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 .
This office action is in response to applicant’s arguments/remarks and amendments filed on 06/19/2026. Claims 1, 3-13, and 15-20 have been amended. No Claims have been cancelled. No Claims have been newly added. Accordingly, claims 1-20 are currently pending.
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments, see applicant’s arguments/remarks, filed on 06/19/2026, with respect to the rejection(s) of claim(s) 1, 3, 5, 12-13, 16, and 20 under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schwie in view of Garcia have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejection has been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann et al US 2025/0153741 A1 as detailed below.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claims 1, 13, and 20 recite the limitation "a pick-up location" in lines 14, 17-18, and 15 respectively. It is not clear to the examiner if said “a pick-up location” is the same as the desired pick-up location of the user or the determined pick-up location or a different pick-up location. The metes and bounds of the claimed limitation are vague and ill-defined rendering the claim indefinite. According to the examiner’s best knowledge, the claim limitation will be treated as “the desired pick-up location”.
Claims 1, 13, and 20 recite the limitation "an estimated parking time" in lines 13-14, 17, and 15 respectively. It is not clear to the examiner if said "an estimated parking time" is the same estimated time received from the user or an estimated time calculated by the vehicle. The metes and bounds of the claimed limitation are vague and ill-defined rendering the claim indefinite. According to the examiner’s best knowledge, the claim limitation will be treated as an estimated time calculated by the vehicle or the system.
Claims 2-12, and 14-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being dependent on rejected independent claims 1 and 13 and for failing to cure the deficiencies listed above.
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.
Claim(s) 1, 3, 5, 12-13, 16, and 20 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schwie et al US 10,466,057 B1 (hence Schwie) in view of Garcia US 2024/0256990 A1 (hence Garcia) and Schwendimann et al US 2025/0153741 A1 (hence Schwendimann) as detailed below.
In re claims 1, 13, and 20, Schwie discloses a method of using a vehicle management system to determine high traffic areas and thereby move a self-driving vehicle to a variety of pick-up locations to meet a rider (Abstract) and teaches the following:
receiving user-related data including a desired pick-up location of the user (Col.12, lines 38-55 “the system 4 can also receive a requested pickup location that indicates where the person 1 would like to be picked up by the vehicle 2”);
receiving location-related data including traffic conditions around a location of the vehicle from a server (Col.32, Lines 17-21 “traffic adjacent 422 to the primary pick-up location 420 is greater than a predetermined traffic threshold”);
determining a pick-up location of the user by processing the user-related data and the location-related data (Col.32, lines 21-26 “in response to determining that the traffic adjacent 422 to the primary pick-up location 420 is not greater than the predetermined traffic threshold, methods include sending, by the vehicle management system 4, the self-driving vehicle 2 to the primary pick-up location 420”, and Col.33, lines 3-14 “in response to determining that traffic adjacent 422 to the primary pick-up location 420 is greater than the predetermined traffic threshold (at step 1700), methods may include identifying, by the vehicle management system 4, an alternate pick-up location 428a (at step 1702)”);
recommending the pick-up location to the user (Col.33, lines 15-24 “sending, by the vehicle management system 4, a wireless communication 460 to the remote computing device 12 to request to meet at the alternate pick-up location 428a (at step 1704)”);
setting the pick-up location recommended to the user as a destination of the vehicle (Col.33, lines 25-33 “sending, by the vehicle management system 4, the self-driving vehicle 2 to the alternate pick-up location 428a (at step 1708)”)
and controlling the vehicle such that the vehicle autonomously drives to the destination (Fig.17, #1714 and Col.33, lines 58-60 “sending, by the vehicle management system 4, the self-driving vehicle 2 to the primary pick-up location 420 (at step 1714)”)
However, Schwie doesn’t explicitly teach the following:
user-related information including a desired boarding time of a user, and an estimated parking time of the vehicle
wherein processing the user-related data and the location-related data comprises dynamically evaluating a combination of at least two parameters selected from among an estimated parking time, a travel distance from a parking location to a pick-up location, a travel time from the parking location to the pick-up location, a distance from the location of the user to the pick-up location, a user's walking travel time, road traffic conditions, and vehicle-related data
Nevertheless, Garcia discloses system, method, and computer program product embodiments for ride hailing an autonomous vehicle by a third party (Abstract) and teaches the following:
user-related information including a desired boarding time of a user (Paragraph 0072 “an advanced scheduled pick-up associated with a rider profile may include parameters, such as a time, a day”), and an estimated parking time of the vehicle (Paragraph 0072 “an amount of time to wait at each stop or destination location”)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skills in the art at the time the invention was filed to have modified the Schwie reference to include a desired boarding time of a user and an estimated parking time of the vehicle as part of a user related information, as taught by Garcia, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to assign, based on the pick-up request, an autonomous vehicle to pick-up the rider based on the rider profile (Garcia, Paragraph 0002).
