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 .
Status of the Claims
Claims 1-20 are presented for examination. Applicant filed a response to non-final Office action on 04/16/2026 amending claims 1, 11, and 13-20. In light of Applicnat’s amendments, Examiner has withdrawn the previous § 101 and grounds of prior art rejections of claims 1-20. Examiner has, however, established new § 101 and new grounds of § 103 rejections for claims 1-20 in the instant Office action. Since the new § 101 and the new grounds of § 103 rejections were necessitated by Applicant’s amendments, the instant rejection of claims 1-20 is FINAL rejection of the claims.
Examiner’s Remarks
Patent Eligibility under § 101: Applicant argues in pages 6-7 of Applicant’s Remarks:
The rejection characterizes the amended claims as being directed to "certain methods of organizing human activity (i.e., commercial interaction including business relations)." Applicant respectfully disagrees because the amended independent claims do not recite or describe a commercial interaction or business relation. The claims recite a specific technical pipeline in which a scheduler automatically initiates a scraper to collect data from a plurality of sources, processing circuitry automatically categorizes customer reviews without receiving a request from a stakeholder, and automatically outputs an alert to a device of the stakeholder in response to determining that particular respective sentiment falls below a threshold level. No step of the amended claims involves a commercial transaction, a business agreement, or an interaction between parties in a commercial or business context. The amended claims describe the automated operation of specific computing components (e.g., a scheduler, a scraper, processing circuitry) performing specific technical functions in an ordered sequence. Thus the claims are not directed to an abstract idea.
Further, the presently amended independent claims are directed to a practical application. The claims recite an ordered combination of technical elements that together solve a specific technical problem of automatically monitoring and processing customer reviews from multiple sources to output alerts without human initiation. The scheduler automatically initiates the scraper, and the processing circuitry automatically performs sentiment categorization without a stakeholder request. This is not a generic recitation of computer components applied to an abstract concept. Rather, the claims are directed to a specific technical architecture in which each component performs a defined role in an automated pipeline.
Examiner respectfully disagrees. Customer sentiments are collected for improving the business relationship between the business and the customers. This falls under "certain methods of organizing human activity (i.e., commercial interaction including business relations).” Further, there is no integration of recited abstract idea into a practical outcome because Applicant’s claim limitations are recited in high level of abstraction lacking details and specifics as to how a technological solution to a problem of technology is carried out. As such, instant claims 1-20 are not patent eligible under § 101.
Prior Art under § 102 and § 103: Examiner has carefully considered Applicant’s arguments directed to the previous grounds of prior art rejection but they are moot in view of new grounds of § 103 rejection necessitated by Applicant’s amendment of independent claims 1, 13, and 20.
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 USC § 101 because they are directed to non-statutory subject matter. The rationale for this finding is explained below.
The Supreme Court in Mayo laid out a framework for determining whether an applicant is seeking to patent a judicial exception itself or a patent-eligible application of the judicial exception. See Alice Corp., 134 S. Ct. at 2355,110 USPQ2d at 1981 (citing Mayo, 566 U.S. 66, 101 USPQ2d 1961). This framework, which is referred to as the Mayo test or the Alice/Mayo test (“the test”), is described in detail in Manual of Patent Examining Procedure (”MPEP”) (see MPEP § 2106(III) for further guidance). The step 1 of the test: It need to be determined whether the claims are directed to a patent eligible (i.e., statutory) subject matter under 35 USC § 101. Step 2A of the test: If the claims are found to be directed to a statutory subject matter, the next step is to determine whether the claims are directed to a judicial exception i.e., law of nature, natural phenomenon, and abstract idea (Prong 1). If the claims are found to be directed to an abstract idea, it needs to be determined whether the claims recite additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application (Prong 2). Step 2B of the test: If the claims are directed to a judicial exception, the next and final step is to determine whether the claims recite additional elements that amount to significantly more than the judicial exception.
Step 1 of the Test:
When considering subject matter eligibility under 35 USC § 101, it must be determined whether the claim is directed to one of the four statutory categories of invention, i.e., process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter. Here, the claimed invention of claims 1-12 is a series of steps, which is method (i.e., a process) and, thus, one of the statutory categories of invention. Further, the claimed invention of claims 13-19 is at least one non-transitory machine readable medium, which is also one of the statutory categories of invention. Still further, the claimed invention of claim 20 is a system, which is also one of the statutory categories of invention.
