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 Status
Claims 1-20 are pending.
The pending claims comprise 3 groups:
1) System1: 1-9, and
2) Method1: 10-16, and
3) Product1: 17–20.
All appear to have similar scope.
As of 03/07/2024, independent method claim 10 is as followed:
10. A method for determining the effect of a treatment on a product, comprising:
[1] extracting telemetry data from a use of the product, and net promoter score values associated with the product in a plurality of batches, at least one of the telemetry data or the net promoter score values including confounding variables;
[2] aggregating the telemetry data and net promoter score values from each batch of the plurality of batches into an aggregated data structure to generate a plurality of aggregated data structures, each aggregated data structure of the plurality of data structures corresponding to a batch of the plurality of batches;
[3] appending the plurality of data structures to generate an aggregated dataset via a batch aggregation element;
[4] performing data preprocessing on the aggregated dataset to generate a filtered dataset with at least one of one or more debiasing fields, an outcome variable, and one or more treatment fields;
[5] transmitting a request to a double machine learning (DML) cluster to generate treatment effect scores for the filtered dataset, the DML cluster including a treatment model and an effect model, wherein each of the treatment and effect models receives the confounding variables to for use in debiasing;
[6] receiving the treatment effect scores as an output from the DML cluster; and
[7] generating a visual representation of the treatment effect scores via a data visualization engine.
Note: for referential purpose, numbers are added to the beginning of each step.
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 a judicial exception (i.e., a law of nature, a natural phenomenon, or an abstract idea) without significantly more.
Step 1: 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.,
(1) process,
(2) machine,
(3) manufacture or product, or
(4) composition of matter.
Step 2A, Prong 1: 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.,
1) law of nature,
2) natural phenomenon, and
3) abstract idea.
and if so, it must additionally be determined whether the claim is a patent-eligible application of the exception. If an abstract idea is present in the claim, any element or combination of elements in the claim must be sufficient to ensure that the claim amounts to significantly more than the abstract idea itself. Examples of abstract ideas include:
(1) Mathematical concepts -- mathematical relationships, mathematical formulas or equations, and mathematical calculations;
(2) Mental processes—concepts performed in the human mind (including an observation, evaluation, judgment, and opinion).
(3) Certain methods of organizing human activities.
(i) fundamental economic principles or practices (including hedging, insurance, mitigating risk);
(ii) commercial or legal interactions (including agreements in the form of contracts; Legal obligations; Advertising, marketing or sales activities or behaviors; business relations);
(iii) managing personal behavior or relationships or interactions between people (including social activities, teaching, and following rules or instructions).
For instance, in Alice Corp. (Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 134 S. Ct. 2347 (2014)), the Court found that “intermediated settlement” was a fundamental economic practice, which is considered as (1) a certain method of organizing human activities, which is an abstract idea.
Step 1:
In the instant case, with respect to claims 1-20:
Claim categories:
1) System1: 1–9, and
2) Method1: 10-16, and
3) Product1: 17-20.
Analysis of Step 1:
System: claims 1-9 are directed to a system comprising a processor and a memory for determining effects of a feature on a product using double machine learning (DML) cluster. (Step 1:Yes).
Method: claims 10-16 are directed to a process; i.e., a series of steps or acts, for a method for determining effects of a feature on a product using double machine learning (DML) cluster. (Step 1:Yes).
Article: claims 17-20 are directed to a non-transitory computer readable medium having instructions to carry out a process; i.e., a series of steps or acts, for a method for determining effects of a feature on a product using double machine learning (DML) cluster. (Step 1:Yes).
Thus, the claims 1-20 are generally directed towards one of the four statutory categories under 35 USC § 101.
Claims 1-6 and 8-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more.
Step 2A,
(1) Prong One: Does the claim recite a judicial exception?
(2) Prong Two: Are there any additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application?
Only if a claim (1) recites a judicial exception and (2) does not integrate that exception into a practical application, then proceeds to step 2B.
Step 2B: Are there any additional elements that adds an inventive concept to the claim? Determine whether the claim:
(3) adds a specific limitation beyond the judicial exception that is not “well-understood, routine, and conventional” in the field (see MPEP 2106.05(d)); or
(4) simply appends well-understood, routine, and conventional activities previously known to the industry, specified at a high level of generality, to the judicial exception.
A. Step 2A, Prong One:
Claim 1 and 10 as exemplary, recites a method for determining the effect of a treatment on a product or a causal relationship between two items which is a fundamental economic principle or business practice for determining , which is considered as (i) a certain method of organizing human activities, which is an abstract idea.
(ii) commercial or legal interactions (including agreements in the form of contracts; Legal obligations; Advertising, marketing or sales activities or behaviors; business relations);
Furthermore, independent claims 1, and 10 recite an abstract idea related to evaluation/analyzing / determining the effect of a treatment on a product or a causal relationship between two items, which constitutes an abstract idea based on “Mental Processes” related to concepts performed in the human mind including observation, evaluation, judgment, and opinion.
(2) Mental processes—concepts performed in the human mind (including an observation, evaluation, judgment, and opinion).
B. Step 2A, Prong Two:
The judicial exception is not integrated into a practical applications because it deals with a method for determining the effect of a treatment on a product by carrying out steps of:
The claims recites the additional elements of:
Steps: Types
[1] extracting … data ..score values (data) Data gathering,
insignificant extra-solution activity (IE-SA) step.
