Johnson Controls Technology Company

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Sep 14, 2021

2020003482 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 14, 2021)

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.
15/279,336 09/28/2016 Carlos Felipe Alcala Perez 16BE083-US
(117277-0176)
6255
26371 7590 09/14/2021
FOLEY & LARDNER LLP
3000 K STREET N.W.
SUITE 600
WASHINGTON, DC 20007-5109
EXAMINER
NORTON, JENNIFER L
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2117
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/14/2021 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):
ipdocketing@foley.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte CARLOS FELIPE ALCALA PEREZ
___________

Appeal 2020-003482
Application 15/279,336
Technology Center 2100

____________

Before ALLEN R. MacDONALD, CARL W. WHITEHEAD JR. and
IRVIN E. BRANCH, Administrative Patent Judges.

WHITEHEAD JR., Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

STATEMENT OF THE CASE1
Appellant2 is appealing the final rejection of claims 1–3, 5–13 and
15–19 under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a). See Appeal Brief 9. Claims 1, 11 and 19

1 Rather than reiterate Appellant’s arguments and the Examiner’s
determinations, we refer to the Appeal Brief (filed December 20, 2019), the
Reply Brief (filed April 7, 2020), the Final Action (mailed May 3, 2019) and
the Answer (mailed February 7, 2020), for the respective details.

2 “Appellant” refers to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42(a) (“The
word ‘applicant’ when used in this title refers to the inventor or all of the
joint inventors, or to the person applying for a patent as provided in
§§ 1.43, 1.45, or 1.46.”). Appellant identifies Johnson Controls Technology
Company, a subsidiary of
Appeal 2020-003482
Application 15/279,336

2

are independent. Claims 4, 14 and 20 are cancelled. See Appeal Brief 18
and 21–22. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM.
Introduction
According to Appellant:
The present disclosure relates generally to building
management systems. The present disclosure relates more
particularly to a building management system which uses
principal component analysis (PCA) to model various operating
states for connected equipment. A building management system
(BMS) is, in general, a system of devices configured to control,
monitor, and manage equipment in or around a building or
building area. A BMS can include, for example, a HVAC system,
a security system, a lighting system, a fire alerting system, any
other system that is capable of managing building functions or
devices, or any combination thereof.
Specification ¶ 1.
The claimed subject matter relates to building models used in
computerized analysis and/or control for buildings (e.g., models
700, 752, 800, 900, 1000; FIGS. 7A-10B). For example, such
models can be used for performing predictive diagnostics for
connected equipment in a building (e.g., “The predictive
diagnostics system uses principal component analysis (PCA)
models to represent a plurality of distinct operating states for
connected equipment controlled by the building controller”,
paragraph [0058]). The invention is separately defined in three
independent claims, Claim 1, Claim 11, and Claim 19.
Appeal Brief 2.

Johnson Controls International plc. as the real party in interest. Appeal
Brief 2.

Appeal 2020-003482
Application 15/279,336

3

Figure 1 shows a building equipped with a HVAC system is
reproduced below:

The BMS that serves building 10 includes an HVAC system 100. HVAC
system 100 can include a plurality of HVAC devices (e.g., heaters, chillers,
air handling units, pumps, fans, thermal energy storage, etc.) configured to
provide heating, cooling, ventilation, or other services for building 10. For
example, HVAC system 100 is shown to include a waterside system 120 and
an airside system 130. Waterside system 120 may provide a heated or chilled
fluid to an air handling unit of airside system 130. Airside system 130 may
use the heated or chilled fluid to heat or cool an airflow provided to building
10.
Specification ¶ 65.
Appeal 2020-003482
Application 15/279,336

4

Representative Claim3 (disputed limitations emphasized)
1. A building management system comprising:
connected equipment configured to measure a plurality of monitored
variables and operable to affect a variable state or condition within a building by
interacting with a physical environment of the building; and
a predictive diagnostics system comprising:
a communications interface configured to receive samples of the
monitored variables from the connected equipment;
a principal component analysis (PCA) modeler configured to
automatically assign each of the samples of the monitored variables to one of a
plurality of operating states of the connected equipment and to construct a PCA
model for each operating state using the samples assigned to the operating state,
the PCA modeler configured to determine whether the connected equipment is
switching between the operating states based on a variance of the samples;
a fault predictor configured to generate a fault prediction in
response to determining that the samples are moving toward a known faulty
state; and

3 Appellant does not argue the claims individually. Appeal Brief 10.
(“Accordingly, the general observation of difference between samples is
beyond the broadest reasonable interpretation of the term ‘a variance of the
samples’ as recited in Claims 1, 11, and 19.”). Accordingly, we select
independent claim 1 as representative. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv)
(“When multiple claims subject to the same ground of rejection are argued
as a group or subgroup by appellant, the Board may select a single claim
from the group or subgroup and may decide the appeal as to the ground of
rejection with respect to the group or subgroup on the basis of the selected
claim alone.”).
Appeal 2020-003482
Application 15/279,336

5

a controller configured to adjust an operation of the connected
equipment based on the fault prediction by providing control signals to the
connected equipment, the control signals causing the connected equipment to
affect the variable state or condition within the building by interacting with the
physical environment of the building.