Conclusion of Step 1 Analysis: Therefore, claims 1- 20 are statutory under 35 USC § 101 in view of step 1 of the test.
Step 2A of the Test:
Prong 1: Claims 1-20, however, recite an abstract idea of automatically categorizing customer review sentiments. The creation of automatically categorizing customer review sentiments, as recited in the independent claims 1, 13, and 20, belongs to certain methods of organizing human activity (i.e., commercial interaction including business relations) that are found by the courts to be abstract ideas. The limitations in independent claims 1, 13, and 20, which set forth or describe the recited abstract idea, are found in the following steps:
“assigning a respective sentiment to each of the customer reviews, the respective sentiment relating to an aspect of the restaurant” (claims 1, 13, and 20);
“automatically categorizing, without receiving a request from a stakeholder of the restaurant, each of the customer reviews according to the respective sentiment” (claims 1, 13, and 20); and
“automatically outputting an alert to a device of the stakeholder of the restaurant in response to determining that a customer review of the customer reviews has been categorized according to a particular respective sentiment that falls below a threshold level” (claims 1, 13, and 20).
Prong 2: In addition to abstract steps recited above in Prong 1, independent claims 1, 13, and 20, recite additional elements:
“a scheduler” (claims 1, 13, and 20);
“a scraper” (claims 1, 13, and 20);
“at least one non-transitory machine-readable medium including instructions, which when executed by processing circuitry, causes the processing circuitry to perform operations” (claim 13);
“processing circuitry” (claims 1 and 20); and
“memory, including instructions, which when executed by the processing circuitry, cause the processing circuitry to perform operations” (claim 20).
These additional elements are recited at a high level of generality (e.g., as a generic processor performing a generic computer functions) such that they amount to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic computer components. Further, the following limitation recites insignificant extra solution activity (for example, data gathering):
“automatically initiating collecting data from a plurality of sources, the collected data including customer reviews corresponding to a restaurant” (claims 1, 13, and 20).
This additional limitations does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because it does not impose a meaningful limit on the judicial exception. The additional elements/limitation of independent claims 1, 13, and 20, here do not render improvements to the functioning of a computer or to any other technology or technical field (see MPEP § 2106.05(a)), nor do they integrate the abstract idea into a practical application under MPEP § 2106.05(b) (particular machine); MPEP § 2106.05(c) (particular transformations); or MPEP § 2106.05(e) (other meaningful limitations).
Conclusion of Step 2A Analysis: The limitations in independent claims 1, 13, and 20, which set forth or describe the recited abstract idea are not patent eligible either alone or in combination. The additional elements/limitation in independent claims 1, 13, and 20, are not patent eligible either alone or in combination. Further, the combination of these additional elements/limitation and the limitations which set forth or describe the recited abstract idea is no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using a generic device. Accordingly, even in combination, these additional elements/limitation and the limitations which set forth or describe the recited abstract idea do not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because they do not impose any meaningful limits on practicing the abstract idea. Therefore, independent claims 1, 13, and 20, are non-statutory under 35 USC § 101 in view of step 2A of the test.
Step 2B of the Test: The additional elements of independent claims 1, 13, and 20, (see above under Step 2A – Prong 2) are described by Applicant’s Specification in following terms:
[0045] Machine (e.g., computer system) 700 may include a hardware processor 702 (e.g., a central processing unit (CPU), a graphics processing unit (GPU), a hardware processor core, or any combination thereof), a main memory 704 and a static memory 706, some or all of which may communicate with each other via an interlink (e.g., bus) 708. The machine 700 may further include a display unit 710, an alphanumeric input device 712 (e.g., a keyboard), and a user interface (UI) navigation device 714 (e.g., a mouse). []
[0046] The storage device 716 may include a machine readable medium 722 that is non-transitory on which is stored one or more sets of data structures or instructions 724 (e.g., software) embodying or utilized by any one or more of the techniques or functions described herein. The instructions 724 may also reside, completely or at least partially, within the main memory 704, within static memory 706, or within the hardware processor 702 during execution thereof by the machine 700. In an example, one or any combination of the hardware processor 702, the main memory 704, the static memory 706, or the storage device 716 may constitute machine readable media.