Nevertheless, Schwendimann discloses providing wait times for pickups of passengers involving autonomous vehicles (Abstract) and teaches the following:
wherein processing the user-related data and the location-related data comprises dynamically evaluating a combination of at least two parameters selected from among an estimated parking time, a travel distance from a parking location to a pick-up location, a travel time from the parking location to the pick-up location, a distance from the location of the user to the pick-up location, a user's walking travel time, road traffic conditions, and vehicle-related data (Paragraph 0022 “Selecting potential pickup locations for the subset may involve determining a plurality of factors for each potential pickup location”, Paragraph 0024 “Each of the potential pickup locations in the subset may then be assigned a wait time”, and Paragraph 0025 “A congestion impact score may be a proxy for a potential impact or how likely a particular potential pickup location is to impact traffic congestion in the area adjacent to that potential pickup location”)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skills in the art at the time the invention was filed to have modified the Schwie reference to include determining a plurality of factors for each potential pickup location, as taught by Schwendimann, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to better enable the user to select the most optimal pickup spot for the user (Schwendimann, Paragraph 0027).
In re claim 3, Schwie teaches the following:
changing the recommended pick-up location to a new pick-up location, wherein changing the recommended pick-up location includes determining the new pick-up location based on the user-related data and the location-related data, which are updated according to a changed schedule of the user (Col.22, lines 13-18 “the vehicle 2 might travel to the pick-up location 120 to find the user is not there and then come back to the pick-up location 120 in 20 minutes”, and Col.22, lines 44-57 “ the user may have taken a different means of transportation to travel to her next destination (e.g., travel back home). Accordingly, the vehicle management system 65 may be arranged and configured to instruct the vehicle 2 to travel to another location”)
In re claims 5 and 16, Schwie teaches the following:
determining the parking location of the vehicle based on the user-related data and the location-related data; and recommending the parking location to the vehicle (Col.19, line 65 – Col.20, line 10 “after sending the self-driving vehicle 2 to the pick-up location 120, the vehicle management system 65 may instruct the self-driving vehicle 2 to find a parking location 134 in response to determining, by the vehicle management system 65, that communicative coupling between the vehicle management system 65 and the remote computing device 12 has been restored”, and Col.20, lines 43-53)
In re claim 12, Schwie teaches the following:
changing the recommended pick-up location to a new pick-up location through determining the new pick-up location of the user based on the location-related data including real-time traffic conditions (Col.32, lines 21-26 “in response to determining that the traffic adjacent 422 to the primary pick-up location 420 is not greater than the predetermined traffic threshold, methods include sending, by the vehicle management system 4, the self-driving vehicle 2 to the primary pick-up location 420”, and Col.33, lines 3-14 “in response to determining that traffic adjacent 422 to the primary pick-up location 420 is greater than the predetermined traffic threshold (at step 1700), methods may include identifying, by the vehicle management system 4, an alternate pick-up location 428a (at step 1702)”)
Claim(s) 2 and 14 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann, and further in view of Tatsumoto et al US 2022/0049964 A1 (hence Tatsumoto).
In re claims 2 and 14, the combination of Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann discloses the claimed invention as recited above including wherein determining the pick-up location of the user includes: determining the desired pick-up location as the pick-up location when the desired boarding time is the same as or later than a time when the vehicle will arrive at the desired pick-up location (Col.19, lines 10-23 “ can send the vehicle 2 to try to pick up the user (either right away or later, closer to an estimated pick up time)”), but doesn’t explicitly teach the following:
determining a location at which the vehicle is able to arrive earlier than the desired boarding time as the pick-up location when the desired boarding time is earlier than the time when the vehicle will arrive at the desired pick-up location
Nevertheless, Tatsumoto discloses vehicle dispatch for taxis or ridesharing (Abstract and Paragraph 0003) and teaches the following:
determining a location at which the vehicle is able to arrive earlier than the desired boarding time as the pick-up location when the desired boarding time is earlier than the time when the vehicle will arrive at the desired pick-up location (Paragraph 0020 “the server apparatus 12 notifies, to the terminal apparatus 11, a second boarding location (alternative boarding location) which is within a predetermined distance range from the specified boarding location and reachable by a dispatchable vehicle 13 earlier than the specified boarding location.”)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skills in the art at the time the invention was filed to have modified the Schwie reference to include a second boarding location reachable by a dispatchable vehicle earlier than the first boarding location, as taught by Tatsumoto, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to reduce the time from when the passenger requests vehicle dispatch until arrival of the vehicle (Tatsumoto, Paragraph 0005).
Claim(s) 4 and 15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann, and further in view of Ogden et al US 2023/0342674 A1 (hence Ogden).
