DETAILED ACTION
Notice of 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 Claims
This action is in reply to the application filed on February 10, 2025.
Claims 1–20 are currently pending and have been examined.
Information Disclosure Statement
The Information Disclosure Statements filed on July 22, 2018 have been considered. Initialed copies of the Forms 1449 are enclosed herewith.
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.
Claim 5 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claim 5 recites the limitation “distributed ledger arrangement” in line 1. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. For the purposes of examination, “distributed ledger arrangement” has been interpreted as the distributed ledger arrangement from claim 4.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 101:
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.
First of all, claims must be directed to one or more of the following statutory categories: a process, a machine, a manufacture, or a composition of matter. Claims 1–12 are directed to a machine (“A system”), and claims 13–20 are directed to a process (“A method”). Thus, claims 1–20 satisfy Step One because they are all within one of the four statutory categories of eligible subject matter.
Claims 1–20, however, are directed to an abstract idea without significantly more. For claim 1, the specific limitations that recite an abstract idea are:
. . . autonomously, generate and broadcast a service request . . ., wherein the service request includes an autonomous request to a journey from a first location to a second location; and . . .
receive the service request . . .;
in response to the service request, generate a service bid; and
communicate the service bid . . .,
. . . provide the journey from the first location to the second location . . ..
The claims, therefore, recite a executing a transportation service request, which is the abstract idea of certain methods of organizing human activity because they recite a commercial interaction.
The judicial exception recited above is not integrated into a practical application. The additional elements of the claims are various generic technologies and computer components to implement this abstract idea (“decentralized computing network”, “autonomous economic agents”, “software module”, “data processing arrangement”, “service components”, “autonomous vehicles”, “open economic framework”, “distributed ledger arrangement”, “blockchain”, “smart contract”, “digital token”, “digital wallet”, and “encrypted”). These additional elements are not integrated into a practical application because the invention merely applies the abstract idea to generic computer technology, using the computer to communicate and execute a service request. Because the invention is using the computer simply as a tool to perform the abstract idea on, the judicial exception is not integrated into a practical application.
Finally, the claims do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because, as discussed above, the additional elements in combination are at a high level of generality such that they amount to no more than mere instructions to apply the abstract idea using generic components. Because merely “applying” the exception using generic computer components cannot provide an inventive concept, the additional elements do not recite significantly more than the judicial exception. Thus, claim 1 is not patent eligible.
Independent claim 13 is rejected as ineligible subject matter under 35 U.S.C. 101 for substantially the same reasons as independent system claim 1. There are no additional elements recited in this claim other than the generic technology and computer parts discussed above (“decentralized computing network”, “autonomous economic agents”, “software module”, “data processing arrangement”, “service components”, and “autonomous vehicles”). The only difference is that the features of claim 1 are implemented by a method in claim 13. Thus, because the same analysis should be used for all categories of claims, claim 13 is also not patent eligible. See Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS Bank Int'l, 134 S. Ct. 2347, 2354 (2014).
Dependent claims 2–12 and 14–20 have been given the full two part analysis, analyzing the additional limitations both individually and in combination. The dependent claims, when analyzed individually and in combination, are also held to be patent ineligible under 35 U.S.C. 101.
For claims 2, 3, 12, 14, and 15, the additional recited limitations of these claims merely further narrow the abstract idea discussed above. These dependent claims only narrow the service request recited in claims 1 and 13 by further specifying the service bid—“mutually different from each other”, “provide a maximum value”, and “generate a single service bid”. The limitations of these claims fail to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because these claims do not introduce additional elements other than the generic components discussed above (“autonomous vehicles” and “autonomous economic agents”). These dependent claims, therefore, also amount to merely using a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea. Finally, the additional recited limitations of these dependent claims fail to establish that the claims provide an inventive concept because claims that merely use a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea cannot provide an inventive concept.
For claims 4–6, 16, and 17, the additional recited limitations of these claims merely further narrow the abstract idea discussed above. These dependent claims only narrow the service request recited in claims 1 and 13 by further specifying how the service providers are compared—“compare characteristics of a confidence score”, “compare service ratings and a number of services provided”, and “obtain verifiable information associated with characteristics of the confidence score . . . without disclosing identifiable information”. The limitations of these claims fail to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because these claims do not introduce additional elements other than the generic components discussed above (“autonomous economic agents” and “autonomous vehicles”). These claims do recite an open economic framework, distributed ledger arrangement, and blockchain, but again, these are also merely being used as tools to store and communicate data. These dependent claims, therefore, also amount to merely using a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea. Finally, the additional recited limitations of these dependent claims fail to establish that the claims provide an inventive concept because claims that merely use a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea cannot provide an inventive concept.
