Remarks
Claims 21-40 are pending.
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 .
Claim Interpretation
The claims include subject matter that does not have any effect on the scope of the claims, such as “originating from an artificial intelligence computing entity” and similar language. The claims will operate in the same exact fashion if the request is received from an AI computing entity (e.g., a voice controlled AI assistant) or a non-AI computing entity (e.g., a human or a smartphone without AI assistance). Indeed, Applicant cites other companies’ AI computing entities, such as Amazon’s Echo, Google’s Home, and the like (e.g., paragraph 103 of the specification). Applicant did not invent these nor can these other companies’ devices be used to define Applicant’s claims.
Double Patenting
The nonstatutory double patenting rejection is based on a judicially created doctrine grounded in public policy (a policy reflected in the statute) so as to prevent the unjustified or improper timewise extension of the “right to exclude” granted by a patent and to prevent possible harassment by multiple assignees. A nonstatutory double patenting rejection is appropriate where the conflicting claims are not identical, but at least one examined application claim is not patentably distinct from the reference claim(s) because the examined application claim is either anticipated by, or would have been obvious over, the reference claim(s). See, e.g., In re Berg, 140 F.3d 1428, 46 USPQ2d 1226 (Fed. Cir. 1998); In re Goodman, 11 F.3d 1046, 29 USPQ2d 2010 (Fed. Cir. 1993); In re Longi, 759 F.2d 887, 225 USPQ 645 (Fed. Cir. 1985); In re Van Ornum, 686 F.2d 937, 214 USPQ 761 (CCPA 1982); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); In re Thorington, 418 F.2d 528, 163 USPQ 644 (CCPA 1969).
A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on nonstatutory double patenting provided the reference application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with the examined application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. See MPEP § 717.02 for applications subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA as explained in MPEP § 2159. See MPEP § 2146 et seq. for applications not subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . A terminal disclaimer must be signed in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(b).
The filing of a terminal disclaimer by itself is not a complete reply to a nonstatutory double patenting (NSDP) rejection. A complete reply requires that the terminal disclaimer be accompanied by a reply requesting reconsideration of the prior Office action. Even where the NSDP rejection is provisional the reply must be complete. See MPEP § 804, subsection I.B.1. For a reply to a non-final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.111(a). For a reply to final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.113(c). A request for reconsideration while not provided for in 37 CFR 1.113(c) may be filed after final for consideration. See MPEP §§ 706.07(e) and 714.13.
The USPTO Internet website contains terminal disclaimer forms which may be used. Please visit www.uspto.gov/patent/patents-forms. The actual filing date of the application in which the form is filed determines what form (e.g., PTO/SB/25, PTO/SB/26, PTO/AIA /25, or PTO/AIA /26) should be used. A web-based eTerminal Disclaimer may be filled out completely online using web-screens. An eTerminal Disclaimer that meets all requirements is auto-processed and approved immediately upon submission. For more information about eTerminal Disclaimers, refer to www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/applying-online/eterminal-disclaimer.
Claims 21-40 are provisionally rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 21-40 of copending Application No. 18/329,107 (reference application). Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because the copending application’s claims include all subject matter found within the current claims that have an effect on the scope of the claims along with additional subject matter (e.g., additional information in claim 21 of the copending application regarding partitions and services). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to omit the additional subject matter of claim 21 of the copending application based on the legal precedent that elimination of a step or an element and its function is obvious if the function is not desired. Ex parte Wu, 10 USPQ 2031 (Bd. Pat. App. & Inter. 1989).
This is a provisional nonstatutory double patenting rejection because the patentably indistinct claims have not in fact been patented.
Claims 21, 34, and 39 are provisionally rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 12, and 16 of copending Application No. 18/652,359 (reference application). Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because the copending claims include all subject matter in the instant claims with additional subject matter. Claim 21 corresponds to claim 1, claim 31 corresponds to claim 12, and claim 39 corresponds to claim 16.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to omit the additional subject matter of claim 1 of the patent based on the legal precedent that elimination of a step or an element and its function is obvious if the function is not desired. Ex parte Wu, 10 USPQ 2031 (Bd. Pat. App. & Inter. 1989).
