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 . Claims 1-20 have been examined.
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119 (a)-(d).
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 08/01/2024, 12/12/2025, 03/10/2026 & 07/27/2026 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Interpretation
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(f):
(f) Element in Claim for a Combination. – An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The claims in this application are given their broadest reasonable interpretation using the plain meaning of the claim language in light of the specification as it would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim element (also commonly referred to as a claim limitation) is limited by the description in the specification when 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is invoked.
As explained in MPEP § 2181, subsection I, claim limitations that meet the following three-prong test will be interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
(A) the claim limitation uses the term “means” or “step” or a term used as a substitute for “means” that is a generic placeholder (also called a nonce term or a non-structural term having no specific structural meaning) for performing the claimed function;
(B) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is modified by functional language, typically, but not always linked by the transition word “for” (e.g., “means for”) or another linking word or phrase, such as “configured to” or “so that”; and
(C) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is not modified by sufficient structure, material, or acts for performing the claimed function.
Use of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim with functional language creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites sufficient structure, material, or acts to entirely perform the recited function.
Absence of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is not to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is not interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites function without reciting sufficient structure, material or acts to entirely perform the recited function.
Claim limitations in this application that use the word “means” (or “step”) are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action. Conversely, claim limitations in this application that do not use the word “means” (or “step”) are not being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action.
This application includes one or more claim limitations that do not use the word “means,” but are nonetheless being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, because the claim limitation(s) uses a generic placeholder that is coupled with functional language without reciting sufficient structure to perform the recited function and the generic placeholder is not preceded by a structural modifier. Such claim limitation(s) is/are: “first imaging device”, “second imaging device”, “defect determination unit”, and “boulder determination unit” in claims 1-10, 14-18, and 20.
Because this/these claim limitation(s) is/are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, it/they is/are being interpreted to cover the corresponding structure described in the specification as performing the claimed function, and equivalents thereof. See at least [0049], [0206], [0224], Fig. 30 of the Specification (e.g., processor and sensor)
If applicant does not intend to have this/these limitation(s) interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, applicant may: (1) amend the claim limitation(s) to avoid it/them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph (e.g., by reciting sufficient structure to perform the claimed function); or (2) present a sufficient showing that the claim limitation(s) recite(s) sufficient structure to perform the claimed function so as to avoid it/them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph.
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 an abstract idea without significantly more.
101 Analysis – Step 1
Claims 1-20 are directed toward a system and method. Therefore, it can be seen that they fall within one of the four statutory categories of invention. However, the claims clearly do not meet the three-prong test for patentability.
101 Analysis – Step 2A, Prong I
Regarding Prong I of the Step 2A analysis in the 2019 PEG, the claims are to be analyzed to determine whether they recite subject matter that falls within one of the follow groups of abstract ideas:
Mathematical concepts – mathematical relationships, mathematical formulas or equations, mathematical calculations;
Certain methods of organizing human activity – fundamental economic principles or practices (including hedging, insurance, mitigating risk); commercial or legal interactions (including agreements in the form of contracts; legal obligations; advertising, marketing or sales activities or behaviors; business relations); managing personal behavior or relationships or interactions between people (including social activities, teaching, and following rules or instructions); and/or
Mental processes – concepts performed in the human mind (including an observation, evaluation, judgment, opinion).
Independent claim 1 includes limitations that recite an abstract idea (emphasized below) and will be used as a representative claim for the remainder of the 101 rejection. Claim 1 recites:
A monitoring system for a work machine, comprising:
a first imaging device configured to image working equipment included in the work machine, the first imaging device being provided in the work machine and having a first angle of view;
a second imaging device configured to image a ground on which the work machine travels, the second imaging device being provided in the work machine and having a second angle of view wider than the first angle of view;
a defect determination unit configured to determine presence or absence of a defect in the working equipment based on image data captured by the first imaging device; and
a boulder determination unit configured to determine presence or absence of a boulder on the ground based on image data captured by the second imaging device.
The examiner submits that the foregoing bold limitation(s) constitute a “mental process” and/or “certain methods of organizing human activity” because under its broadest reasonable interpretation, the claim covers performance of the limitation in the human mind. For example, “determine presence or absence of a defect in the working equipment based on image data captured by the first imaging device” in the context of this claim encompasses the user mentally analyzing the data and determine presence or absence of a defect in the working equipment. Similarly, the limitation of “determine presence or absence of a boulder on the ground based on image data captured by the second imaging device” in the context of this claim encompasses the user mentally determining presence or absence of a boulder on the ground based on image data captured. Accordingly, the claim recites at least one abstract idea.