For claims 7, 8, and 18, the additional recited limitations of these claims merely further narrow the abstract idea discussed above. These dependent claims only narrow the service request recited in claims 1 and 13 by further specifying how the service bid is generated—“acquire prices associated with past travel services provided” and “employ zero-knowledge protocol to acquire the prices associated with the past travel services . . . without acquiring identifiable information”. The limitations of these claims fail to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because these claims do not introduce additional elements other than the generic components discussed above (“autonomous economic agents”). These claims do recite an open economic framework, but again, this is also merely being used as a tool to store and communicate data. These dependent claims, therefore, also amount to merely using a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea. Finally, the additional recited limitations of these dependent claims fail to establish that the claims provide an inventive concept because claims that merely use a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea cannot provide an inventive concept.
For claims 9, 10, 19, and 20, the additional recited limitations of these claims merely further narrow the abstract idea discussed above. These dependent claims only narrow the service request recited in claims 1 and 13 by further specifying the agreement—“comprises at least one of: a price . . . a time frame”, “automatically generate . . . based on an interaction”, and “share the agreement”. The limitations of these claims fail to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because these claims do not introduce additional elements other than the generic components discussed above (“autonomous economic agents”). These claims do recite an open economic framework, distributed ledger arrangement, and smart contract, but again, these are also merely being used as tools to store and communicate data. These dependent claims, therefore, also amount to merely using a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea. Finally, the additional recited limitations of these dependent claims fail to establish that the claims provide an inventive concept because claims that merely use a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea cannot provide an inventive concept.
For claim 11, the additional recited limitations of this claim merely further narrow the abstract idea discussed above. This dependent claim only narrows the service request recited in claim 1 by further specifying the payment—“remunerate the selected service provider”. The limitations of this claim fail to integrate the abstract idea into a practical application because this claim does not introduce additional elements other than the generic components discussed above (“autonomous economic agents”). These claims do recite an open economic framework, digital token, digital wallet, and encrypted, but again, these are also merely being used as tools to provide and receive payment. This dependent claim, therefore, also amounts to merely using a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea. Finally, the additional recited limitations of this dependent claim fails to establish that the claim provides an inventive concept because claims that merely use a computer, in its ordinary capacity, as a tool to perform the abstract idea cannot provide an inventive concept.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event that the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis 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.
The factual inquiries set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
(1) Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
(2) Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
(3) Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
(4) Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
Claims 1–3, 5, 12, and 13–15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sweeney et al., U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0147959 (“Sweeney”) in view of Seriani, U.S. Patent App. No. 2014/0229258 (“Seriani”) and Berg, U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0338963 (“Berg”).
For claim 1, Sweeney teaches:
. . . a client autonomous economic agent that is configured to, autonomously, generate and broadcast a service request to other autonomous economic agents, wherein the service request includes an autonomous request to a journey from a first location to a second location (¶ 22: client service application communicates with service arrangement system to request and select service provider for transport service); and
a plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents, each of the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents being associated with one or more service components, wherein each of the one or more service components comprises at least two autonomous vehicles associated with corresponding service provider autonomous economic agent, and wherein each of the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents is configured to (¶ 69: service providers in service arrangement system include autonomous vehicles for providing transport services):
receive the service request from the client autonomous economic agent (¶ 68: transport service request received); . . .
wherein at least one service component from amongst the one or more service components is associated with managing travelling (¶ 83: autonomous vehicle systems include sensors for completing transport), and
wherein the at least one service component is configured to autonomously provide the journey from the first location to the second location, via the at least one service component (¶ 84, 88: trip is completed, through autonomous vehicles and sensors).
Sweeney does not teach: in response to the service request, generate a service bid; and communicate the service bid to the client autonomous economic agent.
Seriani, however, teaches:
in response to the service request, generate a service bid (¶ 43: bid generated based on request); and
communicate the service bid to the client autonomous economic agent (¶ 47: requesting customer receives bid),
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
The combination of Sweeney and Seriani does not teach: A system for autonomously managing travelling, comprising a decentralized computing network that comprises one or more autonomous economic agents, wherein each autonomous economic agent is a software module connected to a data processing arrangement, wherein the system comprises.