[2] aggregating data… values (data) Data gathering, IE-SA.
[3] appending …data structure … dataset. Data gathering, IE-SA.
[4] data processing… filtered dataset. Data preparation.
[5] transmitting a request (data) to DML .. Data transmitting/analysis-modeling/prediction
[6] receiving treatment effect scores (data) Data receiving, IE-SA.
[7] generating a visual representation (data). Data displaying, IE-SA.
Steps [1], [2], [3], [5], [6] and [7] are data gathering, data (request) transmitting, data receiving and data displaying which are considered as insignificant extra-solution activity steps.
Steps [4] and [5] are data processing and data analysis using models for generating a treatment effect values/scores. Note that phrases such as “… to generate…,””to batch…,””for use in debiasing,” are considered as “intended use.”
The claim does not result in an improvement to the functioning of the computer system or to any other technology or technical field. Further, the claim limitations are not indicative of integration into a practical application by applying or using the judicial exception in some other meaningful way. The combination of these additional elements is no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computing device, i.e. a processor, a memory, batch aggregation element, DML cluster, models, data visualization engine, etc. Accordingly, even in combination, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. The claim is directed to an abstract idea for determining the effect of a treatment on a product by generating a visual representation of the treatment effect scores and does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application. See MPEP 2106.05(f).
C. Step 2B:
The claims recites the additional elements of steps [1]-[7] above.
Steps [1], [2], [3], [5], [6] and [7] are data gathering, data (request) transmitting, data receiving and data displaying which are considered as insignificant extra-solution activity steps.
Steps [4] and [5] are data processing and data analysis using models for generating a treatment effect values/scores. Note that phrases such as “… to generate…,””to batch…,””for use in debiasing,” are considered as “intended use.”
The claim does not result in an improvement to the functioning of the computer system or to any other technology or technical field. Further, the claim limitations are not indicative of integration into a practical application by applying or using the judicial exception in some other meaningful way. The combination of these additional elements is no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computing device, i.e. a processor, a memory, batch aggregation element, DML cluster, models, data visualization engine, etc. Accordingly, even in combination, these additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. The claim is directed to an abstract idea for determining the effect of a treatment on a product by generating a visual representation of the treatment effect scores and does not integrate a judicial exception into a practical application. See MPEP 2106.05(f).
The claim does not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because as discussed above, the additional elements, steps [4]-[5] when considered both individually and as an ordered combination do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea(s). As for the system claims, mere instructions to apply an exertion using generic computer components cannot provide an inventive concept. These generic computer components are claimed at high level of generality to perform their basis functions which amount to no more than generally linking the use of the judicial exception to the particular technological environment of field of use and further see insignificant extra-solution activity MPEP 2106.05 (f), (g) and (h). The Symantec, TLI, and OIP Techs, court decisions cited in MPEP 2106.05(d)(II) indicate that mere receipt or transmission of data over a network, sorting data, analyzing data, and transmitting the data is a well-understood, routine and conventional function when it is claimed in a merely generic manner (as it is here). The claim are basically collect data, analyze data, and provide set of results, which are not patent eligible, see Electric Power Group, LLC. For these reasons, there is no inventive concept in the claim, and thus the claim is not patent eligible.
As for dep. claims 2-4 (part of 1 above), which deal with further details of the representation displaying parameters, these further limit the abstract idea of the analysis parameters, without including: (a) an improvement to another technology or technical field, (b) an improvement to the functioning of the computer itself, or (c ) meaningful limitations beyond generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment. Therefore, claims 2-4 are not considered as being “significantly more”, and thus do not facilitate the claim to meet the “inventive concept”.
As for dep. claim 5 (part of 1 above), which deals with further details of the treatment effect parameters, this further limits the abstract idea of the analysis parameters, without including: (a) an improvement to another technology or technical field, (b) an improvement to the functioning of the computer itself, or (c ) meaningful limitations beyond generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment.
As for dep. claims 6-7 (part of 1 above), which deal with further details of the data processing parameters, these further limit the abstract idea of the analysis, without including: (a) an improvement to another technology or technical field, (b) an improvement to the functioning of the computer itself, or (c ) meaningful limitations beyond generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment. Therefore, claims 6-7 are not considered as being “significantly more”, and thus do not facilitate the claim to meet the “inventive concept”.
As for dep. claims 8-9 (part of 1 above), which deal with further details of the output of the DML cluster, these further limit the abstract idea of the treatment effect analysis, without including: (a) an improvement to another technology or technical field, (b) an improvement to the functioning of the computer itself, or (c ) meaningful limitations beyond generally linking the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological environment. Therefore, claims 8-9 are not considered as being “significantly more”, and thus do not facilitate the claim to meet the “inventive concept”.
Therefore, claims 1-20 are not drawn to eligible subject matter as they are directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. step 2B: NO
Citations of Pertinent Prior Art
CHEN ET AL., US 2020/0.202 in view of (2) EHSANI ET AL., US 12,067,041, and (3) FULLER ET AL., US 2016/0.019.490, and (4) CARDNO ET AL., US 2018/0.189.990 and (5) CN 110.609.851 fairly teaches claimed invention except for steps (4) “performing …” and (5) “Transmitting a request…”
No claims are allowed.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Tan "Dean" D NGUYEN whose telephone number is (571)272-6806. The examiner can normally be reached on M-F: 6:30-4:30 PM (ET).
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/TAN D NGUYEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3689