101 Analysis – Step 2A, Prong II
Regarding Prong II of the Step 2A analysis in the 2019 PEG, the claims are to be analyzed to determine whether the claim, as a whole, integrated the abstract idea into a practical application. As noted in the 2019 PEG, it must be determined whether any additional elements in the claim beyond the abstract idea integrate the exception into a practical application in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception. The courts have indicated that additional elements merely using a computer to implement an abstract idea , adding insignificant extra solution activity, or generally linking use of a judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use do not integrate a judicial exception into a “practical application.”
In the present case, the additional limitations beyond the above-noted abstract idea are as follows (where the underlined portions are the “additional limitations” while the bolded portions continue to represent the “abstract idea”):
A monitoring system for a work machine, comprising:
a first imaging device configured to image working equipment included in the work machine, the first imaging device being provided in the work machine and having a first angle of view;
a second imaging device configured to image a ground on which the work machine travels, the second imaging device being provided in the work machine and having a second angle of view wider than the first angle of view;
a defect determination unit configured to determine presence or absence of a defect in the working equipment based on image data captured by the first imaging device; and
a boulder determination unit configured to determine presence or absence of a boulder on the ground based on image data captured by the second imaging device.
For the following reason(s), the examiner submits that the above identified additional limitations do not integrate the above-noted abstract idea into a practical application.
Regarding the additional limitations of “a first imaging device configured to image working equipment included in the work machine, the first imaging device being provided in the work machine and having a first angle of view” and “a second imaging device configured to image a ground on which the work machine travels, the second imaging device being provided in the work machine and having a second angle of view wider than the first angle of view”, the examiner submits that these limitations are mere data gathering in conjunction with a law of nature or abstract ideal (MPEP § 2106.05). In particular, “a first imaging device configured to image working equipment included in the work machine” and “a second imaging device configured to image a ground on which the work machine travels” indicate pre-solution activity such that it amounts no more than a step of gathering data for use in a claimed process. Lastly, the “determination unit” recited at a high level of generality, i.e., as a generic processor performing a generic computer function of processing data. This generic processor limitation is no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component.
Thus, taken alone, the additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. Further, looking at the additional limitation(s) as an ordered combination or as a whole, the limitation(s) add nothing that is not already present when looking at the elements taken individually. For instance, there is no indication that the additional elements, when considered as a whole, reflect an improvement in the functioning of a computer or an improvement to another technology or technical field, apply or use the above-noted judicial exception to effect a particular treatment or prophylaxis for a disease or medical condition, implement/use the above-noted judicial exception with a particular machine or manufacture that is integral to the claim, effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing, or apply or use the judicial exception in some other meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment, such that the claim as a whole is not more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception (MPEP § 2106.05). Accordingly, the additional limitation(s) do/does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea.
101 Analysis - Step 2B
Regarding Step 2B of the 2019 PEG, representative independent claim 1 does not include additional elements (considered both individually and as an ordered combination) that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for the same reasons to those discussed above with respect to determining that the claim does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application. As discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional element of using one or more processors to perform the determining … amounts to nothing more than applying the exception using a generic computer component. Generally applying an exception using a generic computer component cannot provide an inventive concept. And as discussed above, the additional limitations discussed above are insignificant extra-solution activities.
Further, a conclusion that an additional element is insignificant extra-solution activity in Step 2A should be re-evaluated in Step 2B to determine if they are more than what is well- understood, routine, conventional activity in the field. The additional limitations of “image working equipment included in the work machine” and “image a ground on which the work machine travels” are well-understood, routine, and conventional activities because the background recites that the sensors are all conventional sensors mounted on the work machine, and specification does not provide any indication that the monitoring system is anything other than a conventional computer within a vehicle. MPEP 2106.05(d)(II), and the cases cited therein including Intellectual Ventures I, LLC v. Symantec Corp., 838 F.3d 1307, 1321 (Fed. Cir. 2016), TLI Communications LLC v. AV Auto. LLC, 823 F.3d 607, 610 (Fed. Cir. 2016), and OIP Techs., Inc., v. Amazon.com, Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1363 (Fed. Cir. 2015), indicate that mere collection or receipt of data over a network is a well-understood, routine, and conventional function when it is claimed in a merely generic manner. Hence, the claim is not patent eligible.
Dependent claims 2-19 do not recite any further limitations that cause the claim(s) to be patent eligible. Rather, the limitations of dependent claims are directed toward additional aspects of the judicial exception and/or well-understood, routine and conventional additional elements that do not integrate the judicial exception into a practical application (i.e., further characterizing the receipt of data and the mental processes). Therefore, dependent claims 2-19 are not patent eligible under the same rationale as provided for in the rejection of independent claim 1.
