Capital One Financial Corporation

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Mar 2, 2020

14297809 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Mar. 2, 2020)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
United States Patent and Trademark Office
Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS
P.O. Box 1450
Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450
www.uspto.gov
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
14/297,809 06/06/2014 Joshua Bufford 05793.3187-01000 5403
121629 7590 03/02/2020
Finnegan/Capital One
901 New York Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20001
EXAMINER
WALSH, DANIEL I
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2887
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
03/02/2020 ELECTRONIC
Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding.
The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication.
Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the
following e-mail address(es):
CapOne_USPTO@finnegan.com
lisa.tkach@finnegan.com
regional-desk@finnegan.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte JOSHUA BUFFORD, CHRISTINE LANDI, and JON LINTVET

Appeal 2019-002316
Application 14/297,809
Technology Center 2800
____________

Before JEFFREY T. SMITH, JEFFREY W. ABRAHAM, and
MICHAEL G. McMANUS, Administrative Patent Judges.

SMITH, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 appeals from the
Examiner’s decision to reject claims 29, 32, 37, 40, and 45. We have
jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM.

1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37
C.F.R. § 1.42. Appellant identifies the real party in interest as CAPITAL
ONE SERVICES, LLC. Appeal Br. 3.
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellant’s invention is generally directed to systems and methods for
providing incentives to customers, including flexible incentive awards for
financial products. (Spec. ¶ 8.) More specifically Appellant’s invention is
directed to systems for incentivizing use of financial accounts, wherein the
system comprises a processor and a storage device storing non-transitory
instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the system to
perform certain operations. (Spec. ¶¶ 24, 25, 49.)
Claim 29 illustrates the subject matter on appeal and is reproduced
below:
29. A system for incentivizing use of financial accounts
comprising:
a processor; and
a storage device storing non-transitory instructions that,
when executed by the processor, cause the system to perform
operations comprising:
identifying a financial account associated with a
customer and· provided by a financial account issuer;
determining a profitability score with respect to the
customer indicating a predicted profit made by the financial
account issuer based upon at least a profitability model formula
and historical data associated with at least one of the identified
financial account and one or more other financial accounts of
the customer, wherein the profitability model formula is a
multivariate logistic regression model configured to minimize
an error of the profitability score;
creating a profitability grid by dividing profitability score
determinations for a plurality of customers into a predetermined
number of profitability groups, the profitability groups having
group scores and corresponding to ranges of profitability
scores;
allocating the customer to one of the profitability groups
based on the profitability score of the customer;
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associating an incentive with the profitability group
based on the group score of the profitability group of the
customer;
providing the incentive to the customer based on
purchase transactions made using the financial account;
identifying a set of preferred merchants;
providing, via a computing device of the customer, a
webpage displaying the set of preferred merchants;
receiving a selection of the preferred merchants from the
computing device of the customer;
removing display of the selected preferred merchants
from the webpage;
determining a merchant profitability based on statistics
regarding transactions made by a plurality of customers at the
selected preferred merchants, the statistics comprising number
of transactions made, frequency of transactions and forecasts of
projected transactions;
determining a preferred incentive for the customer for
transactions at the selected preferred merchants based on the
group score and the merchant profitability; and
providing the preferred incentive to the computing device
of the customer based on purchase transactions made using the
financial account at one or more of the selected preferred
merchants.

Appeal Br. 30–31, Claims Appendix.

The following rejection is presented for our review: 2
Claims 29, 32, 37, 40, and 45 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as
directed to a judicial exception without significantly more.

2 The complete statement of the rejection on appeal appears in the Final
Office Action. (Final Act. 2–5.)
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OPINION
After review of the respective positions provided by Appellant and the
Examiner, we AFFIRM the Examiner’s rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
The Examiner has reproduced the rejections on appeal in the Examiner’s
Answer. (Ans. 3–6.)
We limit our discussion to the independent claims 29, 37, and 45. 37
C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).
PRINCIPLES OF LAW
Rejection 35 U.S.C. § 101
Patent-eligible subject matter is defined in 35 U.S.C. § 101 of the
Patent Act, which recites:
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.