Berg, however, teaches:
A system for autonomously managing travelling, comprising a decentralized computing network that comprises one or more autonomous economic agents, wherein each autonomous economic agent is a software module connected to a data processing arrangement, wherein the system comprises (¶ 16: example system including decentralized network of autonomous nodes; ¶ 17: nodes include computing devices with software).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the bidding in Seriani by adding the decentralized system from Berg. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of providing a distributed exchange for bid matching transactions—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Berg (¶ 3: distributed systems provide improvements over standard computing systems, but may not support larger transactions; ¶ 14: invention provides distributed exchange with matching system).
For claim 2, Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg teach all the limitations of claim 1 above, and Seriani further teaches:
A system of claim 1, wherein the service bid for each of the at least two autonomous vehicles are mutually different from each other (¶ 45, 48: multiple service providers provide individual bids).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the decentralized system in Berg by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
For claim 3, Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg teach all the limitations of claim 1 above, and Seriani further teaches:
A system of claim 1, wherein the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents is configured to provide a maximum value to a service provider associated with the one or more service components (¶ 48: most competitive bids provided for value-add).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the decentralized system in Berg by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
For claim 5, Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg teach all the limitations of claim 1 above, and Berg further teaches:
A system of claim 1, wherein the distributed ledger arrangement is configured to employ a blockchain data structure (¶ 13: distributed network is blockchain-based).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the bidding in Seriani by adding the decentralized system from Berg. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of providing a distributed exchange for bid matching transactions—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Berg (¶ 3: distributed systems provide improvements over standard computing systems, but may not support larger transactions; ¶ 14: invention provides distributed exchange with matching system).
For claim 12, Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg teach all the limitations of claim 1 above, and Seriani further teaches:
A system of claim 1, wherein the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents that are associated with the at least two autonomous vehicles are further operable to generate a single service bid (¶ 45, 48: multiple service providers provide a bid).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the decentralized system in Berg by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
For claim 13, Sweeney teaches:
. . . (i) autonomously, generating and broadcasting a service request, from a client autonomous economic agent to other autonomous economic agents, the client autonomous agent being communicably coupled with a client device, wherein the service request includes an autonomous request for a journey from the first location to the second location (¶ 22: client service application communicates with service arrangement system to request and select service provider for transport service); and
(ii) using a plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents that are associated with one or more service components comprising at least two autonomous vehicles associated with corresponding service provider autonomous economic agents, for (¶ 69: service providers in service arrangement system include autonomous vehicles for providing transport services):
receiving the service request from the client autonomous economic agent (¶ 68: transport service request received); . . .
wherein at least one service component from amongst the one or more service components is associated with managing travelling (¶ 83: autonomous vehicle systems include sensors for completing transport), and
wherein the at least one service component is configured to autonomously provide the journey from a first location to a second location, via the at least one service component (¶ 84, 88: trip is completed, through autonomous vehicles and sensors).
Sweeney does not teach: in response to the service request, generating a service bid; and communicating the service bid to the client autonomous economic agent.
Seriani, however, teaches:
in response to the service request, generating a service bid (¶ 43: bid generated based on request); and
communicating the service bid to the client autonomous economic agent (¶ 47: requesting customer receives bid),
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
The combination of Sweeney and Seriani does not teach: A method for autonomously managing travelling that is implemented using a system comprising a decentralized computing network that comprises one or more autonomous economic agents, wherein each of the one or more autonomous economic agents is a software module connected to a data processing arrangement, wherein the method comprises.
Berg, however, teaches:
A method for autonomously managing travelling that is implemented using a system comprising a decentralized computing network that comprises one or more autonomous economic agents, wherein each of the one or more autonomous economic agents is a software module connected to a data processing arrangement, wherein the method comprises (¶ 50: example process; ¶ 16: example system including decentralized network of autonomous nodes; ¶ 17: nodes include computing devices with software).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the bidding in Seriani by adding the decentralized system from Berg. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of providing a distributed exchange for bid matching transactions—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Berg (¶ 3: distributed systems provide improvements over standard computing systems, but may not support larger transactions; ¶ 14: invention provides distributed exchange with matching system).
For claim 14, Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg teach all the limitations of claim 13 above, and Seriani further teaches:
A method of claim 13, wherein each service bid for each of the at least two autonomous vehicles are mutually different from each other (¶ 45, 48: multiple service providers provide individual bids).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the decentralized system in Berg by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
For claim 15, Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg teach all the limitations of claim 13 above, and Seriani further teaches:
A method of claim 13, further comprising providing a maximum value to a service provider associated with the one or more service components (¶ 48: most competitive bids provided for value-add).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the decentralized system in Berg by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
Claims 4, 7, 9, 16, 18, and 19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sweeney et al., U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0147959 (“Sweeney”) in view of Seriani, U.S. Patent App. No. 2014/0229258 (“Seriani”); Berg, U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0338963 (“Berg”); and Balamurugan et al., U.S. Patent App. No. 2013/0290128 (“Balamurugan”).
For claim 4, Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg teach all the limitations of claim 1 above, and Berg further teaches:
A system of claim 1, further comprising an open economic framework on the decentralized computing network, wherein the open economic framework comprises a distributed ledger arrangement that is configured to at least one of (¶ 13: distributed network is blockchain-based).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the bidding in Seriani by adding the decentralized system from Berg. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of providing a distributed exchange for bid matching transactions—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Berg (¶ 3: distributed systems provide improvements over standard computing systems, but may not support larger transactions; ¶ 14: invention provides distributed exchange with matching system).
The combination of Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg does not teach: compare characteristics of a confidence score associated with each of at least two service provider autonomous economic agents associated with the generation of the service bid; and compare service ratings and a number of services provided using the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents associated with the at least two autonomous vehicles.
Balamurugan, however, teaches:
compare characteristics of a confidence score associated with each of at least two service provider autonomous economic agents associated with the generation of the service bid (¶ 36: bid evaluation for each provider based on utility score and performance score); and
compare service ratings and a number of services provided using the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents associated with the at least two autonomous vehicles (¶ 30–31: total past performances evaluated and compared based on positive and negative deviations).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the bidding in Seriani, and the decentralized system in Berg by adding the bid evaluation from Balamurugan. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of comprehensively evaluating bids based on prior data—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Balamurugan (¶ 9: need for bid evaluation; ¶ 10: invention provides for bid evaluation and ranking).
For claim 7, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 4 above, and Seriani further teaches:
A system of claim 4, wherein when the service bid is generated by the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agent associated with travel agencies, in response to generation of the service request for acquiring cheapest travel services between two locations, the open economic framework is further operable to acquire prices associated with past travel services provided by the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents associated with the travel agencies, wherein the past services were provided to the client autonomous economic agent for travelling between the two locations (¶ 19: lowest prices determined; ¶ 53: service provider transaction history tracked).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the decentralized system in Berg, and the bid evaluation in Balamurugan by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
For claim 9, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 4 above, and Sweeney further teaches:
A system of claim 4, the open economic framework being operable to generate an agreement related to the service, wherein said agreement is stored on the distributed ledger arrangement with the confidence score associated with a given service provider autonomous economic agent, wherein the agreement comprises at least one of: a price agreed by the service provider autonomous economic agent for providing the service, a price agreed by the client autonomous economic agent for providing the service, a time frame requested by the user for obtaining the service (¶ 28: once transport service selected, trip information includes price parameters).
For claim 16, Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg teach all the limitations of claim 13 above, and Berg further teaches:
A method of claim 13, further comprising an open economic framework on the decentralized computing network, wherein the open economic framework comprises a distributed ledger arrangement, wherein the method comprises at least one of (¶ 13: distributed network is blockchain-based).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney and the bidding in Seriani by adding the decentralized system from Berg. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of providing a distributed exchange for bid matching transactions—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Berg (¶ 3: distributed systems provide improvements over standard computing systems, but may not support larger transactions; ¶ 14: invention provides distributed exchange with matching system).
The combination of Sweeney, Seriani, and Berg does not teach: comparing characteristics of a confidence score associated with each of at least two service provider autonomous economic agents associated with the generation of the service bid; and comparing service ratings and a number of services provided using the plurality of service providers autonomous economic agents associated with the at least two autonomous vehicles.
Balamurugan, however, teaches:
comparing characteristics of a confidence score associated with each of at least two service provider autonomous economic agents associated with the generation of the service bid (¶ 36: bid evaluation for each provider based on utility score and performance score); and
comparing service ratings and a number of services provided using the plurality of service providers autonomous economic agents associated with the at least two autonomous vehicles (¶ 30–31: total past performances evaluated and compared based on positive and negative deviations).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the bidding in Seriani, and the decentralized system in Berg by adding the bid evaluation from Balamurugan. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of comprehensively evaluating bids based on prior data—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Balamurugan (¶ 9: need for bid evaluation; ¶ 10: invention provides for bid evaluation and ranking).
