20Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
2. This Office Action is an answer to a communication on 5/22/2025.
3. Claims 1-20 are pending.
Foreign Priority
4. Applicant claims a Chinese priority of 12/03/2021.
Information Disclosure Statement (IDS)
5. Applicant filed two IDSs on 5/22/2025, and 6/12/2025; they are considered.
Claimed Interpretations
6. Examiner notes that the fundamentals of the rejections are based on the broadest reasonable interpretation of the claim language. Applicant is kindly invited to consider the reference as a whole. References are to be interpreted as by one of ordinary skill in the art rather than as by a novice. See MPEP 2141. Therefore, the relevant inquiry when interpreting a reference is not what the reference expressly discloses on its face but what the reference would teach or suggest to one of ordinary skill in the art.
Claim Rejections – 35 USC § 101
7. 35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
8. Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to an abstract idea without significantly more
A. 101 Analysis – Step 1
Claim 8 is directed to a method (i.e., a process). Therefore, claim 8 is within at least one of the four statutory categories.
101 Analysis – Step 2A, Prong I
Regarding Prong I of the Step 2A analysis in the 2019 PEG, the claims are to be analyzed to determine whether they recite subject matter that falls within one of the follow groups of abstract ideas: a) mathematical concepts, b) certain methods of organizing human activity, and/or c) mental processes.
Claim 8 includes a limitation that recites an abstract idea (emphasized with bold-face terms) and will be used as a representative claim for the remainder of the 101 rejection. Claim 8 recites:
The method for obtaining data of claim 7, wherein obtaining the neural network model by training the neural network by the server, according to the first driving data and the vehicle driving trajectory comprises:
obtaining a predicted driving trajectory of each of the vehicles within the first preset period by performing a predicting processing using the neural network, based on the first driving data of each of the vehicles at the first preset time;
calculating a loss value of the neural network according to the vehicle driving trajectory and the predicted driving trajectory; and
obtaining the neural network model by adjusting the neural network until the loss value is within a preset range.
The examiner submits that the foregoing bolded limitation constitutes a “mathematical concept” because under its broadest reasonable interpretation, the claim covers performance of the limitation with a specific calculation. Specifically, the “calculating a loss value of the neural network according to the vehicle driving trajectory and the predicted driving trajectory” step for calculating this value is necessary based on previous evaluation(s). Accordingly, the claim recites at least one abstract idea.
B. 101 Analysis – Step 2A, Prong II
Regarding Prong II of the Step 2A analysis in the 2019 PEG, the claims are to be analyzed to determine whether the claim, as a whole, integrates the abstract into a practical application. As noted in the 2019 PEG, it must be determined whether any additional elements in the claim beyond the abstract idea integrate the exception into a practical application in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on the judicial exception. The courts have indicated that additional elements merely using a computer to implement an abstract idea, adding insignificant extra solution activity, or generally linking use of a judicial exception to a particular technological environment or field of use do not integrate a judicial exception into a “practical application.”
In the present case, the additional limitations beyond the above-noted abstract idea are “controls the orientation of the work device by using a total value obtained by adding the operator correction value and the assistance correction value” (where the underlined portions are the “additional limitations” while the bolded portions continue to represent the “abstract idea”); the examiner submits that the above identified additional limitations do not integrate the above-noted abstract idea into a practical application.(see MPEP 2106.07 a section that talks about rejecting a dependent claim under 101 even when the independent claim is not rejected under 35 USC 101)
Accordingly, the additional limitation does not impose any meaningful limits on practicing this abstract idea.
C. 101 Analysis – Step 2B
Regarding Step 2B of the Revised Guidance, representative dependent claim 8 does not include additional elements (considered both individually and as an ordered combination) that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception for adding a calculation requirement
Hence, the claim 8 is not patent eligible.
Claim Rejections 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of 35 U.S.C. 112(a):
(a) IN GENERAL.—The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor or joint inventor of carrying out the invention.