In re claims 4, and 15, the combination of Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann discloses the claimed invention as recited above but doesn’t explicitly teach the following:
wherein recommending the pick-up location comprises providing data including a travel route and the travel time required from the parking location of the vehicle to the pick-up location to the user
Nevertheless, Ogden discloses ride services within a mapping application in a client computing device (Abstract) and teaches the following:
wherein recommending the pick-up location comprises providing data including a travel route and the travel time required from the parking location of the vehicle to the pick-up location to the user (Paragraph 0064 “present an indication of the driver on the map display along with the pick-up location or destination location for the user to view the driver's progress to the pick-up location or on the route to the destination location“ and Fig.11B, Fig.13B, and Paragraph 0097)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skills in the art at the time the invention was filed to have modified the Schwie reference to include ride request displays, as taught by Ogden, with a reasonable expectation of success, in order to present suitable information regarding the ride service route segment and ride information (Ogden, Paragraphs 0003 and 0005).
Claim(s) 6 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann, and further in view of Sugano et al US 2024/0257286 A1 (hence Sugano).
In re claim 6, the combination of Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann discloses the claimed invention as recited above but doesn’t explicitly teach the following:
changing the recommended parking location to a new parking location, wherein changing the recommended parking location includes determining the new parking location of the vehicle based on the user-related data and the location-related data, which are updated according to a changed schedule of the user
Nevertheless, Sugano discloses a technique for managing parking of vehicles in a parking lot (Paragraph 0002) and teaches the following:
changing the recommended parking location to a new parking location, wherein changing the recommended parking location includes determining the new parking location of the vehicle based on the user-related data and the location-related data, which are updated according to a changed schedule of the user (Paragraph 0058 “park the vehicle 1 at a position closer to the pick-up and drop-off area 21 as the current time is closer to the scheduled usage time”, and Paragraph 0066)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skills in the art at the time the invention was filed to have modified the Schwie reference to include moving the vehicle to the pick-up and drop-off area, as taught by Sugano, in order to improve the efficiency of the traffic flow in the parking lot (Sugano, Paragraph 0075).
Claim(s) 7 and 17 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann, and further in view of Khoo et al US 2020/0175869 A1 (hence Khoo).
In re claims 7, and 17, the combination of Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann discloses the claimed invention as recited above but doesn’t explicitly teach the following:
providing data including congestion in parking lots, parking fees, a travel distance and a time required from the location of the vehicle to the user
Nevertheless, Khoo discloses alerting a driver of a vehicle of parking conditions within a predetermined distance of a destination (Abstract) and teaches the following:
providing data including congestion in parking lots, parking fees, a travel distance and a time required from the location of the vehicle to the user (Paragraphs 0017, 0032, and 0041)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skills in the art at the time the invention was filed to have modified the Schwie reference to include parking data as taught by Khoo, in order to provide multiple parking options so the driver can determine where to park (Khoo, Paragraph 0032).
Claim(s) 8-9, 11, and 18-19 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann, and further in view of Zack US 2021/0120385 A1 (hence Zack).
In re claims 8, and 18, the combination of Schwie, Garcia, and Schwendimann discloses the claimed invention as recited above but doesn’t explicitly teach the following:
providing a list of services available during the estimated parking time based on the user-related data and the location-related data
Nevertheless, Zack discloses vehicle telematics and in particular the utilization of vehicle telematics for the purpose of vehicle maintenance (Abstract) and teaches the following:
providing a list of services available during the estimated parking time based on the user-related data and the location-related data (Paragraph 0023 “ examples of assets may comprise fueling stations, recharging stations, lodging, parking” and Paragraph 0024 “total available parking, a list of services provided by the asset”)
It would have been obvious to one having ordinary skills in the art at the time the invention was filed to have modified the Schwie reference to include location-related information, as taught by Zack, in order to present information about nearby vendors of goods or services to a passenger of a vehicle (Zack, Paragraph 0002).
In re claims 9 and 19, Zack teaches the following:
changing the provided list of available services to a new service list, wherein changing the provided list of available services to the new service list includes providing the new service list available during the estimated parking time based on the user-related data and the location-related data, which are updated according to a changed schedule of the user (Paragraph 0024)
In re claim 11, Zack teaches the following:
wherein providing the list of available services comprises providing a list of services that need to be used in consideration of the user-related data and the location-related data (Paragraph 0024)
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 10 would be allowable if rewritten to overcome the rejection(s) under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), 2nd paragraph, set forth in this Office action and to include all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) 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 nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) 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 mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RAMI KHATIB whose telephone number is (571)270-1165. The examiner can normally be reached M-F: 9:00am-5:30pm.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Erin M Piateski can be reached at 571-270 7429. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/RAMI KHATIB/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3669
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