For claim 18, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 16 above, and Seriani further teaches:
A method of claim 16, wherein when the service bid is generated by the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agent associated with travel agencies, in response to generation of the service request for acquiring cheapest travel services between the two locations, the method further comprises acquiring prices associated with past travel services provided by the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents associated with the travel agencies, by the open economic framework, wherein the past services were provided to the client autonomous economic agent for travelling between the two locations (¶ 19: lowest prices determined; ¶ 53: service provider transaction history tracked).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the decentralized system in Berg, and the bid evaluation in Balamurugan by adding the bidding from Seriani. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating bid responses to customer transportation requests—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Seriani (¶ 12: need for more rapid responses to customer requests, so invention facilitates relationship between service provider and customer).
For claim 19, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 16 above, and Sweeney further teaches:
A method of claim 16, further comprising generating, by the open economic framework, an agreement related to the service, wherein said agreement is stored on the distributed ledger arrangement with the confidence score associated with a given service provider autonomous economic agent, wherein the agreement comprises at least one of: a price agreed by the service provider autonomous economic agent for providing the service, a price agreed by the client autonomous economic agent for providing the service, a time frame requested by the user for obtaining the service (¶ 28: once transport service selected, trip information includes price parameters).
Claims 6, 8, and 17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sweeney et al., U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0147959 (“Sweeney”) in view of Seriani, U.S. Patent App. No. 2014/0229258 (“Seriani”); Berg, U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0338963 (“Berg”); Balamurugan et al., U.S. Patent App. No. 2013/0290128 (“Balamurugan”); and Sidhu, U.S. Patent App. No. 2009/0265229 (“Sidhu”).
For claim 6, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 4 above. The combination of Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan does not teach: wherein the open economic framework is operable to obtain verifiable information associated with characteristics of the confidence score for each of the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents without disclosing identifiable information of the one or more other service provider autonomous economic agents thereto.
Sidhu, however, teaches:
A system of claim 4, wherein the open economic framework is operable to obtain verifiable information associated with characteristics of the confidence score for each of the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents without disclosing identifiable information of the one or more other service provider autonomous economic agents thereto (¶ 89: anonymous ID provided for service provider without identifying information; ¶ 97: member rating included and displayed with ID; ¶ 90: consumer still able to identify and investigate service provider while maintaining service provider anonymity).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the bidding in Seriani, the decentralized system in Berg, and the bid evaluation in Balamurugan by adding the anonymous rating from Sidhu. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of better connecting consumers and service providers online—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Sidhu (¶ 10: need for better connection to ensure best fit and competition; ¶ 90: invention provides anonymous bidding to enable privacy while still allowing for evaluation).
For claim 8, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 7 above. The combination of Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan does not teach: wherein the open economic framework is operable to employ zero-knowledge protocol to acquire the prices associated with the past travel services, and to verify that the past travel services were provided to the client autonomous economic agent by a given service provider autonomous economic agent, without acquiring identifiable information associated with the client autonomous economic agent.
Sidhu, however, teaches:
A system of claim 7, wherein the open economic framework is operable to employ zero-knowledge protocol to acquire the prices associated with the past travel services, and to verify that the past travel services were provided to the client autonomous economic agent by a given service provider autonomous economic agent, without acquiring identifiable information associated with the client autonomous economic agent (¶ 89: anonymous ID provided for service provider without identifying information; ¶ 97: member rating included and displayed with ID; ¶ 90: consumer still able to identify and investigate service provider while maintaining service provider anonymity).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the bidding in Seriani, the decentralized system in Berg, and the bid evaluation in Balamurugan by adding the anonymous rating from Sidhu. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of better connecting consumers and service providers online—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Sidhu (¶ 10: need for better connection to ensure best fit and competition; ¶ 90: invention provides anonymous bidding to enable privacy while still allowing for evaluation).
For claim 17, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 16 above. The combination of Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan does not teach: acquiring services provided by one or more other service provider autonomous economic agent, by the open economic framework, to obtain verifiable information associated with the characteristics of the confidence score for each of the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents without disclosing identifiable information of the one or more other service provider autonomous economic agents thereto.
