Prosecution Insights
Last updated: July 17, 2026
Application No. 18/975,056

INFORMATION PROCESSING DEVICE, INFORMATION PROCESSING METHOD, AND RECORDING MEDIUM

Non-Final OA §103
Filed
Dec 10, 2024
Priority
Dec 15, 2023 — JP 2023-212134
Examiner
REN, ZHUBING
Art Unit
Tech Center
Assignee
Sharp Corporation
OA Round
1 (Non-Final)
72%
Grant Probability
Favorable
1-2
OA Rounds
1y 5m
Est. Remaining
99%
With Interview

Examiner Intelligence

Grants 72% — above average
72%
Career Allowance Rate
287 granted / 401 resolved
+11.6% vs TC avg
Strong +42% interview lift
Without
With
+42.3%
Interview Lift
resolved cases with interview
Typical timeline
3y 0m
Avg Prosecution
21 currently pending
Career history
410
Total Applications
across all art units

Statute-Specific Performance

§101
0.5%
-39.5% vs TC avg
§103
95.6%
+55.6% vs TC avg
§102
1.8%
-38.2% vs TC avg
§112
0.4%
-39.6% vs TC avg
Black line = Tech Center average estimate • Based on career data from 401 resolved cases

Office Action

§103
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 . DETAIL ACTION Priority Acknowledgment is made of applicant's claim for foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d). The certified copy has been placed of record in the file. Information Disclosure Statement The information disclosure statement (IDS) was submitted on 12/10/2024. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner. 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) 1-11 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over SHIN et al (US 20220093103 A1) in view of FUNASE et al (US 20160019893 A1). Regarding claim 1, SHIN discloses an information processing device [e.g. FIG. 2] comprising one or more processors [e.g. processor], wherein the one or more processors: acquire speech information [e.g. FIG. 4; audio recording] including speech data [e.g. speech data of each speaker's utterances] and an utterance time per utterance [e.g. FIG. 10; a timestamp for the text of a speaker's utterance] issued by a plurality of participants [e.g. FIG. 6 and 10; participants] of a meeting [e.g. FIG. 2 and 4; conversation or meeting]; convert the speech data into character data [e.g. FIG. 4; 410; [0012]; converting speech to text]; acquire operation information [e.g. FIG. 10-13; providing the memo (or answer] that match the audio data 9e.g. question asked by speaker 3] including operation content and an operation time [e.g. FIG. 10-11; time for generating the memo or the answer by speaker 1 at 1:57] per operation performed by the plurality of participants; and generate data [memo data] based on the speech information, the character data, and the operation information [e.g. FIG. 10-11]. It is noted that SHIN differs to the present invention in that SHIN fails to explicitly disclose the concept of generating minutes data. However, FUNASE teaches the well-known concept of an information processing device [e.g. FIG. 2; a controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system] to convert the speech data into character data [e.g. FIG. 4; converts speech data into text data], acquire operation information [e.g. FIG. 2 and 7; providing answer and create minutes of a meeting], generate minutes data [minutes of a meeting] based on the speech information, the character data, and the operation information. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 2, SHIN and FUNASE further disclose in a predetermined proximity time determined for the character data as corresponding to the character data [e.g. SHIN: FIG. 10-11 and 16-17], and generate the minutes data [SHIN: FIG. 10-11; FUNASE FIG. 2 and 7; creating minutes of a meeting], and the predetermined proximity time is a time from the utterance time corresponding to the character data until a predetermined time has elapsed [SHIN: FIG. 4, 7 and 10-11; elapsed recoding time]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 3, SHIN and FUNASE further disclose a display that displays the minutes data [SHIN: FIG. 1-2; displaying the text transcript of the audio; FUNASE FIG. 2-3; display section]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 4, SHIN and FUNASE further disclose the one or more processors cause the display to display the character data and the operation information [SHIN: FIG. 1-2; displaying the text transcript of the audio; FUNASE FIG. 2-3; display the text of the minutes of the meeting]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 5, SHIN and FUNASE further disclose a storage that stores the speech data in association with the utterance time and stores the operation content in association with the operation time [SHIN: FIG. 1-2 and 10-11; memory; recoding speech data and timestamp; FUNASE FIG. 2-3; recording sections]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 6, SHIN and FUNASE further disclose in a case that the operation content includes an input of a character string related to progress of a meeting [e.g. SHIN: FIG. 7; bookmark is a text-based entry], the one or more processors separate the minutes data into subjects at a position corresponding to the character string [e.g. SHIN: an important segment; FUNASE: FIG. 17-19; detecting important utterances]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 7, SHIN and FUNASE further disclose in a case that the operation content includes an input of a predetermined operation or a predetermined symbol [e.g. SHIN: FIG. 7; [0082-0083]; a predetermined keyword], the one or more processors generate the minutes data by using, as an important part, a part corresponding to the operation content [e.g. SHIN: FIG. 7; [0082-0083]; an important segment; FUNASE: FIG. 17-19]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 8, SHIN and FUNASE further disclose in a case of acquiring, from the plurality of participants, the operation information including the operation content, the one or more processors regard a part of the minutes data corresponding to the operation content from each of the plurality of participants as an important part [e.g. SHIN: FIG. 7; [0082-0083]; an important segment; FUNASE: FIG. 17-19]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 9, SHIN and FUNASE further disclose the one or more processors extract main points from the generated minutes data and generates a summary of the minutes data, based on the important part [e.g. SHIN: FIG. 7 and 23; an important segment; extracting keywords; FUNASE: minutes of the meeting; extracting specific phrase; FIG. 17-19; detecting important utterances in a meeting when running over minutes of a meeting]. It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the invention to modify the mobile speech transcription system disclosed by SHIN to exploit the well-known generating meeting minutes technique taught by FUNASE as above, in order to provide controlling a speech-recognition text-generation system, even utterances judged unnecessary in a meeting can be checked later, and minutes of a meeting can be easily edited [See FUNASE; [0006]]. Regarding claim 10, this is a method that includes same limitation as in claim 1 above, the rejection of which are incorporated herein. Regarding claim 11, this is a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium that includes same limitation as in claim 1 above, the rejection of which are incorporated herein. Conclusion The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. JEON et al (US 20130054229 A1). MOYNIHAN et al (US 20230282218 A1). Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to ZHUBING REN whose telephone number is (571)272-2788. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 9am-5pm. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Richemond Dorvil can be reached at 571-272-7602. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /ZHUBING REN/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2658
Read full office action

Prosecution Timeline

Dec 10, 2024
Application Filed
Jun 09, 2026
Non-Final Rejection mailed — §103 (current)

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Study what changed to get past this examiner. Based on 5 most recent grants.

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Prosecution Projections

1-2
Expected OA Rounds
72%
Grant Probability
99%
With Interview (+42.3%)
3y 0m (~1y 5m remaining)
Median Time to Grant
Low
PTA Risk
Based on 401 resolved cases by this examiner. Grant probability derived from career allowance rate.

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