DETAILED ACTION
Acknowledgements
This Office Action is in response to Applicant’s correspondence filed on 1/14/26.
The Examiner notes that citations to United States Patent Application Publication paragraphs are formatted as [####], #### representing the paragraph number.
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 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.
Status of Claims
Claims 1-20 are currently pending.
Claims 1-20 are rejected as set forth below.
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 .
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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 1/14/26 has been entered.
Response to Arguments
Claim Rejections - 35 U.S.C. § 101
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claim(s) 1, 8, 15 have been fully considered and is persuasive. The rejection (and corresponding rejections to its dependent claims, if applicable) is withdrawn.
Claim Rejections - 35 U.S.C. § 103
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1-20 have been considered but are moot because the arguments do not apply to any of the references being used in the current rejection.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
(a) A patent may not be obtained though the invention is not identically disclosed or described as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the subject matter sought to be patented and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which said subject matter pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1-20 is/are rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 103(a) as being unpatentable over United States Patent Application Publication No. 20220005032 to Anderson in view of United States Patent Application Publication No. 20170109744 to Wilkins and United States Patent Application Publication No. 20190236598 to Padmanabhan.
As per claims 1, 8, 15, Anderson teaches:
A method comprising: generating, using at least one processor of an issuer system, a token that represents a line of credit value for a customer account; ([0017], “The environment 100 includes electronic devices, for example, a seller device 105 of a seller and a buyer device 110 of a buyer, in communication with a plurality of interconnected transaction servers 115-135 via a blockchain network 140”; [0035], “The token generation module 325 generates a cryptographic digital token, herein referred to as a “token coin”, corresponding to at least one offering of the one or more offerings in the contract details included in the real-world contract. The token coin may be generated corresponding to the pricing details of the offering in the real-world contract. In some embodiments, the token generation module 325 may assign a symbolic monetary value equivalent to a cumulative price of the offerings in the real-world contract to the token coin.”)
attaching a smart contract to the token to create a wrapped token, wherein the smart contract is configured to implement one or more rules associated with the customer account, wherein the wrapped token is deployed in a digital transaction; (Fig 7, [0103], “Accordingly, the seller 705 and the buyer 710 may come to an agreement, finalize the contract details, and establish the digital contract 720. The digital contract 720 established by the seller 705 or the buyer 710 is converted into a real-world contract 721 with one or more contractual clauses corresponding to the products and/or services and the associated contractual preconditions and offerings offered by the seller 705. A smart contract 722 is generated based on the contract details in the real-world contract 721. A token coin 723 may be generated corresponding to a price set by the seller 705 corresponding to the products and/or services.”)
detecting a trigger event associated with a change in a balance of the line of credit value in the digital transaction or the one or more rules; and in response to detecting the trigger event, syncing in real-time the wrapped token with the balance of the line of credit. (Fig 7, [0104], “In some embodiments, the seller 705 or the buyer 710 may wish to update the contract details in the real-world contract 721. Accordingly, the seller 705 or the buyer 710 make changes to the contract details, such as the pricing details, the contractual preconditions, and/or the offerings in the real-world contract 721. The changes made to the real-world contract 721 generates an updated real-world contract 721 and an updated smart contract 722. An updated token coin 723 may be generated corresponding to the change in the pricing details of the products and/or services in the updated real-world contract 721.”)