There are, however, three judicially created exceptions to the broad
categories of patent-eligible subject matter in 35 U.S.C. § 101: “[l]aws of
nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas.” Alice Corp. Pty. Ltd. v. CLS
Bank Int’l, 573 U.S. 208, 216 (2014); Mayo Collaborative Servs. v.
Prometheus Labs., Inc., 566 U.S. 66, 70 (2012).
In determining whether a claim falls within an excluded category, we
are guided by the Supreme Court’s two-step framework, described in Mayo
and Alice. Alice, 573 U.S. at 217–18 (citing Mayo, 566 U.S. 66, 75–77
(2012)). In accordance with that framework, we first determine what
concept the claim is “directed to.” See Alice, 573 U.S. at 219 (“On their
face, the claims before us are drawn to the concept of intermediated
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settlement, i.e., the use of a third party to mitigate settlement risk.”); see also
Bilski v. Kappos, 561 U.S. 593, 611 (2010) (“Claims 1 and 4 in petitioners’
application explain the basic concept of hedging, or protecting against
risk.”).
Concepts determined to be abstract ideas, and thus patent ineligible,
include certain methods of organizing human activity, such as fundamental
economic practices (Alice, 573 U.S. at 219–20; Bilski, 561 U.S. at 611);
mathematical formulas (Parker v. Flook, 437 U.S. 584, 594–95 (1978)); and
mental processes (Gottschalk v. Benson, 409 U.S. 63, 67 (1972)). Concepts
determined to be patent eligible include physical and chemical processes,
such as “molding rubber products” (Diamond v. Diehr, 450 U.S. 175, 191
(1981)); “tanning, dyeing, making water-proof cloth, vulcanizing India
rubber, smelting ores” (id. at 182 n.7 (quoting Corning v. Burden, 56 U.S.
(15 How.) 252, 267–68 (1853))); and manufacturing flour (Benson, 409 U.S.
at 69 (citing Cochrane v. Deener, 94 U.S. 780, 785 (1876))).
In Diehr, the claim at issue recited a mathematical formula, but the
Supreme Court held that “[a] claim drawn to subject matter otherwise
statutory does not become nonstatutory simply because it uses a
mathematical formula.” Diehr, 450 U.S. at 176; see also id. at 191 (“We
view respondents’ claims as nothing more than a process for molding rubber
products and not as an attempt to patent a mathematical formula.”). Having
said that, the Supreme Court also indicated that a claim “seeking patent
protection for that formula in the abstract . . . is not accorded the protection
of our patent laws, . . . and this principle cannot be circumvented by
attempting to limit the use of the formula to a particular technological
environment.” Id. (citing Benson and Flook); see, e.g., id. at 187 (“It is now
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commonplace that an application of a law of nature or mathematical formula
to a known structure or process may well be deserving of patent
protection.”).
If the claim is “directed to” an abstract idea, we turn to the second
step of the Alice and Mayo framework, where “we must examine the
elements of the claim to determine whether it contains an ‘inventive
concept’ sufficient to ‘transform’ the claimed abstract idea into a patent-
eligible application.” Alice, 573 U.S. at 221 (citation omitted). “A claim
that recites an abstract idea must include ‘additional features’ to ensure ‘that
the [claim] is more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the
[abstract idea].’” Id. (alterations in original) (quoting Mayo, 566 U.S. at 77).
“[M]erely requir[ing] generic computer implementation[] fail[s] to transform
that abstract idea into a patent-eligible invention.” Id.
The PTO published revised guidance on the application of § 101.
USPTO’s 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed.
Reg. 50 (Jan. 7, 2019) (“Revised 101 Guidance”). Under that guidance, we
first look to whether the claim is directed to a judicial exception because:
(1) the claim recites a judicial exception, including certain groupings
of abstract ideas (i.e., mathematical concepts, certain methods of
organizing human activity such as a fundamental economic practice,
or mental processes); and
(2) the claim as a whole fails to recite additional elements that
integrate the judicial exception into a practical application (see
MANUAL OF PATENT EXAMINING PROCEDURE (MPEP) § 2106.05(a)–
(c), (e)–(h) (9th ed. 2018).
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Only if a claim (1) recites a judicial exception and (2) does not integrate that
exception into a practical application, do we then look to whether the claim:
(3) adds a specific limitation beyond the judicial exception that is not
“well-understood, routine, conventional” in the field (see MPEP
§ 2106.05(d)); or
(4) simply appends well-understood, routine, conventional activities
previously known to the industry, specified at a high level of
generality, to the judicial exception.
See Revised 101 Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 56.