This is a description of general-purpose computer. Thus, individually, the additional elements of independent claims 1, 13, and 20, are well-understood, routine, and conventional elements that amount to no more than implementing the abstract idea with a computerized system. Further, the additional limitation of “collecting” information amounts to no more than mere instructions to apply the exception using generic computer components. For the same reason this additional limitation is not sufficient to provide an inventive concept. The additional limitation of “collecting” information was considered as insignificant extra-solution activity in Step 2A - Prong 2. Re-evaluating here in Step 2B, it is also determined to be well-understood, routine, and conventional activity in the field. Similarly to OIP Techs., Inc., v. Amazon.com, Inc., 788 F.3d 1359, 1363, 115 USPQ2d 1090, 1093 (Fed. Cir. 2015) (sending messages over a network), and buySAFE, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F.3d 1350, 1355, 112 USPQ2d 1093, 1096 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (computer receives and sends information over a network), the additional limitation of independent claims 1, 13, and 20, “collects” information over a network in a merely generic manner. The courts have recognized “collecting” information function as well-understood, routine and conventional when claimed in a merely generic manner. Therefore, the additional limitation of independent claims 1, 13, and 20, is well-understood, routine, and conventional. Further, taken as combination, the additional elements/limitation add nothing more than what is present when the additional elements/limitation are considered individually. There is no indication that the combination provides any effect regarding the functioning of the computer or any improvement to another technology.
Conclusion of Step 2B Analysis: Therefore, independent claims 1, 13, and 20, are non-statutory under 35 USC § 101 in view of step 2B of the test.
Dependent Claims: Dependent claims 2-12 depend on independent claim 1; and dependent claims 14-19 depend on independent claim 13. The elements in dependent claims 2-12 and 14-19, which set forth or describe the abstract idea, are:
“the alert is generated based on a trend identified from the customer reviews over time, the trend corresponding to a change in a count of the customer reviews that are negative or positive” (claims 2 and 14: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“categorizing each of the customer reviews includes determining a sentiment score for each of the customer reviews” (claims 3 and 15: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“consolidating the collected data for display on a single webpage; and the alert, when selected on the device of the stakeholder, directs the device to the single webpage” (claims 4 and 16: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“categorizing includes applying a label of positive, neutral, or negative” (claims 5 and 19: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“the alert includes an indication of a suggested improvement for addressing a negative sentiment in the customer reviews” (claims 6 and 18: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“the collected data is collected from two or more review websites, the two or more review websites presenting data in different formats” (claim 7: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“outputting the alert includes outputting the alert in response to determining that categorizing each of the customer reviews indicates a threshold number of reviews were categorized to be positive, neutral, or negative, the threshold being specific to the stakeholder or the restaurant” (claim 8: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“before categorizing each of the customer reviews, using natural language processing to create embeddings for text in the customer reviews” (claim 9: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“the collected data includes data from a plurality of restaurants in a chain, the plurality of restaurants including the restaurant" (claim 10: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“the collected data is collected periodically, and wherein the collected data is categorized in response to being collected” (claim 11: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“outputting the alert includes outputting the alert within a timeframe of a particular customer review being posted to a website, the timeframe being specific to the stakeholder or the restaurant” (claim 12: further narrowing the recited abstract idea);
“the single webpage is further configured to display inventory, employee scheduling, and sales reports for the restaurant” (claim 17: further narrowing the recited abstract idea).
Conclusion of Dependent Claims Analysis: Dependent claims 2-12 and 14-19 do not correct the deficiencies of independent claims 1 and 13, and they are rejected on the same basis.
Conclusion of the 35 USC § 101 Analysis: Therefore, claims 1-20 are rejected as directed to an abstract idea without “significantly more” under 35 USC § 101.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
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 § 102 of this title, 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 1-3, 5-6, 8-15, and 18-20, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Lok (US 2025/0166026 A1) in view of Lee (KR 20250175852 A).
