DETAILED ACTION
This communication is in response to the Application filed on 09/13/2024. Claims 1-12 are pending and have been examined. Claims 1, 11 and 12 are independent. This Application was published as U.S. Pub. No. 2025/0111849.
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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 09/13/2024 was filed. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Priority
Acknowledgment is made of applicant’s claim for foreign priority based on application JP2023-168742 filed on 09/28/2023 and JP2023-219902 filed on 12/26/2023 in Japan Patent Office (JPO) and receipt of a certified copy thereof.
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 1-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to abstract idea without significantly more.
Regarding Claims 1, 11 and 12,
Claims 1, 11 and 12 recite a system, apparatus, and method, which falls under the statutory category of machine, machine, and method, respectively (Step 1: Yes).
Claims recites limitations “(a) acquire a speech uttered by one or more participants…”, “(b) determine, in accordance with an utterance…”, and “(c) provide information supporting the communication…”. Except for the recitation of “circuitry” (e.g., generic computer component), limitations (b) - (c) are concepts, which can be performed in the human mind through observation, evaluation, or judgement, or by a human using a pen and paper. The claims, under their broadest reasonable interpretation, cover the concept of a meeting participant listening to other participant’s presentation/arguments, identifying the keyword/topics, determining the list of supporting documents or evidence for the keywords, and retrieving the relevant information from data sources (e.g., computer, files or internet), and showing to the other participants (see MPEP 2106.04(a)(2) III.
Under its broadest reasonable interpretation when read in light of the specification, the concepts recited in limitations (b) – (c) encompass mental processes practically performed in the human mind. According, the claim recites an abstract idea (Step 2A, Prong one).
The judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application. In particular, an additional element of “circuitry” is recited at a high level of generality (i.e., a generic computing device and generic computer components performing a generic computer functions such as processing and storing data from given input) such that it amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply to the exception using a generic computer component.
The claim recites the following additional elements: limitation (a) is recited at a high level of generality, and amounts to mere data gathering, which is a form of insignificant extra-solution activity. Each of the additional limitations is no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component.
Accordingly, the additional elements do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea and the claim is therefore directed to the judicial exception. (Step 2A: YES).
The claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because they do not include subject matter that could not be performed by a human, as discussed above with respect to integration of the abstract idea into a practical application, the additional element of using the generic computing elements to perform the claimed elements amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component. Mere instructions to apply an exception using a generic computer component cannot provide an inventive concept.
As noted previously, the claim as a whole merely describes how to generally linking the use of the aforementioned concept to a particular technological environment or field of use. Thus, even when viewed as a whole, nothing in the claim adds significantly more (i.e., an inventive concept) to the abstract idea. The claim is not patent eligible. (Step 2B: NO).
Regarding Dependent Claims 2-10,
Claims 2-10 are dependent on supra claim 1 and includes all the limitations of the claim and further limits the elements of Claim 1. Therefore, the dependent claims recite the same abstract idea. The claim recites the additional limitations of “detect one or more predetermined keywords…” in Claim 2, 3, and 7, which are no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer component, generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use, insignificant extra-solution activity, or that are well understood, routine and conventional activities previously known to the industry. Additional elements, “terminal apparatus” and “a database,” is recited at a high level of generality (i.e., a generic computing device and generic computer components) in Claims 3, 4, and 8 and Claims 7 and 9.
No additional elements beyond the use of generic computing elements are claimed, therefore the judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application nor are the claim elements sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception. Therefore, claims are not patent eligible.
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.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1, 11 and 12 are rejected under pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102(g) as being anticipated by Vasylyev, (US Pub No. 2024/0412720, hereinafter, Vasylyev).
Regarding Claim 1,
Vasylyev discloses a system for supporting communication (Vasylyev, Fig.1, Title and Abstract, "…An artificial intelligence (AI) assistant system and a method for providing a contextualized response to a user using AI..."), the system comprising circuitry configured to: acquire a speech uttered by one or more participants participating in the communication (Fig.1, par [085], "...an assistant system 2...Microphone 102 may be configured as the primary input device for assistant system 2 which is responsible for capturing the audio from a user or conversation between two or more individuals."; par [166], "…user group 200 may include any number of participants which may be distributed over any number of locations...user 204 may be another meeting's participant co-located with user 202, and user 206 may be a yet another participant of the meeting but connected from a remote location via internet….");
determine, in accordance with an utterance made by the one or more participants, whether the communication is to be supported, from the speech uttered by the one or more participants (Fig.3, paras [136], "…a first step 802 is to capture audio: The microphone records the conversation between two or more people, converting their voices into an audio signal...In a step 808: Voice Activity Detection (VAD)...In a step 814 "speech-to-text"..."; paras [137-138], "…In a step 838 "contextual understanding", the AI model of the AI Assistant processes the encoded conversation and generates a contextual representation of the ongoing conversation, including any control signals, commands, and relevant information..."; par [143], "…The AI Assistant monitors the conversation and detects control signals in a step 852, which, in turn, can trigger further action. Step 852 can be performed after each capture of user-spoken utterances. It may also be performed in real-time...Control signals may include key phrases,..."); and
provide information supporting the communication based on a determination that the communication is to be supported (par [145], "…Based on the command analysis and context, the AI Assistant generates a response in a step 868 "response generation"...the AI Assistant may also access external sources for information...").