ANALYSIS
With respect to the first step under Alice, we determine that the claims
fall under a statutory category, a “new and useful process, machine,
manufacture, or composition of matter.” 35 U.S.C. § 101. Specifically,
claim 29 is directed to a system for incentivizing use of financial accounts;
claim 37 is directed to a computer-implemented method for incentivizing
use of financial accounts; and claim 45 is directed to non-transitory
computer readable medium comprising the instructions to be implemented
by a computer. We now follow the Revised 101 Guidance to analyze claims
29, 37, and 45 to determine if they are directed to patent-ineligible subject
matter (Step 2A, prong 1).3

3 Appellant limits its arguments to independent claim 29, we will do
likewise. The issues addressed regarding independent claim 29 also apply to
independent claims 37 and 45.
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Applying the guidance set forth in the Revised 101 Guidance, we
conclude that claims 29, 32, 37, 40, and 45 do not recite patent-eligible
subject matter.
The Examiner finds that the claims are directed to ineligible subject
matter (business transaction/fundamental economic practice) for determining
rewards, that is, the claims are directed towards determining a profitability
score and associating and providing incentives to customers based on the
profitability score and a merchant profitability using modeling/mathematical
algorithms. (Final Act. 2.) The Examiner finds that the claimed providing
incentives or rewards is a basic fundamental economic practice. (Final Act.
2.) The Examiner specifically states:
The limitations of providing the incentive based on statistics is merely
calculations that could be performed by human or a general purpose
computer as determining profitability scores or merchant profitability
is merely an abstract idea/ mathematical algorithm and grouping data
based on customer or merchant profitability is merely collecting and
organizing data, and such concepts are similar to those identified as
abstract by the courts (Alice Crop. Pty. Ltd. V CLS Bank Int'l, 134 S.
Ct. 2347+ (2014) and Content Extraction and Transmission LLC V.
Wells Fargo Bank, Natl' Assoc.- F.3d-, 2014 WL 7272219, at *3,
buySafe, Inc. v. Google, Inc., 765 F. 3d at 1354-55, Digitech Image
Techs., LLC v Elecs for Imaging, Inc. (2014), and “Methods which
can be performed entirely in the human mind are unpatentable . . .
because computational methods which can be performed entirely in
the human mind are the types of methods that embody the ‘basic tools
of scientific and technological work’ that are free to all men and
reserved exclusively to none.” (quoting Benson, 409 U.S. at 67)).
Additionally, the abstract idea can be seen as the organization and
manipulation of data which could be performed mentally, as well, and
is similar to other concepts identified as abstract by the courts, such as
comparing new and stored information and using rules to identify
options in SmartGene, Inc. v Advanced Biological Labs., 555 Fed.
Appx. 950 (Fed. Cir. 2014) or creating contractual relationships in
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BuySafe (above). The limitations regarding merchant profitability
and profitability are merely improving the judicial exception, when or
why to give a reward, and thus are grouped with the limitations for the
judicial exception and not as part of significantly more than the
judicial exception.

(Final Act. 2–3.)