Anderson does not explicitly teach, but Wilkins teaches:
wherein the token is indicative of a line of credit value that represents available funds across multiple accounts associated with digital and non-digital assets; ([0023]-[0024], “ETFs, mutual funds, index funds, other funds and/or other multiple security assets are unique in that they are composed of individual securities. The Crypto Fund Creation and Redemption Platform uses distributed ledgers/crypto ledgers (such as block chains) to document and verify ownership and availability of: (1) the digital representations of securities (referred to herein as “digital tokens”) used to create the Crypto Fund shares (referred to herein as “digital fund tokens”); and (2) the digital representations of the funds and/or other multiple security shares (referred to herein as “digital fund tokens”) themselves. The digital tokens and digital fund tokens are associated with various digital accounts referred to as addressed accounts or wallets.”; [0046], “In exemplary embodiments implementing indirect creation of digital fund tokens, the fund creation module 215 can receive digital tokens, which are digital representations of securities (such as bonds, stocks, assets, liabilities, currencies, commodities) into an associated creation wallet and create digital fund tokens from an assigned mixture of the digital tokens.”, The Examiner notes that Bitcoin is a digital currency asset as described in [0004].)
One of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that applying the known technique of Wilkins to the known invention of Anderson would have yielded predictable results and resulted in an improved invention. It would have been recognized that the application of the technique would have yielded predictable results because the level of ordinary skill in the art demonstrated by the references applied shows the ability to incorporate such digital token features into a similar invention. Further, it would have been recognized by those of ordinary skill in the art that modifying the token so it is indicative of a line of credit value that represents available funds across multiple accounts associated with digital and non-digital assets results in an improved invention because applying said technique allows the token to track and trade a diverse range of securities, thus reducing the risk involved in trading the token.
Anderson as modified does not explicitly teach, but Padmanabhan teaches:
wherein a smart contract is deployed in a digital transaction to purchase an item and wherein the one or more rules implement one or more artificial models for fraud control; detecting whether the digital transaction is a fraudulent transaction using the one or more artificial models for fraud control; ([0420], “In such a case, the administrator or developer of that smart contract transaction, has specified that this particular smart contract, when executed as a smart contract transaction 1697 by the permissioned blockchain network 1640 is to expressly execute the previously determined machine learning model as part of the final smart contract transaction 1697 execution to determine whether the particular transaction is a fraudulent transaction and thus rejected 1699 pursuant to the machine learning model, or to determine if the transaction is to be approved and executed 1698 as a valid transaction for the blockchain without alerts, or to determine if the transaction is suspect and thus trigger an alert which must be cleared prior to approval of the transaction, without immediately rejecting the transaction.”)
One of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized that applying the known technique of Padmanabhan to the known invention of Anderson as modified would have yielded predictable results and resulted in an improved invention. It would have been recognized that the application of the technique would have yielded predictable results because the level of ordinary skill in the art demonstrated by the references applied shows the ability to incorporate such smart contract features into a similar invention. Further, it would have been recognized by those of ordinary skill in the art that modifying the smart contract attached to the token so it is deployed in a digital transaction to purchase an item and wherein the one or more rules implement one or more artificial models for fraud control and modifying the invention to include the step of detecting whether the digital transaction is a fraudulent transaction using the one or more artificial models for fraud control results in an improved invention because applying said technique ensures that fraudulent transactions will be accurately detected, thus reducing the risk involved in trading the token and improving the overall security of the invention.
As per claims 2, 9, 16, Anderson teaches:
wherein the trigger event is a transaction at a merchant system, and wherein the method further comprises: storing the wrapped token in a first digital wallet of a customer device; generating another token that represents a portion of the line of credit, wherein the smart contract is attached to the another token, and wherein the portion of the line of credit is equal to a value of the transaction; and transferring the another token with the attached smart contract from the first digital wallet to a second digital wallet associated with the merchant system; ([0104], “An updated token coin 723 may be generated corresponding to the change in the pricing details of the products and/or services in the updated real-world contract 721. Upon final agreement between the seller 705 and the buyer 710, the buyer 710 may make a token payment 725 corresponding to a monetary value of the updated token coin 723. The token payment 725 may be equivalent to the monetary value of the updated token coin 723. In some embodiments, the token payment 725 may a partial initial payment corresponding to the monetary value of the updated token coin 723. The buyer 710 may confirm the receipt of the services and/or products by the seller 705 on the online transaction platform 715. The smart contract 720 may then automatically make an additional token payment 725 corresponding to the updated value of the token coin 723 on behalf of the buyer 710 when a partial payment was made by the buyer 710 initially. Upon completion of the token payment 725, the token coin 723 may be transferred to a digital wallet assigned to the seller 705 in the online transaction platform 715.”; [0096], “Further, the method 400 may also include a step 430 of transferring the stored token coin from the buyer to the seller. The token coin may be transferred from a payor digital wallet of the buyer to a payee digital wallet of the seller.”)