As to independent claims 1, 13, and 20
Lok shows:
processing circuitry; and memory, including instructions, which when executed by the processing circuitry, cause the processing circuitry to perform operations (Lok: page 27, ¶¶ 297-300) comprising:
assigning, using processing circuitry, a respective sentiment to each of the customer reviews, the respective sentiment relating to an aspect of the restaurant (Lok: pages 2-3, ¶ 44; and page 5, ¶ 62);
automatically categorizing, using the processing circuitry and without receiving a request from a stakeholder of the restaurant, each of the customer reviews according to the respective sentiment (Lok: page 3, ¶¶ 45-48); and
automatically outputting an alert to a device of the stakeholder of the restaurant in response to determining that a customer review of the customer reviews has been categorized according to a particular respective sentiment that falls below a threshold level (Lok: page 18, ¶ 178).
Lok does not show:
automatically initiating, by a scheduler, collecting data from a plurality of sources using a scraper, the collected data including customer reviews corresponding to a restaurant.
Lee shows:
automatically initiating, by a scheduler, collecting data from a plurality of sources using a scraper, the collected data including customer reviews corresponding to a restaurant (Lee: page 7 – disclosing: “Returning to Figure 2, the scraping module (230) collects external data (RED) that may impact the sales of a merchant from a web server (WS) through web crawling and data scraping. Examples of external data (RED) may include structured data such as the merchant's sales information, purchase information, tax information, weather information, business district information, demographic information, and economic indicators, as well as unstructured data such as customer reviews, as described above in Table 2. The scraping module (230) may be configured to include a web crawler (231), a scraper (233), and a scheduler (235) as illustrated.”; and page 8 – disclosing: “The scraper (233) parses the HTML structure of a crawled webpage to scrape external data (RED). For example, the DOM (Document Object Model) tree can be explored using well-known HTML parsing libraries such as BeautifulSoup or Scrapy, or regular expressions can be used to identify and collect external data (RED) based on specific tags, classes, IDs, etc. The scheduler (235) performs a function that schedules the execution of the scraping module (230) at a preset time. This allows web crawling and data scraping to be automatically performed at specific times, and allows for scheduling tasks considering time periods with low network load. Additionally, the scheduler (235) can set up not only one-time scraping tasks but also regularly recurring tasks. For example, by using a scheduling tool such as cron to run the scraping module (230) daily, weekly, monthly, or at a subscriber-specified interval, the system operator can optimize network performance when collecting external data (RED).”).
Motivation to combine Lok and Lee
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the method, the non-transitory computer readable medium, and the system of Lok by automatically initiating, by a scheduler, collecting data from a plurality of sources using a scraper, the collected data including customer reviews corresponding to a restaurant of Lee in order to provide a sales diagnosis service in real time (Lee: page 2).
As to claims 2 and 14: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claims 1 and 13. Lok also shows that the alert is generated based on a trend identified from the customer reviews over time, the trend corresponding to a change in a count of the customer reviews that are negative or positive (Lok: page 18, ¶ 178).
As to claims 3 and 15: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claims 1 and 13. Lok also shows categorizing each of the customer reviews includes determining a sentiment score for each of the customer reviews (Lok: page 2, ¶ 42).
As to claims 5 and 19: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claims 1 and 13. Lok also shows that categorizing includes applying a label of positive, neutral, or negative (Lok: page 3, ¶¶ 45-48).
As to claims 6 and 18: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claims 1 and 13. Lok also shows that the alert includes an indication of a suggested improvement for addressing a negative sentiment in the customer reviews (Lok: page 25, ¶¶ 269-275).
As to claim 8: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claim 1. Lok also shows that outputting the alert includes outputting the alert in response to determining that categorizing each of the customer reviews indicates a threshold number of reviews were categorized to be positive, neutral, or negative, the threshold being specific to the stakeholder or the restaurant (Lok: pages 3-4, ¶ 48; and page 18, ¶ 178).
As to claim 9: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claim 1. Lok also shows that before categorizing each of the customer reviews, using natural language processing to create embeddings for text in the customer reviews (Lok: page 5, ¶ 63; and page 6, ¶ 75).
As to claim 10: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claim 1. Lok also shows that the collected data includes data from a plurality of restaurants in a chain, the plurality of restaurants including the restaurant (Lok: page 5, ¶ 63).