Claim 11 is an apparatus claim with limitations similar to the limitations of Claim 1 and is rejected under similar rationale.
Claim 12 is a method claim with limitations similar to the limitations of Claim 1 and is rejected under similar rationale.
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 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.
Claims 2-10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Vasylyev in view of Leaman et al., (US Pat No. 12,271,869, hereinafter, Leaman).
Regarding Claim 2,
Vasylyev discloses the system according to claim 1, wherein the circuitry is configured to:
Vasylyev discloses an AI assistant processes a contextual representation (e.g., control signals, key phrases), but does not explicitly discloses detecting predetermined keywords from the speech by participants.
However, Leaman, in the analogous field of endeavor, discloses detect one or more predetermined keywords from the speech uttered by the one or more participants (Leaman, Figs.67-69, col.151, ll.53 - col.152, ll.63, "...conversation intelligence system 528 that may provide services related to recording and transcribing
conversations such as calls, and adding these transcribed calls into the system framework or platform (e.g., multiservice business platform 510)..."; Fig.69, col.156, lls.16-65, "…the CI system 528 may perform various techniques to extract one or more keyword(s)…the CI system 528 may have a predetermined list of keywords that may be identified..."); and
provide, in response to detection of the one or more predetermined keywords, the information supporting the communication corresponding to the detected one or more predetermined keywords (Leaman, Figs.67-69, col.157, lls.25-67, "…the CI system 528 may be configured to trigger certain actions, tasks, and/or workflows when certain topics and/or keywords are detected… the CI system 528 may trigger a workflow that automatically generates a price quote that may be sent to a customer (e.g., supporting information)..."; Fig.10, col.23, lls.21-col.24, ll.58, "…an information extraction system 204 that identifies entities, events, and/or relationships between entities or events from the information retrieved by the crawling system 202; one or more proprietary databases 208 ; one or more knowledge graphs 210 representing specific types of entities… a content generation system 216 that generates content of a communication...")
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art, before effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified a real-time contextually aware AI assistant of Vasylyev with a multi-service business platform system having conversation intelligence system of Leaman with a reasonable expectation of success to improve a customer relationship management (CRM) system to enable, in a single database and system, the development and maintenance of a set of universal contact objects that relate to the contacts of a business and that have attributes that enable use for a wide range of activities, and improved customizability with CRM systems and other-related systems for marketing and sales activities (Leaman, col. 1, Background, col.7, ll.53 - col.8, ll.13).
Regarding Claim 3,
Vasylyev in view of Leaman discloses the system according to claim 2, wherein the one or more participants include a first participant participating in the communication, and a second participant different from the first participant (Vasylyev, Fig.1, par [166], "…System 2 monitors and records a conversation involving a group of people ( e.g., user group 200)...user 202 may be the moderator or organizer of a meeting, user 204 may be another meeting's participant co-located with user 202..."), and the circuitry is configured to: acquire a speech uttered by the second participant from a terminal apparatus used by the first participant (Vasylyev, Fig.3, par [136], "…a first step 802 is to capture audio: The microphone records the conversation between two or more people, converting their voices into an audio signal...In a step 808: Voice Activity Detection (VAD)...In a step 814 "speech-to-text"...") and detect the one or more predetermined keywords from the speech uttered by the second participant (Leaman, Fig.69, col.156, lls.16-65, "…the CI system 528 may perform various techniques to extract one or more keyword(s)…the CI system 528 may have a predetermined list of keywords that may be identified...").
Regarding Claim 4,
Vasylyev in view of Leaman discloses the system according to claim 3, wherein the circuitry is configured to cause the terminal apparatus used by the first participant to display the information supporting the communication (Vasylyev, Fig.1: Display 145, paras [012, 403], "…The AI assistant system may include a display device, the processor may be further configured to execute instructions to generate visual content based on the conversational context data and the generated conversational response and output the generated visual content to the display device...").
Regarding Claim 5,
Vasylyev in view of Leaman discloses the system according to claim 3, wherein the circuitry is configured to provide the information supporting the communication in real time in accordance with an utterance made by the second participant (Vasylyev, Title, par [132], "…the software components of assistant system 2 are configured for real-time processing, recognizing voices and processing them as the conversation is ongoing...").
Regarding Claim 6,
Vasylyev in view of Leaman discloses the system according to claim 3, wherein the circuitry is configured to acquire the speech uttered by the second participant from the terminal apparatus from which the speech uttered by the one or more participants including the speech uttered by the second participant is transmitted (Vasylyev, Fig.1, par [085], "...an assistant system 2...Microphone 102 may be configured as the primary input device for assistant system 2 which is responsible for capturing the audio from a user or conversation between two or more individuals."; par [166], "…user group 200 may include any number of participants which may be distributed over any number of locations...user 202 may be the moderator or organizer of a meeting, user 204 may be another meeting's participant co-located with user 202, and user 206 may be a yet another participant of the meeting but connected from a remote location via internet….").
Regarding Claim 7,
Vasylyev in view of Leaman discloses the system according to claim 3, wherein the circuitry is configured to detect the one or more predetermined keywords, the one or more predetermined keywords being registered in a support database in which information supporting the communication is registered (Leaman, col.152, ll.64 - col.154, ll.57, "…the conversation object 5000 defines a set of properties of a recorded conversation...any conversations that are processed by the CI system 528 may be represented in a client's datastores (e.g., knowledge base instance of the instances knowledge graph 640 and/or events data store(s) 558) as conversation object instances..."), and the first participant selects the support database in which the one or more predetermined keywords to be detected are registered (Leaman, Fig.45, col.126, ll.57 - col.128, ll.25, "…the reporting system 526 may provide a graphical user interface (GUI) to a user via a user device (e.g., user device(s) 570), where the user may select a reporting type...the user may select two data sources (e.g., objects)..."; Fig.46, col.84, ll.57 - col.85, ll.37, "…a portion of the multi-service business platform 510 with specific emphasis on details of the customization system 520 and the storage system 550 used to create custom objects (e.g., conversation object)….").
Regarding Claim 8,
Vasylyev in view of Leaman discloses the system according to claim 7, wherein the support database includes a plurality of questions and answers to the plurality of questions, and the circuitry is configured to cause the terminal apparatus used by the first participant to display a question corresponding to the detected one or more predetermined keywords among the plurality of questions, and an answer to the question (Vasylyev, paras [145-146], "…when given a prompt or a question... an information retrieval system to search for relevant documents or passages from the external knowledge source...Useful examples of the knowledge base include but are not limited to structured databases, web resources, and document collections curated for the specific domain or application..."; Fig.16, col.48, ll. - col.49, ll., "…A multi-client service platform 1600 may refer to a computing system that provides customer service solutions for any number of different
Clients… use the platform 1600 to find and provide content that may be used to help provide service or
support to its contacts (e.g., articles that answer frequency asked questions, "how-to" videos, user manuals, and the like) via a graphical user interface..."; col.164, ll.45-52, "…This GUI 7200 may provide a coaching view that may show questions asked, keywords mentioned, topics, etc." ).
Regarding Claim 9,
Vasylyev in view of Leaman discloses the system according to claim 7, wherein the support database includes one or more databases among a database related to a frequently asked question (FAQ), a database related to an anticipated question and an answer, a database related to product information, a database related to industry information, and a database related to conversation information (par [176], "…Training module 162 would first collect and preprocess a large dataset of customer support conversations from various sources, such as call center transcripts, online chat logs, and email exchanges. This dataset would be annotated with relevant information, such as the customer's intent (e.g., troubleshooting, billing inquiry)..."; Leaman, Fig.10, col.23, lls.43-53, "…one or more proprietary databases 208 that store information relating to organizations or individuals that use the directed content system 200; one or more knowledge graphs 210 representing specific types of entities (e.g., businesses, people, places, products), relationships between entities...", Fig.67, Conversation Datastore 6720).
Regarding Claim 10,
Vasylyev in view of Leaman discloses the system according to claim 2, wherein the circuitry is configured to determine that the communication is not to be supported in a case where the one or more predetermined keywords are not detected, such that the information supporting the communication is not provided (paras [137-138], "…In a step 838 "contextual understanding", the AI model of the AI Assistant processes the encoded conversation and generates a contextual representation of the ongoing conversation, including any control signals, commands, and relevant information..."; par [143], "…The AI Assistant monitors the conversation and detects control signals in a step 852, which, in turn, can trigger further action...").
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Nelson et al., (US Pat No. 11,645,630, hereinafter, Nelson) discloses Artificial intelligence is introduced into an electronic meeting context to perform various tasks before, during, and/or after electronic meetings. The artificial intelligence may analyze a wide variety of data such as data pertaining to other electronic meetings, data pertaining to organizations and users, and other general information pertaining to any topic (Nelson, Abstract).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to JANGWOEN LEE whose telephone number is (703)756-5597. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 8:00 am - 5:00 pm ET.
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/JANGWOEN LEE/Examiner, Art Unit 2656
/BHAVESH M MEHTA/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2656
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