As per claims 3, 10, 17, Anderson teaches:
monitoring an execution of the smart contract to yield a status; upon the status indicating that one or more conditions of the one or more rules are fulfilled, unlocking by the issuer system the another token from the smart contract; and redeeming the another token with a digital asset. ([0104], “The buyer 710 may confirm the receipt of the services and/or products by the seller 705 on the online transaction platform 715. The smart contract 720 may then automatically make an additional token payment 725 corresponding to the updated value of the token coin 723 on behalf of the buyer 710 when a partial payment was made by the buyer 710 initially. Upon completion of the token payment 725, the token coin 723 may be transferred to a digital wallet assigned to the seller 705 in the online transaction platform 715. The seller 705 may redeem the transferred token coin 723 in the digital wallet for financial currency as preferred by the seller 705. Value of the token coin 723 may be rebalanced after the redemption. The financial currency may correspond to a local currency, cryptocurrency, or other forms of the financial currency.”)
As per claims 4, 11, Anderson teaches:
wherein monitoring the execution of the smart contract comprises: monitoring a transfer of an asset between the merchant system and the issuer system associated with the customer account. ([0050], “The computer instructions in the smart contract may be correspond to specific automated actions to be performed, such as sending reminders, confirming delivery of service and/or product, and confirming payments, on a specified date and time as included in the real-world contract. In some embodiments, the smart contract may control the sale or transfer of a digital asset, such as, the token coin, on a specific date and time to the seller as included in the real-world contract.”)
As per claims 5, 12, 18, Anderson teaches:
in response to generating the another token, updating the line of credit value associated with the customer account in real time; and updating another line of credit value associated with another customer account, wherein the another customer account is associated with a non-digital asset and wherein the customer account and the another customer account are associated with a same customer. ([0104], “An updated token coin 723 may be generated corresponding to the change in the pricing details of the products and/or services in the updated real-world contract 721. The seller 705 may redeem the transferred token coin 723 in the digital wallet for financial currency as preferred by the seller 705. Value of the token coin 723 may be rebalanced after the redemption. The financial currency may correspond to a local currency, cryptocurrency, or other forms of the financial currency.”, The Examiner notes that updating the local currency balance of a customer’s account after the token coin is redeemed is equivalent to updating another line of credit value associated with the another customer account.)
As per claims 6, 13, 19, Anderson teaches:
wherein the digital asset is cryptocurrency. ([0104], “The financial currency may correspond to a local currency, cryptocurrency, or other forms of the financial currency.”)
As per claims 7, 14, 20, Anderson teaches:
wherein the one or more rules further comprises a payment of a merchant fee, or a fulfillment of a reward or incentive. ([0046], “The step 405 may also include the step 407 of setting at least one pricing detail corresponding to the one or more offerings, such as products and/or services, in the digital contract. Examples of the services may include, but not limited to, artist performance fees, licensing fees, and related service fees.”)
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure:
United States Patent No. 11200569 to James discloses an invention that generally relates to the use of stable value digital assets and/or fiat-backed digital assets as cryptocurrencies that can be linked to other digital assets using blockchain technology and/or through a peer-to-peer network. In embodiments, the present invention relates to specific applications of fiat-backed digital assets and/or stable value digital asset tokens tied to a peer-to-peer network, such as a blockchain network.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JAY HUANG whose telephone number is (408)918-9799. The examiner can normally be reached 9:00a - 5:30p PT.
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/JAY HUANG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3619
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