Therefore, claims 1-20 are ineligible under 35 USC §101.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-5, 14-15, and 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Murakami et al. (JP 2021080790 A) (Murakami hereinafter).
Regarding claim 1, Murakami discloses a monitoring system for a work machine, comprising:
a first imaging device configured to image working equipment included in the work machine, the first imaging device being provided in the work machine and having a first angle of view (Fig. 12, damage determination unit 603);
a second imaging device configured to image a ground on which the work machine travels, the second imaging device being provided in the work machine and having a second angle of view wider than the first angle of view (Fig. 12, road surface condition acquisition 601);
a defect determination unit configured to determine presence or absence of a defect in the working equipment based on image data captured by the first imaging device ([0055], the damage determination unit 603 determines whether or not the tire 6 is damaged when the tire 6 comes into contact with the monitoring target 200 by driving the traveling mechanism 4. The monitoring target information and the storage unit 602 acquired by the road surface condition acquisition unit 601. Judgment is made based on the standard information stored in. The damage determination unit 603 may determine whether or not the tire is damaged by using the tire information regarding the shape of the block pattern of the tire or the size of the block pattern. The damage determination unit 603 makes a determination based on any of a determination by artificial intelligence (AI), a determination by pattern matching by image processing, a determination by analysis of a received signal of a radar scanner, and the like); and
a boulder determination unit configured to determine presence or absence of a bounder on the ground based on image data captured by the second imaging device ([0037], a plurality of defined image data 301, 302, and 303 are prepared as the learning data set 310. The learning data set 310 is associated with classification (labeling) such as the presence or absence of rock 202 that should be noted for each image data as incidental information).
Regarding claim 2, Murakami discloses the monitoring system for the work machine according to claim 1, as stated above, wherein the second imaging device is disposed above the first imaging device ([0023], the number of cameras 20 is not limited to one, and may be a plurality. For example, as shown in Fig. 7, it may be attached to the back side of the bucket 12 (the upper surface of the bucket facing the driver’s cab3) (camera 20a), above the front fender 18 (camera 20b), or behind (camera 20e), above, below, or beside the lighting 19 (camera 20c), above the ceiling of the driver’s cab 3 (camera 20d), or attached to the cover of the housing 8R (camera 20f)).
Regarding claim 3, Murakami discloses the monitoring system for the work machine according to claim 1, as stated above, wherein the work machine includes a headlight and a housing that holds the headlight, and each of the first imaging device and the second imaging device is disposed in the housing (Fig. 7).
Regarding claims 4-5, Murakami discloses the monitoring system for the work machine according to claim 3, as stated above, wherein each of the first imaging device and the second imaging device is disposed outside the headlight in a vehicle width direction of the work machine; and wherein the second imaging device is disposed above the first imaging device in the housing (Figs. 4 and 5).
Regarding claims 14-15, Murakami discloses the monitoring system for the work machine according to claim 1, as stated above, wherein the work machine includes a rotating member that contact the ground and the work machine travels on the ground by rotation of the rotating member, and the second imaging device images the ground at least in a traveling direction of the rotating member; and the rotating member includes a front rotating member and a rear rotating member disposed behind the front rotating member, and the second imaging device images the ground in front of the front rotating member (Fig. 1, the traveling mechanism 4 has wheels 5 that can rotate around the rotating shaft DX. The tire 6 is mounted on the wheel 5. The wheel 5 includes two front wheels 5F and two rear wheels 5R. The tire 6 includes a right front tire 6FR and a left front tire 6FL mounted on the front wheel 5F, and a right rear tire 6RR and a left rear tire 6RL mounted on the rear wheel 5R. In the following, the right front tire 6FR and the left front tire 6FL may be collectively referred to as the front tire 6F, and the right rear tire 6RR and the left rear tire 6RL may be collectively referred to as the rear tire 6R. The traveling mechanism 4 can travel on the road surface).
Regarding claim 19, Murakami discloses the monitoring system for the work machine according to claim 1, as stated above, wherein the work machine is a wheel loader (Fig. 1).
Regarding claim 20, the elements contained in claim 20 are substantially similar to elements presented in claim 1, except that it set forth the claimed invention as a method rather than a system and is rejected for the same reasons as applied above.
Prior Art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant’s disclosure. See attached form PTO-892.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Luke Huynh whose telephone number is 571-270-5746. The examiner can normally be reached Mon 8-5, Tues 8-12, Thurs & Fri 8-2.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Hitesh Patel can be reached at 571-270-5442. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/LUKE HUYNH/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3667
08/28/2026
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