We agree with the Examiner’s conclusion that the claims recite an
abstract idea. The independent claims recite a certain method of organizing
human activity (an abstract idea); we also consider the claims to include
citations directed to collecting/gathering information and analyzing it, which
broadly recites an abstract mental process. For example, claim 29 recites:
“incentivizing use of financial accounts” (directed to managing personal
behavior); “determining a preferred incentive for the customer for
transactions at the selected preferred merchants based on the group score and
the merchant profitability” and “providing the preferred incentive to the
computing device of the customer” (steps directed to managing personal
behavior); “determining a profitability score with respect to the customer
indicating a predicted profit made by the financial account issuer based upon
at least a profitability model formula and historical data associated with at
least one of the identified financial account and one or more other financial
accounts of the customer, wherein the profitability model formula is a
multivariate logistic regression model configured to minimize an error of the
profitability score” (evaluation or judgement steps which could be
performed in the mind); “creating a profitability grid by dividing
profitability score determinations for a plurality of customers into a
predetermined number of profitability groups, the profitability groups having
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group scores and corresponding to ranges of profitability scores; and
allocating the customer to one of the profitability groups based on the
profitability score of the customer” (steps directed to organizing and
manipulating data).
These limitations are all directed to certain methods of organizing
human activity as they are directed to incentivizing actions of the user
(managing human behavior).4 It falls within the enumerated “Certain
methods of organizing human activity” as grouping of abstract ideas set
forth in the 2019 Revised 101 Guidance.5 Our reviewing court has
concluded that the concepts of collecting, displaying, and manipulating data
often are ineligible subject matter. Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Capital

4 This corresponds to Prong One (a) of Step 2A of the 2019 Revised 101
Guidance. “To determine whether a claim recites an abstract idea in Prong
One, examiners are now to: (a) Identify the specific limitation(s) in the claim
under examination (individually or in combination) that the Examiner
believes recites an abstract idea . . . .” Id. at 54.
5 This corresponds to Prong One ["Evaluate Whether the Claim Recites a
Judicial Exception"] (b) of Step 2A of the 2019 Revised 101 Guidance. “To
determine whether a claim recites an abstract idea in Prong One, examiners
are now to: . . . (b) determine whether the identified limitation(s) falls within
the subject matter groupings of abstract ideas enumerated in Section 1 of the
[2019 Revised 101 Guidance].” Id. at 54. This case implicates subject
matter grouping “(b )”:
(b) Certain methods of organizing human activity-fundamental
economic principles or practices (including hedging, insurance,
mitigating risk); commercial or legal interactions (including
agreements in the form of contracts; legal obligations;
advertising, marketing or sales activities or behaviors; business
relations); managing personal behavior or relationships or
interactions between people (including social activities,
teaching, and following rules or instructions);

Id. at 52.
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One Fin. Corp., 850 F.3d 1332, 1340 (Fed. Cir. 2017); see also Content
Extraction, LLC v. Wells Fargo Bank Nat’l Ass’n, 776 F.3d 1343, 1347
(Fed. Cir. 2016); Elec. Power Grp. v. Alstom S.A., 830 F.3d 1350, 1353
(Fed. Cir. 2016).
Further, merely combining several abstract ideas does not render the
combination any less abstract. RecogniCorp, LLC v. Nintendo Co., 855 F.3d
1322, 1327 (Fed. Cir. 2017) (“Adding one abstract idea (math) to another
abstract idea . . . does not render the claim non-abstract.”); see also
FairWarning IP, LLC v. Iatric Sys., Inc., 839 F.3d 1089, 1093–94 (Fed. Cir.
2016) (determining the pending claims were directed to a combination of
abstract ideas).
Appellants argue that claim 29 recites an improvement in a computer
related technology.6 Appeal Br. 25–28 (citing BASCOM Global Internet
Services, Inc. v. AT&T Mobility LLC, 119 USPQ2d 1236 1244 (Fed. Cir.
2016). Specifically, Appellants argue:
[I]nstead of directly using a customer’s profitability score,
which may be different for each customer, to determine a
preferred incentive for the customer, the claimed method first
allocates each customer to a profitability group according to the

