, or otherwise accentuating one or more choices).
4. (Currently Amended) The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein the method further comprises the step of :assigning discount prices to at least one of said plurality of products, the discount prices being based on a remaining expiration period, (see Knight, ¶ 65).
5. (Currently Amended) The computer-implemented method (100) according to claim 1, wherein: the at least one parameter is selected by means of a trained learning algorithm configured to reduce waste in said retail store; the step of determining the priority scheme comprises, determining, by means of the trained learning algorithm, the priority scheme for said plurality of products based on the at least one selected parameter; and the step of determining the at least one product comprises, determining, by means of the trained learning algorithm, the at least one product from said priority scheme having the highest priority order, (see Knight, ¶ 65).
6. (Currently Amended) The computer-implemented method (100) according to claim 1, further comprising the step of, upon updating the priority scheme, repeating the step of: determining at least one product from said priority scheme having a highest priority order, (see Knight, ¶ 14).
7. (Currently Amended) The computer-implemented method according to claim 1, wherein the POS data comprises quantity and identity of products sold at a point in time, (see Knight, ¶ 78)(The inventory system 908 may be able to provide a presence or absence indication showing that an item is available for purchase, the quantity of items available, the expiration date and time of each item available, configuration and location of the items, and other factors).
12. (New) The computer-implemented method according to claim 2, wherein the step of determining at least one product from said priority scheme having a highest priority order is based upon an additional-sales forecast parameter determined for each product; the additional-sales forecast parameter determining an additional sales expected from a product, by having said product being graphically emphasized on said display entity during a time period, (see Knight, ¶ 54)(The present embodiment 500 allows stores with lower sales volume, and thus a smaller amount of sales data, to have an effective recommendation system).
13. (New) The computer-implemented method according to claim 2, wherein the method further comprises the step of: assigning discount prices to at least one of said plurality of products, the discount prices being based on a remaining expiration period, (see Knight, ¶ 65).
As per claims 8-11 and 14-20, these claims contain the same or similar features as claims 1-7 and 12-15 above, and therefore the remaining claims are rejected on the same basis and rationale as those claims rejected above herein by reference.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure: US 10878394 B1.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RUSSELL S GLASS whose telephone number is (571)272-7285. The examiner can normally be reached M-F, 9-5.
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/RUSSELL S GLASS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3627