This is a provisional nonstatutory double patenting rejection because the patentably indistinct claims have not in fact been patented.
Claims 21-23, 34, and 39 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 4, 5, 14, and 19 of U.S. Patent No. 11,909,733. Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because the patented claims include all subject matter in the instant claims with additional subject matter. Claim 21 corresponds to claim 1, claim 22 corresponds to claim 4, claim 23 corresponds to claim 5, claim 31 corresponds to claim 14, and claim 39 corresponds to claim 19.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to omit the additional subject matter of claim 1 of the patent based on the legal precedent that elimination of a step or an element and its function is obvious if the function is not desired. Ex parte Wu, 10 USPQ 2031 (Bd. Pat. App. & Inter. 1989).
Claims 21, 34, and 39 are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over claims 1, 12, and 17, respectively, of U.S. Patent No. 11,997,105. Although the claims at issue are not identical, they are not patentably distinct from each other because the patented claims include all subject matter in the instant claims with additional subject matter.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made to omit the additional subject matter of claim 1 of the patent based on the legal precedent that elimination of a step or an element and its function is obvious if the function is not desired. Ex parte Wu, 10 USPQ 2031 (Bd. Pat. App. & Inter. 1989).
Examiner’s Note
It is noted that the IDSes filed 10/16/2025 contain a large number of references for consideration by the Examiner. If the applicant and/or applicant’s representative is aware of any particular reference or portion of a reference in the lists which the examiner should pay particular attention to, it is requested that it be specifically pointed out in response to this office action.
Information Disclosure Statement(s)
Mooney v. Brunswick Corp. (Mooney v. Brunswick Corp., 663 F.2d 724, 212 U.S.P.Q. 401, 407 (7th Cir. 1981)) states the following:
Mooney's reissue application cited 56 prior art references (including the Kiekhaefer drawing and the Gale Products drawing) but in no purported order of importance. The letter which accompanied the application similarly failed to disclose which references were most relevant to the patentability of the gear structure. Ordinarily, an examiner specifies the pertinent prior art references in the Office Action, but neither the Kiekhaefer drawing nor the Gale Products drawing were listed by the examiner in the Office Action in this case. Considering the large number of references which were included on the patent examiner's list, we do not think it unreasonable for the district court to have concluded that the examiner failed to consider these drawings as relevant prior art. As a result, the statutory presumption of validity which may be enhanced when prior art has been considered and rejected by the Patent Office is dissipated in Mooney's case with respect to the Kiekhaefer drawing and the Gale Products drawing. Compare Ortho Pharmaceutical Corp. v. American Hospital Supply Corp., 534 F.2d 89 (7th Cir. 1976) and Tracor, Inc. v. Hewlett-Packard Co., 519 F.2d 1288 (7th Cir. 1975) with Chicago Rawhide Manufacturing Co. v. Crane Packing Co., supra.
Thus, 56 references has been found by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit to be large enough to be considered a “large number of references” and that it is not “unreasonable … to have concluded that the examiner failed to consider these drawings as relevant prior art” with respect to 2 drawings buried within the 56 references. It is noted that “these drawings” could be any portion of any document within an IDS.
Therefore, the IDS or set of IDSes in the current application that contains at least 56 references is clearly also considered to have a large number of references and it is not unreasonable to conclude that the examiner cannot consider everything within these documents.
As discussed in Ecto World, LLC v. RAI Strategic Holdings, Inc. (Ecto World, LLC v. RAI Strategic Holdings, Inc., IPR2024-01280, Paper 13 (May 19, 2025)):
Most IDS submissions contain fewer than 25 references. See Setting and Adjusting Patent Fees During Fiscal Year 2025, 89 FR 91898 at 91924 (Nov. 20, 2024) (“Approximately 87% of applications contain 50 or fewer applicant-provided items of information, and approximately 77% contain fewer than 25 . . . [O]nly 4% of applications contain more than 200 applicant-provided items of information.”).