6 This corresponds to Prong Two ["If the Claim Recites a Judicial Exception,
Evaluate Whether the Judicial Exception Is Integrated Into a Practical
Application"] of Step 2A of the 2019 Revised 101 Guidance. “A claim that
integrates a judicial exception into a practical application will apply, rely on,
or use the judicial exception in a manner that imposes a meaningful limit on
the judicial exception, such that the claim is more than a drafting effort
designed to monopolize the judicial exception.” Id. at 54. One
consideration, implicated here, that is “indicative that an additional element
(or combination of elements) may have integrated the exception into a
practical application” (id. at 55) is if “[a]n additional element reflects an
improvement in the functioning of a computer, or an improvement to other
technology or technical field” (id. at 55).
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customer's profitability score, and then determines the preferred
incentive for the customer using a group score associated with
the respective profitability group. By classifying the diverse
profitability scores into a set of different levels, i.e., group
scores, the claimed method avoids considering or creating too
many levels of incentives. See specification, ¶ [063]. This
way, the algorithm used for determining the preferred
incentives can be simplified and the computation speed is
improved. Therefore, the claimed method improves the
computer efficiencies. . . .
By removing the selected preferred merchants from the
webpage, the claimed method removes a potential source of
confusion from the customer and prevents the customer from
selecting the same merchant multiple times. Id., ¶ [048]. This
way, the claimed method not only improves the efficiency of
the incentive computer system by reducing the user’s error rate,
but also improves the user experience of the system.

(Appeal Br. 27.)

Appellant further argues the computer’s ability of predicting
profitability associated with a customer and tailoring a rewards program
according to a customer’s preference over certain merchants are functions
which similar systems “could not do before,” and are therefore “directed to a
non-abstract improvement in computer functionality.” (Appeal Br. 20).
The record does not adequately support the argument that the claimed
system provides a technical improvement. The record does not suggest any
such added computer functionality. The Specification does not describe the
claimed system as providing additional computer functionality that
incentivizes use of financial accounts. No technical improvement is
mentioned. Rather, the Specification discloses only non-technical
improvements, such as providing the customer additional rewards or benefits
for purchases made at the selected merchant. See e.g., Spec. para. 27
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("[T]he present invention may obtain a list of merchant(s) selected by the
customer and provide the customer additional rewards or benefits for
purchases made at the selected merchant(s.)”); see also para. 7 (“[A] need
exists for improved systems and methods for providing incentives to
customers, including incentives to attract or retain customers.”) These
improvements may help the customer receive a promoted incentive or
reward but that alone is insufficient to show that there is an improvement to
computer functionality. The Specification does not describe improving
computer functionality. Specifically see Spec. para. 63 (“The formula and
profitability grid may then be used to determine the reward points and/or
reward incentive parameters for a particular customer.”) Appellant’s
technical improvement argument is unpersuasive as to error in the
Examiner’s, or our, characterization of what the claim is directed to because
the record evidence fails to support it. Appellant’s attorney’s arguments in a
brief cannot take the place of evidence in the record. See generally In re
Glass, 474 F.2d 1015, 1019 (CCPA 1973); see also In re Pearson, 494 F.2d
1399, 1405 (CCPA 1974); In re De Blauwe, 736 F.2d 699, 705 (Fed. Cir.
1984); Meitzner v. Mindick, 549 F.2d 775 (CCPA 1977), and In re Schulze,
346 F.2d 600, 602 (1965).
Appellant argues the claims focus on specific means or methods and
not merely on a “result or effect.” Specifically, Appellant argues the
claimed invention recites “specific steps for providing incentives to a
customer in relation to one or more preferred merchants selected by the
customer.” Appeal Br. 22–23 (citing McRO, Inc. v. Bandai Namco Games
Am. Inc., 837 F.3d 1299 (Fed. Cir. 2016)). Appellant further argues the
claimed invention recites an ordered combination of elements, and an
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incentive concept that improves the technology of providing preferred
incentives to customers. (Appeal Br. 27–28.)
Our reviewing court addressed this in McRO in which the court
reviewed claims which use “a combined order of specific rules that renders
information into a specific format that is then used and applied to create
desired results: a sequence of synchronized, animated characters” McRO,
837 F.3d at 1315 . The court found that the claims did not “simply use a
computer as a tool to automate conventional activity,” but instead used the
computer to “perform a distinct process” that is carried out in a different way
than the prior non-computer method to improve the technology of (3-D
animation techniques). See McRO, 837 F.3d at 1314–16. Here, we do not
find that the claims recite such an ordered set of rules carried out in a
different way than the non-computer method. The claimed steps, discussed
above with respect to the abstract idea analysis, are not steps which are
unique to a use of a computer. Thus, we do not find that the claims recite
and improve a technological process in a manner analogous to that in McRO.
The limitations of claim 29 taken alone or in ordered combination are
nothing more than the fundamental economic business practice of collecting
and organizing data as it pertains to rewards including various data
manipulations and calculations. Providing customers with incentives for
particular merchants is a routine business practice and displaying a webpage
is not significantly more.
Alice step two-Does the Claim Provide an Inventive Concept?7