As to claim 11: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claim 1. Lok also shows that the collected data is collected periodically, wherein the collected data is categorized in response to being collected (Lok: pages 3-4, ¶ 48).
As to claim 12: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claim 1. outputting the alert includes outputting the alert within a timeframe of a particular customer review being posted to a website, the timeframe being specific to the stakeholder or the restaurant (Lok: pages 3-4, ¶ 48; and page 18, ¶ 178).
Claims 4, 7, and 16, are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Lok in view of Lee, and further in view of Rehling (US 8,918,312 B1).
As to claims 4 and 16: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claims 1 and 13. Lok also shows consolidating the collected data for display on a single webpage (Lok: Page 5, ¶ 63). Lok does not show that the alert, when selected on the device of the stakeholder, directs the device to the single webpage. Rehling shows that the alert, when selected on the device of the stakeholder, directs the device to the single webpage (Rehling: col. 16, lines 34-52). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the method and the non-transitory computer readable medium of Lok by the alert, when selected on the device of the stakeholder, directing the device to the single webpage of Rehling in order for the business to monitor online information (Rehling: col. 1, lines 20-21).
As to claim 7: Lok in view of Lee shows all the elements of claim 1. Lok also shows that the collected data is collected from two or more review websites (Lok: Page 5, ¶ 63). Lok does not show the two or more review websites presenting data in different formats. Rehling shows the two or more review websites presenting data in different formats (Rehling: col. 7, lines 14-18). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the method and the non-transitory computer readable medium of Lok by the two or more review websites presenting data in different formats of Rehling in order for the business to monitor online information (Rehling: col. 1, lines 20-21).
Claim 17 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Lok in view of Lee, further in view of Rehling, and further in view of Hope (US 2014/0074570 A1).
As to claim 17: Lok in view of Lee, and further in view of Rehling, shows all the elements of claim 16. Lok does not show that the single webpage is further configured to display inventory, employee scheduling, and sales reports for the restaurant. Hope shows that the single webpage is further configured to display inventory, employee scheduling, and sales reports for the restaurant (Hope: page 5, ¶ 59). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified the non-transitory computer readable medium of Lok by the single webpage being further configured to display inventory, employee scheduling, and sales reports for the restaurant of Hope in order to control the commerce system (Hope: page 1, ¶ 1).
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Ferchau (US 12,306,834 B1) discloses: “ FIG. 9. Shows various capabilities in a system settings page, such as user and/or web scraper management and things like setting up a scheduler for automated search processes.”
Andrews (SG 10201605262R A) discloses: “[0066] Many efforts have been made by information-based companies to collect and/or analyze large corpus or universe of documents and information inclusive of traditional and new age media, blogs, webpages, etc. For example, webcrawlers and screen scrapers have been used to extract available information and data for subsequent processing and analysis, e.g., formatting/reformatting, structured/unstructured data. Companies may use this information to create or improve a corporate or product image or identity in the minds of customers, this is increasingly significant in the context of CSR and environmental responsibility. Systems that can discern from the information, e.g., text, any underlying “sentiment” or “opinion” represented by the expressions are very useful in forming predictive models. This is often referred to as sentiment or opinion mining and also as “sentic” or “affective” computing. These techniques often use natural language processing and are designed to recognize and interpret human sentiment (opinions, affects or emotions, e.g., happy, sad, scared, important, insignificant, positive, negative) and generate a response based on the human affect or emotion detected.”
Gräbner, Dietmar, et al. "Classification of customer reviews based on sentiment analysis." ENTER. 2012.
S. Panichella, A. Di Sorbo, E. Guzman, C. A. Visaggio, G. Canfora and H. C. Gall, "How can i improve my app? Classifying user reviews for software maintenance and evolution," 2015 IEEE International Conference on Software Maintenance and Evolution (ICSME), Bremen, Germany, 2015, pp. 281-290.
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new grounds of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a). A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any extension fee pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to VIRPI H. KANERVO whose telephone number is 571-272-9818. The examiner can normally be reached on Monday – Friday, 10 am – 6 pm. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor Abhishek Vyas can be reached on 571-270-1836. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/VIRPI H KANERVO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3691
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