It was decided in Ecto World, LLC v. RAI Strategic Holdings, Inc. that, since the IDS was large, even though the Examiner signed the IDS as considered (please see PTAB response referenced therein as well as file history for the application), the size of the IDS warranted further consideration since the Examiner may not have fully considered everything therein. Indeed, Examiners do not have time to review every reference in a large IDS.
Therefore, for the above reasons that the current IDS or set of IDSes is considered large and the fact that the USPTO as well as Federal Circuit believe that examiners cannot review every reference in a large IDS, this IDS or set of IDSes cannot be considered.
Applicant is hereby requested to call the Examiner’s attention to particular references and portions of references that the Examiner should pay particular attention to.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 21-40 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Osterkamp (U.S. Patent 12,333,533) in view of Fountaine (U.S. Patent Application Publication 2018/0321905).
Regarding Claim 21,
Osterkamp discloses a computer-implemented method comprising:
Receiving, by one or more processors and originating from a computing entity, an exchange request for executing a value-based exchange, wherein the exchange request is indicative of a universally unique ephemeral key (UUEK) and one or more attributes (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 3; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 5; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; any device receiving a request for a transaction with a token, which is indicative of many attributes, such as facilitating server (e.g., Column 10, line 43 to Column 11, line 5)all information associated with the temporary account and/or user account (e.g., Column 12, lines 22-49, Column 12, line 64 to Column 13, line 20), for example);
Identifying, by the one or more processors, an exchange identifier based at least in part on the UUEK, wherein the exchange identifier corresponds to an exchange data object that comprises an instrument identifier for a service provider instrument of a member platform (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; token, portion of token (e.g., the first digit in the token may correspond to the facilitating server and the rest would then correspond to the account), account info, user info, etc., as examples);
Providing, by the one or more processors and using a service provider interface, an exchange authorization request to the member platform, wherein the exchange authorization request is indicative of the one or more attributes and the instrument identifier (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; sending the token up the line for authorization, asking user to authorize the transaction prior to allowing it to occur, determining if enough funds, if the time is prior to expiration of the token, checking geographic area, checking other rules, etc., as examples);
Receiving, by the one or more processors and using the service provider interface, an exchange authorization response that is indicative of at least one of an authorization or a denial (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; response, such as authentication from user, authentication confirmation, transaction approval, etc., as examples); and
Providing, by the one or more processors and to the computing entity, an exchange response based at least in part on the exchange authorization response, wherein the exchange response is indicative of the authorization or the denial (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; authentication confirmation, approval, etc., as examples; authentication confirmation, transaction approval, etc., as examples);
But does not appear to explicitly disclose that the computing entity is an artificial intelligence computing entity.
Fountaine, however, discloses that the computing entity is an artificial intelligence computing entity (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Paragraphs 2, 26, 47, 61-63, 79, 85, 86, 106-108, and associated figures; AI assistant, such as Siri, Alexa, Cortana, Google Assistant, Bixby, or the like, for example, performing functionality such as ordering goods/services, for example). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of applicant’s invention, which is before any effective filing date of the claimed invention, to incorporate the voice control techniques of Fountaine into the digital wallet system of Osterkamp in order to allow people to use AI assistants, to increase extensibility of the system by allowing for voice controlled transactions, to increase privacy of voice controlled systems, and/or to increase security in the system.
Regarding Claim 34,
Claim 34 is a system claim that corresponds to method claim 21 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding Claim 39,
Claim 39 is a medium claim that corresponds to method claim 21 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding Claim 22,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 21, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the UUEK comprises a partner partition that identifies a partner platform, the instrument identifier comprises an instrument key for the member platform, and the computer-implemented method further comprises (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; token, portion of token (e.g., the first digit in the token may correspond to the facilitating server and the rest would then correspond to the account), account info, user info, etc., as examples):
Identifying a system instrument data object based at least in part on the instrument key (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; this could be lookup of user info, or lookup of account info using user info, etc., for example);and
Generating the exchange authorization request based at least in part on the system instrument data object (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; authorization as above based on the just described data, for example).