The following is a quotation of the first paragraph of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112:
The specification shall contain a written description of the invention, and of the manner and process of making and using it, in such full, clear, concise, and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to which it pertains, or with which it is most nearly connected, to make and use the same, and shall set forth the best mode contemplated by the inventor of carrying out his invention.
9. Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(a) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), first paragraph, as failing to comply with the written description requirement. The claims contain subject matter which was not described in the specification in such a way as to reasonably convey to one skilled in the relevant art that the inventor or a joint inventor, or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the inventor(s), at the time the application was filed, had possession of the claimed invention; in these claims, a limitation of "a controller" to calculate different claimed values .
Applicant does not show to one with skill in the art how to calculate a loss value of the neural network according to the vehicle driving trajectory and the predicted driving trajectory as required in this claim in such full, clear, concise and exact claimed term (for prior art searching, the examiner interprets claimed “calculate” is “determine”.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC§ 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(f):
(f) Element in Claim for a Combination. – An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
10. The claims in this application are given their broadest reasonable interpretation (BRI) using the plain meaning of the claim language in light of the specification as it would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim element (also commonly referred to as a claim limitation) is limited by the description in the specification when 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is invoked.
As explained in MPEP § 2181, subsection I, claim limitations that meet the following three-prong test will be interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
(A) the claim limitation uses the term “means” or “step” or a term used as a substitute for “means” that is a generic placeholder (also called a nonce term or a non-structural term having no specific structural meaning) for performing the claimed function;
(B) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is modified by functional language, typically, but not always linked by the transition word “for” (e.g., “means for”) or another linking word or phrase, such as “...is configured to...” to predict .. (as in pending claims 13, and 19).
For examination purposes, the examiner assumes that 35 U.S.C. 112(f) is not invoked for this pending application because “...is configured to ...” can be interpreted as a certain intent of use both in software and in hardware.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in 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.
11. Claims 1-4, 9-12, and 15-18 are rejected as obvious over McGill Jr. et al (US Pub 20200089246 A1 hereafter McGill’246).
A. Per claims 1, 9,and 15: McGill’246, teaches a method, a device, and a medium to obtain data, comprising features:
collecting driving data of a vehicle by a vehicle-mounted device (e.g., by camera 126, see McGill’246, para.[0104]);
generating a driving trajectory corresponding to the vehicle-mounted device, according to the driving data (using a camera, see McGill’246, FIG 1 ref. 170. 10 ref. 450, claims 11-12); and
generating training data for training a neural network by the vehicle-mounted device, according
to the previous driving data and the vehicle driving trajectory (see McGill’246, FIG.9, para.[0076], and [0080]).
McGill’246 does not disclose exactly claimed language; however, it 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 to implement McGill’246’s suggestions to use a vehicle mounted camera to process in an AI environment and to provide better data to generating a more accurate vehicle driving trajectory.
B. Per dependent claims 2, 10, and 16: The rationales and reference for a rejection of claim 1 are incorporated.
McGill’246 also suggests about collecting the previous driving data of the vehicle at
the first time, and collecting data of the vehicle
within that period by the vehicle-mounted device (see McGill’246, FIG 9), comprises:
obtaining data collected by sensors of the vehicle at the first time as the first driving data,
based on a Controller Area Network bus of the vehicle (see McGill’246 FIG. 9 and claim 10); and
obtaining driving status data of the vehicle at each time point within the first preset period as
the second driving data, by using navigation sensor and neural-network components of the vehicle (e.g., iteratively updating obtained data, see McGill’246 claim 15).
C. Per dependent claims 3, 11, and 17: The rationales and reference for a rejection of claim 2 are incorporated.
It has been well-known that navigation sensors comprise a camera and a radar the navigation sensor components comprise an Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) (see McGill’246 claim 10), and a Global Positioning System (see McGill’246 para. [0101]) component, and the driving status data comprises a speed, an attitude/position (see McGill’246 FIG. 7 ref. 620, para.[0048], [0101]), [0115])
and coordinates of the vehicle (e.g. a starting location) at each time point within the previous period (see McGill’246 para. [0115]).