Sidhu, however, teaches:
A method of claim 16, further comprising acquiring services provided by one or more other service provider autonomous economic agent, by the open economic framework, to obtain verifiable information associated with the characteristics of the confidence score for each of the plurality of service provider autonomous economic agents without disclosing identifiable information of the one or more other service provider autonomous economic agents thereto (¶ 89: anonymous ID provided for service provider without identifying information; ¶ 97: member rating included and displayed with ID; ¶ 90: consumer still able to identify and investigate service provider while maintaining service provider anonymity).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the bidding in Seriani, the decentralized system in Berg, and the bid evaluation in Balamurugan by adding the anonymous rating from Sidhu. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of better connecting consumers and service providers online—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Sidhu (¶ 10: need for better connection to ensure best fit and competition; ¶ 90: invention provides anonymous bidding to enable privacy while still allowing for evaluation).
Claims 10, 11, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Sweeney et al., U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0147959 (“Sweeney”) in view of Seriani, U.S. Patent App. No. 2014/0229258 (“Seriani”); Berg, U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0338963 (“Berg”); Balamurugan et al., U.S. Patent App. No. 2013/0290128 (“Balamurugan”); and Molinari et al., U.S. Patent App. No. 2017/0011460 (“Molinari”).
For claim 10, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 9 above. The combination of Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan does not teach: wherein when the agreement is implemented as a smart contract, the open economic framework is further configured to: automatically generate the smart contract, based on an interaction between the service provider autonomous economic agent and the client autonomous economic agent; and share the agreement with the client autonomous economic agent and the selected service provider autonomous economic agent.
Molinari, however, teaches:
A system of claim 9, wherein when the agreement is implemented as a smart contract, the open economic framework is further configured to (¶ 44: agreement is through smart contract):
automatically generate the smart contract, based on an interaction between the service provider autonomous economic agent and the client autonomous economic agent (¶ 44: smart contract is created based on agreement); and
share the agreement with the client autonomous economic agent and the selected service provider autonomous economic agent (¶ 98: parties presented with smart contract).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the bidding in Seriani, the decentralized system in Berg, and the bid evaluation in Balamurugan by adding the smart contract from Molinari. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating electronic transactions—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Molinari (¶ 7: need for transactions to be processed more efficiently and transparently; ¶ 8: invention provides peer-to-peer network with smart contracts).
For claim 11, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 4 above. The combination of Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan does not teach: wherein the open economic framework is further operable to remunerate the selected service provider autonomous economic agent by a digital token for the provided service, wherein the digital token is stored in a digital wallet, in any one of: an encrypted form, a partially encrypted form.
Molinari, however, teaches:
A system of claim 4, wherein the open economic framework is further operable to remunerate the selected service provider autonomous economic agent by a digital token for the provided service, wherein the digital token is stored in a digital wallet, in any one of: an encrypted form, a partially encrypted form (¶ 88: tokens for executing agreement encrypted and maintained in cryptographic wallet).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the bidding in Seriani, the decentralized system in Berg, and the bid evaluation in Balamurugan by adding the smart contract from Molinari. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating electronic transactions—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Molinari (¶ 7: need for transactions to be processed more efficiently and transparently; ¶ 8: invention provides peer-to-peer network with smart contracts).
For claim 20, Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan teach all the limitations of claim 19 above. The combination of Sweeney, Seriani, Berg, and Balamurugan does not teach: wherein when the agreement is implemented as a smart contract, the method further comprises: automatically generating the smart contract, based on an interaction between the service provider autonomous economic agent and the client autonomous economic agent by the open economic framework; and sharing the agreement with the client autonomous economic agent and the selected service provider autonomous economic agent.
Molinari, however, teaches:
A method of claim 19, wherein when the agreement is implemented as a smart contract, the method further comprises (¶ 44: agreement is through smart contract):
automatically generating the smart contract, based on an interaction between the service provider autonomous economic agent and the client autonomous economic agent by the open economic framework (¶ 44: smart contract is created based on agreement); and
sharing the agreement with the client autonomous economic agent and the selected service provider autonomous economic agent (¶ 98: parties presented with smart contract).
It would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the art, before the effective filing date of the claimed invention, to have modified the transport service request in Sweeney, the bidding in Seriani, the decentralized system in Berg, and the bid evaluation in Balamurugan by adding the smart contract from Molinari. One of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to make this modification for the purpose of facilitating electronic transactions—a benefit explicitly disclosed by Molinari (¶ 7: need for transactions to be processed more efficiently and transparently; ¶ 8: invention provides peer-to-peer network with smart contracts).
Prior Art Not Relied Upon
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to Applicant’s disclosure. Those prior art references are as follows:
Cao, U.S. Patent App. No. 2016/0364678, discloses customer ride-sharing requests and matching.
Conclusion
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/DIVESH PATEL/Examiner, Art Unit 3696
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