References
Name4 Reference Date
Hsiung US 2003/0109951 A1 June 12, 2003
Trainor US 2017/0091870 A1 March 30, 2017
Ahmed US 2018/0046149 A1 February 15, 2018

Rejection on Appeal5
Claims 1, 11 and 19 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Trainor, Ahmed and Hsiung. Final Action 14–28.

ANALYSIS
Appellant contends, “The broadest reasonable interpretation of the
term ‘a variance of the samples’ is a statistical metric that measures an
amount of variation of the samples from their average value.” Appeal Brief
11 (citing Specification ¶¶ 174, 325, 331). Appellant further contends:
[T]he term “variance” is widely used in statistics to refer to a
statistical metric that measures an amount of variation of a set of
numbers from their average value (e.g., “variance [STAT] The

4 All reference citations are to the first named inventor only.

5 The Examiner withdraws the 35 U.S.C. § 112(a) rejections of claims 1–3,
5–13 and 15–19, as well as, the provisional double patenting rejection of
claim 1. See Answer 3.
Appeal 2020-003482
Application 15/279,336

6

square of the standard Deviation”, Parker, Sybil (2003)
Dictionary of Scientific and Technical Terms, Sixth Edition,
McGraw-Hill, pg. 2015 “standard deviation [STAT] The positive
square root of the expected value of the square of the difference
between a random variable and its mean” Id, pg. 2045).
Appeal Brief 12.
Appellant argues, “The term ‘variance’ has a meaning that is more
specific than a mere general observation that samples are different from one
another” and therefore “Such a broad meaning of ‘variance’ is inconsistent
with both the use of the term ‘variance’ throughout the application and the
meaning that would be understood by one skilled in the art.” Appeal Brief
12. Appellant concludes that, “The analysis under§ 103 therefore requires
considering the claims with the term ‘a variance of the samples’ interpreted
as a quantitative statistical metric rather than a mere fact of differences
between samples.” Appeal Brief 12.
The Examiner finds that Trainor discloses, a “modeler configured to
determine whether the connected equipment is switching between the
operating states based on a variance of the samples (pg. 6, par. [0099]-
[0101] and pg. 7, par. [0121]; i.e. state transitions of a drift state).” Final
Action 16. Appellant contends, “The cited paragraphs of Trainor describe
the general idea of classifying states and identifying state transitions based
on sensor data” and therefore “the cited paragraphs of Trainor merely
describe that ‘the state prediction system 50 uses this information to
construct a mathematical model that includes a state representation, state
transitions and state triggers.’” Appeal Brief 12–13 (citing Trainor ¶ 121).
Appellant argues that, “Trainor does not describe the mathematics of
that model, nor does Trainor mention anything about using a statistical
metric that measures an amount of variation of the samples from their
Appeal 2020-003482
Application 15/279,336

7

average value” and consequently “Trainor does not disclose using ‘a
variance of the samples’ within the broadest reasonable interpretation of that
term.” Appeal Brief 13. Appellant concludes, “Therefore, Trainor does not
teach, suggest, or disclose ‘determining whether the connected equipment is
switching between the operating states based on a variance of the samples’
as in Claim 11 or similar features of Claims 1 and 19.” Appeal Brief 13.
We do not find Appellant’s argument persuasive of Examiner error.
Trainor discloses, “Over a period of time, the sensor based state
prediction system 50 collects information about the premises and the sensor
based state prediction system 50 uses this information to construct a
mathematical model that includes a state representation, state transitions and
state triggers.” Trainor ¶121; see Final Action 16. We agree with Appellant
that employing basic well-known statistical metrics (e.g. variances) and
Trainor’ mathematical models may not be exactly the same. See Appeal
Brief 12; Final Action 16. Nonetheless, we discern no meaningful
difference between the basic well-known statistical metrics model employed
by the claimed invention and the mathematical model disclosed by Trainor
in regard to providing information to the premises management system. We
emphasize that “‘the question under 35 USC 103 is not merely what the
references expressly teach but what they would have suggested to one of
ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made.’” Merck & Co.
v. Biocraft Labs., Inc., 874 F.2d 804, 807 (Fed. Cir. 1989) (quoting In re
Lamberti, 545 F.2d 747, 750 (CCPA 1976)) (emphasis added).
Finally, Appellant has not demonstrated that combining Trainor’s
mathematical models with Ahmed’s and Hsiung’s systems would have been
“uniquely challenging or difficult for one of ordinary skill in the art,” and we
Appeal 2020-003482
Application 15/279,336

8

find the proposed modification would have been well within the purview of
the ordinarily skilled artisan. See Leapfrog Enters., Inc. v. Fisher-Price,
Inc., 485 F.3d 1157, 1162 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (citing KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex
Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (2007)); see Final Action 17–19; Appeal Brief 14–
15). Accordingly, we affirm the Examiner’s obviousness rejection of claims
1, 11 and 19
CONCLUSION
Claims
Rejected
35
U.S.C. §
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1, 11, 19 103 Trainor, Ahmed,
Hsiung
1, 11, 19

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

AFFIRMED