One of ordinary skill in the art understood about using the above available sensors to know a current status of a vehicle’s environment, and its operating conditions to predict a next trajectory..
D. Per dependent claims 4, 12, and 18: The rationales and references for a rejection of claim 1 are incorporated.
McGill’246 also suggests:
storing data sets (see McGill’246, para [0114]) of different driving data as an array according to an organized order (e.g., based on a recorded time), and each element in the array corresponding to a current/track location/ point of the vehicle driving trajectory (see McGill’246, para. [0357], [0473]).
12. Claims 5-8, 13-14, and 19-20 are rejected as obvious over McGill’246, in view of Nvidia’745 (US Pub.20240017745 A1).
A. Per dependent claims 5, 13, and 19: The rationales and reference for a rejection of claim 1 are incorporated.
Nvidia’745 also suggests a feature of transmiting/communicating/sending the training data to a server by the vehicle mounted device (see Nvidia’745 FIG.7 ref. 708); and enabling the server (see Nvidia’745 para. [0237]) to train the neural network according to received training data and obtain a neural network model, which will be used to predict an autonomous driving trajectory of a vehicle (see Nvidia’745 para. [0002], and [0062]).
It 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 to implement McGill’246’ with Nvidia’745 to perform multiple calculations on a powerful server before sending a best obtained result/trajectory to an autonomous vehicle.
B. Per dependent claims 6, 14, and 20: The rationales and reference for a rejection of claim 5 are incorporated.
McGill’246 also suggests duplication features:
sending different driving data of the vehicle at a future time to the server by the vehicle-mounted device, which predicts an autonomous driving trajectory of the vehicle within a preset period by using the neural network model based on the driving data, accordingly being after a preset time (see McGill’246, FIGs. 7, 9);
receiving the autonomous driving trajectory sent by the server for the third driving data, and
controlling an automatic driving of the vehicle within the second preset period according to the
autonomous driving trajectory by the vehicle-mounted device (see McGill’246 FIGs. 9-10, 13 (ref. 1340)) .
C. Per dependent claim 7: The rationales and references for a rejection of claim 1 are incorporated.
McGill’246 suggests a step of: receiving training data by a server, the training data sent by each of vehicles comprising first driving data of a vehicle at first preset time and a vehicle driving trajectory of each of the
vehicles within a first preset period, the first preset period being after the first preset time, the vehicle driving trajectory being generated by a plurality of data sets of second driving data within the first preset period; and
obtaining a neural network model by training a neural network by the server, according to the
first driving data and the vehicle driving trajectory, the neural network model being invoked to predict an autonomous driving trajectory of each of the vehicles.McGill’246 use a neural network for reinforcement learning before predicting a more accurate trajectory (see McGill’246 Fig.9).
A motivation is to process multiple data from involved vehicles at a server to predict a trajectory for a specific vehicle.
Conclusion
13. Claims 1-20 are rejected.
14. The attached prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
15. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Cuong H Nguyen whose telephone number is (571) 272-6759 (email address is cuong.nguyen@uspto.gov). The examiner can normally be reached on M - F: 9:30AM- 5:30PM. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, 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, Bendidi Rachid can be reached on (571) 272-4896. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of an application may be obtained from the Patent Application Information Retrieval (PAIR) system. Status information for published applications may be obtained from either Private PAIR or Public PATER. Status information for unpublished applications is available through Private PAIR only, For more information about the PAIR system, see https//ppair-my.uspto.gov/pair/PrivatePair. Should you have questions on access to the Private PAIR system, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll- free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative or access to the automated information system, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or S71-272- 1000.
/CUONG H NGUYEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3664
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