Regarding Claim 35,
Claim 35 is a system claim that corresponds to method claim 22 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding Claim 23,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 21, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the UUEK comprises a service provider partition that identifies a service provider platform and the computer- implemented method comprises (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures):
Identifying the member platform based at least in part on the service provider partition (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures);
Identifying a system instrument data object based at least in part on the member platform and the exchange identifier (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures); and
Generating the exchange authorization request based at least in part on the system instrument data object (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures).
Regarding Claim 36,
Claim 36 is a system claim that corresponds to method claim 23 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding Claim 24,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 21, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the exchange data object comprises one or more exchange attributes that are indicative of an expiration status, and the computer-implemented method further comprises: validating the UUEK based at least in part on the expiration status (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, line 52 to Column 5, line 11; Column 8 line 47 to Column 9, line 22; Column 9, line 33 to Column 10, line 20; Column 11, lines 29-53; Column 12, lines 4-21; Column 13, lines 53-67; and associated figures; verifying time is within time before token expires, for example).
Regarding Claim 37,
Claim 37 is a system claim that corresponds to method claim 24 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding Claim 25,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 24, in addition, Osterkamp discloses modifying the expiration status to invalidate the UUEK (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, line 52 to Column 5, line 11; Column 8 line 47 to Column 9, line 22; Column 9, line 33 to Column 10, line 20; Column 11, lines 29-53; Column 12, lines 4-21; Column 13, lines 53-67; and associated figures; expiring the token, removing the account, removing the token, etc., as examples).
Regarding Claim 38,
Claim 38 is a system claim that corresponds to method claim 25 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding Claim 26,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 21, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the exchange authorization request is indicative of a user identifier corresponding to the exchange data object (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; token is indicative of account info, user info, etc., as examples).
Regarding Claim 40,
Claim 40 is a medium claim that corresponds to method claim 26 and is rejected for the same reasons.
Regarding Claim 27,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 26, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the user identifier comprises a user key corresponding to a system user identifier and the instrument identifier comprises an instrument key corresponding to a system instrument identifier (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 10, line 21 to Column 11, line 28; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 20; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures).
Regarding Claim 28,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 26, in addition, Osterkamp discloses generating a record for the value-based exchange (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 9, line 50 to Column 10, line 20, Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; records, for example); and
Storing the record in a platform data vault in association with the instrument identifier and the user identifier (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 9, line 50 to Column 10, line 20, Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; storing records in a database, for example).
Regarding Claim 29,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 28, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the record is indicative of a identifier, the one or more attributes, and the exchange authorization response (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 9, line 50 to Column 10, line 20, Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures).
Regarding Claim 30,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 21, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the one or more attributes comprise at least one attribute that is indicative of a value, and wherein the exchange authorization response is based at least in part on a comparison between the value and an asset availability of the service provider instrument (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 9, line 50 to Column 10, line 20, Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; verifying sufficient funds, for example).
Regarding Claim 31,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 21, in addition, Osterkamp discloses generating a replacement UUEK for the service provider instrument, wherein the exchange response is indicative of the replacement UUEK (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures; the approval, confirmation, or the like, is itself a UUEK, and also points to the authorization files/records, for example).
Regarding Claim 32,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 31, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the exchange response is provided to a partner platform, and wherein the partner platform is configured to replace the UUEK with the replacement UUEK (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures).
Regarding Claim 33,
Osterkamp as modified by Fountaine discloses the method of claim 32, in addition, Osterkamp discloses that the UUEK comprises a universally unique identifier and the replacement UUEK comprises a different universally unique identifier (Exemplary Citations: for example, Abstract, Column 4, lines 35-51; Column 6, line 53 to Column 7, line 13; Column 7, line 44 to Column 8, line 10; Column 8, line 59 to Column 9, line 22; Column 11, lines 6-53; Column 12, line 50 to Column 13, line 30; Column 14, lines 14-30; and associated figures).
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Jeffrey D Popham whose telephone number is (571)272-7215. The examiner can normally be reached Monday through Friday 9:00-5:30.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jeffrey Nickerson can be reached at (469) 295-9235. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Jeffrey D. Popham/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2432
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