7 This corresponds to Step 2B of the 2019 Revised 101 Guidance (see p. 56).

[I]f a claim has been determined to be directed to a judicial
exception under revised Step 2A, examiners should then
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Step two is “a search for an ‘inventive concept’-i.e., an element or
combination of elements that is ‘sufficient to ensure that the patent in
practice amounts to significantly more than a patent upon the [ineligible
concept] itself.’” Alice, 573 U.S. at 217–18 (quoting Mayo Collaborative
Servs. v. Prometheus Labs., Inc., 566 U.S. 66, 73 (2012)).
The Examiner finds that the additional claimed elements do not
amount to significantly more than the abstract idea. The Examiner states:
[T]he claim(s) does/do not include additional elements that are
sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial
exception (providing rewards) because the recitations of the
processor and storage device are broad recitations of a generic
computer performing generic computer functions. The addition
of the computer/memory does not add any meaningful
limitation beyond generally linking the abstract idea to a
general purpose computer as it is adding a nominal recitation of
a computer and memory. Thus, though the processor and
memory are real world elements they are not significantly more
and thus are insufficient to change a patent-ineligible abstract
idea into a patent eligible invention (See Alice Corp., 134 S. Ct.
at 2350 (quoting Mayo, 132 S. Ct. at 2353) and Bancorp Servs.
v. Sun Life Assurance Co., 687 F.3d1266, 1278 (Fed. Circ.
2012). Therefore the claims do not include additional inventive
features such that the claim scope does not solely capture the
abstract idea. Providing rewards to customers based on data
manipulation/organization/collection including basic displaying
by generic computer devices is not significantly more than the
abstract idea but merely is an improvement specifying details of
the abstract idea (specific computations, specific displaying and
organizing of data which are nothing more than the abstract
idea).

evaluate the additional elements individually and in
combination under Step 2B to determine whether they provide
an inventive concept (i.e., whether the additional elements
amount to significantly more than the exception itself).
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(Final Act. 3–4.)
Consistent with the Examiner’s findings and analysis, , and
considering the claim elements both individually and as an ordered
combination, we determine that claim 29 is directed to a certain method of
organizing human activity, and simply appends well-understood, routine,
conventional activities previously known to the industry, specified at a high
level of generality, and thus, fails to provide an inventive concept sufficient
to transform the abstract idea into patent-ineligible subject matter.
In summary, Appellant’s arguments have not persuaded us of error in
the Examiner’s determination that representative claim 29 is directed to an
abstract idea; both to a certain method of organizing human activity (an
abstract idea of organizing human activity) and collecting/gathering
information and analyzing it (a mental processes). Further, Appellant’s
arguments have not persuaded us that the Examiner erred in finding that the
claims are not: directed to an improvement in the functioning of the
computer or to other technology or other technical field; directed to a
particular machine; directed to performing or affecting a transformation of
an article to a different state or thing; or directed to using a judicial
exception in some meaningful way beyond linking the exception to a
particular technological environment such that the claim as a whole is more
than a drafting effort to monopolize the judicial exception. For these
reasons, we are unpersuaded that the claims recite additional elements that
integrate the judicial exception into a practical application. Revised 101
Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. at 54. Appellant has not presented separate
arguments with respect to claims 32, 37, 40, and 45, and thus these claims
are grouped with claim 29.
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Accordingly, we sustain the Examiner’s rejection of claims 29, 32, 37,
40, and 45 under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as being directed to patent ineligible
subject matter.

CONCLUSION
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
29, 32, 37,
40, 45
101 Eligibility 29, 32, 37,
40, 45

No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a). See 37 C.F.R.
§ 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED