Final Rejection
This is to replace the prior Final rejection.
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.
1. Claims 1-6, 8-15 and 17-20 are rejected under 35 USC 101.
The claims recite the abstract idea of organizing human activity--collecting receipt data, performing OCR, analyzing purchase and product information, determining purchase frequency and subscription terms, and presenting a subscription offer. These limitations amount to data gathering, analysis, and presentation of results, which are abstract ideas.
The claims do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. The recited electronic system/device, controller, processor, display, input device, communications subsystem, and computer-readable storage device are generic computing components performing their ordinary functions. The claims do not recite an improvement to computer functionality, OCR technology, or any other technical field.
Further, the applicant’s interchangeable recitation of the subject matter as a method, system/device, and computer program product does not render the claims eligible. The claims remain directed to the same abstract concept regardless of claim format, and the device/system and method formulations are substantively equivalent. Accordingly, the claims are directed to an abstract idea implemented on generic computer technology and do not recite significantly more than the abstract idea itself.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) 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.
The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
2. Claim(s) 1, 10 and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Book (US-20220300921-A1) in view of Mitchell (US-10891474-B1).
Book discloses a device/system, method and program, the method comprising:
- “identifying availability of” a “product via an ecommerce service”
[0024]: customer may order laundry detergent online via an ecommerce channel.
[0043]: offer can be presented via a customer device in association with an ecommerce transaction.
[0100]: fulfillment method can include ship to home / delivery / pickup.
- “determining, in part from” an “identified purchase and product information from” “two or more POS purchase receipts, a purchase frequency of the product”
[0023], [0024], [0040], [0051], [0064], [0095]: determine that an item is purchased at a substantially regular interval.
[0040]: customer purchases items at recurring intervals; intervals may be 24 hours, 45 days, 90 days, etc.
[0051]: example of contact solution purchased every 28–30 days.
- “rendering a purchase interface indicating a subscription offer for the product”
[0043]: “the subscription module 112 can present such an offer via a point-of-sale (POS) device of a merchant…”
[0096]: “the subscription module 112 can generate an offer for the customer…”
[0100]: prompts and GUI can be presented to the customer.
[0101]: offer via a GUI with an actuation mechanism.
[0104]-[0106]: offer, confirmation, and subscription creation flow.
- “modifying a display associated with the electronic” apparatus/device/system “to present the purchase interface with the subscription offer for acceptance of the subscription offer by a user of the electronic” apparatus/device/system
[0043]: offer presented via POS device or customer device.
[0100]: additional information presented to the customer.
[0101]: GUI with actuation mechanism for one-click subscription.
[0102]: responsive to customer indicating desire to establish a subscription.
[0103]: automatic association without customer input in some examples.
Book does not appear to expressly disclose the OCR pipeline.
Mitchell teaches:
- “receiving, at” the “electronic” apparatus/device/system “at least one image of” the “[POS] purchase receipts”
“The server 104 may be operable to receive receipt image data from a consumer device 108, and process receipt image data.”
“The receipt cleanup 210 may be configured to receive receipt image data of a receipt 204 captured by camera 202…”
- “performing, by a controller of the electronic” apparatus/device/system “optical character recognition on the at least one image that analyzes the” “[POS] purchase receipts, and identifies purchase and product information about” the “purchase of one or more items comprising” the “product”
“the receipt text extractor 214 may be configured to extract receipt text data from the image data”
“The receipt text data may refer to machine data defining text that has been extracted from the image data of the receipt using machine optical text extraction techniques, such as OCR.”
“the receipt text extractor 214 may be configured to perform a line-by-line extraction… or a receipt element-by-recent element extraction…”
The structured data includes item data such as:
item code / SKU
item name
item cost
unit size
quantity
total item price
It would have been obvious to one ordinary skill in the art at the time of filing to combine receipt OCR with Book’s disclosed subscription recommendation steps because OCR is a known method for extracting item-level purchase data from physical POS receipts. The proposed combination would simply use a routine data-capture technique to supply the transaction information needed for the downstream subscription analysis, thereby predictably increasing automation and expanding the method to brick-and-mortar receipts.
3. Claim(s) 2-6, 8-9, 11-15, 17-18 and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Book (US-20220300921-A1) in view of Mitchell (US-10891474-B1), in further view of Walker (US Patent No. US 6,415,262 B1).
Claims 7 and 16 were incorporated into independent claims to endeavor to overcome Walker after the first office action on the merits (FOAM). The other dependent claims rejected per Walker were not challenged. Accordingly, the citations to Walker in the FOAM are incorporated herein by reference
To the extent that the above detailed citations of Book and Mitchell do not fairly suggest the additional steps, the examiner cites Walker that well established and known norms and standards for the sales of goods, including but not limited to the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC), would fill the gaps, if any. For the avoidance of doubt, individually tailored KSR obvious rationale are being articulated/provided for each dependent device/system claim, and equally are being unified for the method and program:
Claim 2: It would have been obvious to combine the receipt-processing reference with the subscription reference because the receipt-processing reference teaches extracting item-level purchase information from POS receipt images, including quantities and purchase dates, while the subscription reference teaches using observed purchase history to determine recurring purchasing behavior. A person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to use the receipt-derived quantity and date information to determine a consumption rate and to set a subscription quantity and purchase frequency that match that rate, because doing so would have predictably improved the apparatus’/device’s/system’s ability to tailor the subscription to the customer’s actual usage pattern.
Claim 3: It would have been obvious to combine the receipt-processing reference with the subscription reference because the receipt-processing reference teaches extracting purchase price information from receipt images, and the subscription reference teaches generating subscription offers based on transaction history and commercial characteristics of purchased items. A person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to analyze receipt-derived prices to determine an average purchase price and to present a lower subscription price, because offering a reduced recurring price would have been a predictable incentive to encourage acceptance of the subscription offer and improve conversion.
Claim 4: It would have been obvious to combine the receipt-processing reference with the subscription reference because the receipt-processing reference teaches structured receipt data and correction of extracted receipt information based on format rules, which would allow more accurate identification of transaction cost components. A person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to allocate receipt-contained cost adjustments in determining purchase price, because incorporating such adjustments would have more accurately reflected the actual cost paid by the customer and thus improved the reliability of the subscription pricing analysis.
Claim 5: It would have been obvious to combine the receipt-processing reference with the subscription reference because the receipt-processing reference teaches extracting receipt-based purchase amounts and the listed cost adjustments—sales tax, shipping charge, handling charge, insurance fee, use fee, government fee, delivery charge, discount, and coupon—are conventional receipt fields or transaction cost components. A person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to include such adjustments in the price analysis used for subscription pricing, because doing so would have been a routine and predictable refinement to determine the customer’s actual out-of-pocket purchase cost.
Claim 6: It would have been obvious to combine the receipt-processing reference with the subscription reference because the subscription reference teaches using ecommerce data and commercial transaction information to identify and recommend subscription opportunities, and a person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to search multiple ecommerce services for matching subscription offers in order to identify a subscription price lower than the average purchase price reflected in the POS receipts. Such a combination would have represented a predictable use of known ecommerce price-comparison techniques to improve the competitiveness of the offer, provide a lower recurring price to the customer, and increase the likelihood of subscription acceptance while relying on the receipt-derived average purchase price as the baseline for pricing analysis.
Claim 8: It would have been obvious to combine the receipt-processing reference with the subscription reference because the subscription reference teaches identifying subscription opportunities based on purchase patterns and adjusting offers based on product availability. A person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to present a substitute product when the originally identified product is unavailable via an ecommerce service, because doing so would preserve the subscription opportunity and maintain a commercially useful offer when the first product cannot be obtained, yielding the predictable benefit of continued fulfillment through a functionally similar product.
Claim 9: It would have been obvious to combine the receipt-processing reference with the subscription reference because the subscription reference teaches presenting a subscription offer and obtaining user assent before establishing or confirming the subscription. A person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to create and store a subscription order in response to user acceptance and to set a subscription delivery date, because this is the routine implementation of a subscription workflow and would have predictably enabled fulfillment of the accepted offer in an orderly and automated manner.
Claim 11: obvious over receipt OCR plus recurring-purchase analysis to derive consumption rate and subscription cadence.
Claim 12: obvious to use receipt-extracted item prices to set a discounted subscription price.
Claim 13: obvious to include receipt cost adjustments such as tax, shipping, discounts, and coupons in price determination.
Claim 14: dependent on claim 13; the listed adjustments are conventional receipt cost components.
Claim 15: obvious to compare against multiple ecommerce subscription offers to identify a lower price.
Claim 17: obvious to offer a substitute product when the identified product is unavailable online.
Claim 18: obvious to create and store a subscription order upon user acceptance.
Claim 20: obvious to combine receipt-derived quantity/date and price extraction with subscription analysis to determine frequency, quantity, and pricing.
Response to Arguments
Applicant broadened the claim set by removing "a plurality of" the two or more POS purchase receipts. It was part of a 112 rejection, and it weighed in the reason for dropping the prior art and/or for finding additional prior art, previously. In any event, this change warranted an additional reason for non-entry since it is tied to further consideration and/or search for changing the claim scope. That is, there is no longer any requirement for "a plurality of" the two or more POS purchase receipts. Nonetheless, the broadened claim set is/was entered as a one-time courtesy, and the new grounds is/was based on such broadening, so prosecution on the merits remains closed.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MICHAEL FUELLING whose telephone number is (571)270-1367.
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/MICHAEL FUELLING/ Supervisory Patent Examiner
Prosecution Insights