Square, Inc.Download PDFPatent Trials and Appeals BoardMar 8, 20212021001890 (P.T.A.B. Mar. 8, 2021) Copy Citation 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. 14/985,604 12/31/2015 Christopher Philip Renke S156-0160US 2554 126350 7590 03/08/2021 Lee & Hayes, P.C./Square 601 West Riverside Avenue Suite 1400 Spokane, WA 99201 EXAMINER CHEIN, ALLEN C ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3687 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 03/08/2021 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): lhpto@leehayes.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________ Ex parte CHRISTOPHER PHILIP RENKE and JUSTIN BRUNET ____________ Appeal 2021-001890 Application 14/985,604 Technology Center 3600 ____________ Before JOSEPH A. FISCHETTI, JAMES P. CALVE, and NINA L. MEDLOCK, Administrative Patent Judges. MEDLOCK, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s final rejection of claims 1–20. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We REVERSE. 1 We use the term “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37 C.F.R. § 1.42. Our decision references Appellant’s Appeal Brief (“Appeal Br.,” filed August 27, 2020) and Reply Brief (“Reply Br.,” filed January 19, 2021), and the Examiner’s Answer (“Ans.,” mailed November 20, 2020), and Final Office Action (“Final Act.,” mailed April 8, 2020). Appellant identifies Square, Inc. as the real party in interest (Appeal Br. 3). Appeal 2021-001890 Application 14/985,604 2 CLAIMED INVENTION The claimed invention relates to “techniques and arrangements for splitting one or more items from a merchant ticket to one or more other merchant tickets” (Spec. ¶ 17). Claims 1, 3, and 15 are the independent claims on appeal. Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the claimed subject matter: 1. A system that processes payments for a plurality of merchants, the system comprising: one or more processors of a payment processing server; and one or more computer-readable media storing computer- executable instructions that, when executed on the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform acts comprising: receiving, at the payment processing server from point-of-sale (POS) devices, historical ticket information generated at least in part via the POS devices, wherein historical tickets associated with the historical ticket information indicate associations between items and customers; determining, by the payment processing server, based at least in part on the historical ticket information, that a first historical ticket of the historical tickets, received from a first POS device of a first merchant, indicates an association between a first type of item and a first customer; determining, by the payment processing server, based at least in part on the historical ticket information, that the first historical ticket indicates an association between a second type of item and the first customer; storing, by the payment processing server in a database, a split ticket indicator associated with the first customer indicating that the first customer is associated with the first type of item and the second type of item; receiving, by the payment processing server and from a second POS device associated with a second Appeal 2021-001890 Application 14/985,604 3 merchant, an open ticket comprising a list of items including a first item and a second item and a list of customers including the first customer, wherein items of the list of items are unallocated with respect to customers of the list of customers; determining, by the payment processing server, that the first item is of the first type of item; determining by the payment processing server, that the second item is of the second type of item; and sending, by the payment processing server to the second POS device and based at least in part on the split ticket indicator, a message that causes the second POS device to suggest, at least in part via a user interface (UI) presented on a display of the second POS device, to split at least the first item and the second item from the open ticket to a new split ticket associated with the first customer. REJECTIONS Claims 1 and 2 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer (US 2015/0348144 A1, published Dec. 3, 2015), Arvanitis (US 2015/0262245 A1, published Sept. 17, 2015), Farnoosh Torabi, Ladies, This is Why You Should Let the Guy Pay on the First Date (Oct. 21, 2014) (available at https://money.com/who-should-pay-on-first-date/) (“Mmagnarelli”),2 Fujimoto (US 2003/0177068 A1, published Sept. 18, 2003), and Zarghami (US 2009/0006151 A1, published Jan. 1, 2009). Claims 3–7, 9, 10, 12, and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer, Zarghami, and Baril et al. (US 2008/0126220 A1, published May 29, 2008) (“Baril”). 2 For consistency, we use the same designation here that the Examiner used in identifying this article in the Final Office Action. Appeal 2021-001890 Application 14/985,604 4 Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer, Zarghami, Baril, and Mmagnarelli. Claim 11 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer, Zarghami, Baril, and Miyuki (US 2006/0229984 A1, published Oct. 12, 2006). Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer, Zarghami, Baril, and Raff et al. (US 2011/0153393 A1, published June 23, 2011) (“Raff”). Claims 15–17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer and Baril. Claim 18 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer, Baril, and Zarghami. Claim 19 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer, Baril, Zarghami, Mmagnarelli, and Arvanitis. Claim 20 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as unpatentable over Zamer, Baril, Zarghami, Mmagnarelli, Arvanitis, and Fujimoto. ANALYSIS Independent Claim 1 and Dependent Claim 2 We are persuaded by Appellant’s argument that the Examiner erred in rejecting independent claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 because Zamer, on which the Examiner relies, does not disclose or suggest “sending, by the payment processing server to [a] second POS device and based at least in part on [a] split ticket indicator, a message that causes the second POS device to suggest . . . to split at least the first item and the second item from the open ticket to a new split ticket,” wherein the “open ticket compris[es] a list of items including a first item and a second item and a list of customers Appeal 2021-001890 Application 14/985,604 5 . . . wherein items of the list of items are unallocated with respect to customers of the list of customers,” and wherein the spit ticket indicator is derived from “historical tickets associated with the historical ticket information [that] indicate associations between items and customers,” as recited in claim 1 (Appeal Br. 14–17). Zamer is directed to a system and method for splitting a bill among a group of users, e.g., users seated at a table in a restaurant, and describes that voice and context recognition are used to create an inventory of items for a specific user (Zamer ¶ 10). In accordance with the method, each user, thus, provides his or her order by speaking menu items out loud; the voice order is captured by the user’s mobile device and communicated to a waiter device (id. ¶¶ 11, 55). Once each order is associated with a user, the waiter device transmits this information to a service provider, which creates an inventory of items ordered by the specific user (id.). When the group is ready to pay the bill, the waiter device transmits the total bill to each of the users at the table, the service provider then splits the bill according to the inventory of items ordered by each user so that each user pays only for what he or she ordered (id. ¶ 11). Zamer discloses, in paragraphs 61–63, cited by the Examiner, that, in some aspects, the service provider server identifies subgroups within the party at the table, i.e., groups within the party that usually pay together or that are likely to want to pay together (e.g., a family, married couple, a dating couple, an older family member and younger family member), and splits the bill according to the subgroup (Zamer ¶¶ 61, 62). “Subgroups can be identified based on past interactions and/or transactions; social network relationships; subaccounts in an account with the service provider; and/or Appeal 2021-001890 Application 14/985,604 6 context” (id. ¶ 63). Zamer, thus, describes, for example, that the service provider can determine, e.g., based on past transactions, that a first user and second user have dined out together before, and that the first user usually pays for the meal; based on this information, the service provider combines the cost of the items ordered by the first user and second user into a single bill, communicates this cost to the first user, and deducts the cost from the bill for the table (id.). Responding to Appellant’s argument that Zamer does not disclose or suggest recommending a new split ticket that allocates items on an open ticket to a customer based on historical tickets that indicate associations between items and customers, the Examiner points to paragraphs 55 and 61–63 of Zamer as disclosing the argued feature (Final Act. 3–4; see also Ans. 5–6). But, we agree with Appellant that there is nothing in the cited portions of Zamer that discloses or suggests allocating items on an open ticket to a customer based on historical tickets that indicate associations between items and customers, i.e., using past transaction information to decide, given a list of unallocated items, what item a particular customer ordered, as called for in claim 1 (Appeal Br. 16–17; see also Reply Br. 3–6). Instead, Zamer discloses that its system captures a voice order associated with a particular user, and then creates an inventory of items ordered by that user. “Zamer involves no prediction as to what a particular user ordered; once a voice is identified as belonging to a particular user, the ordered items are simply extracted from the recording” (Appeal Br. 16). And although Zamer discloses the use of past transactions, i.e., historical data, in determining whether to combine the cost of items ordered by a first user and Appeal 2021-001890 Application 14/985,604 7 a second user into a single bill, i.e., in determining how to split a bill, that determination, as Appellant observes, is separate from, and comes after the inventory of items ordered by each user has been established using the voice differentiation (id. at 17 (citing Zamer ¶¶ 59, 61–63)). In view of the foregoing, we do not sustain the Examiner’s rejection of independent claim 1 under 35 U.S.C. § 103. For the same reasons, we also do not sustain the Examiner’s rejection of dependent claim 2. Cf. In re Fritch, 972 F.2d 1260, 1266 (Fed. Cir. 1992) (“dependent claims are nonobvious if the independent claims from which they depend are nonobvious”). Independent Claims 3 and 15 and Dependent Claims 4–14 and 16–20 Independent claims 3 and 15 include language substantially similar to the language of independent claim 1, and stand rejected based on the same rationale (with respect to Zamer) applied with respect to claim 1 (Final Act. 16–17, 25–26). Therefore, we do not sustain the rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 103 of independent claims 3 and 15, and claims 4–14 and 16– 20, which depend therefrom for the same reasons set forth above with respect to claim 1. CONCLUSION In summary: Claims Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed 1, 2 103 Zamer, Arvanitis, Mmagnarelli, Fujimoto, Zarghami 1, 2 Appeal 2021-001890 Application 14/985,604 8 Claims Rejected 35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed 3–7, 9, 10, 12, 14 103 Zamer, Zarghami, Baril 3–7, 9, 10, 12, 14 8 103 Zamer, Zarghami, Baril, Mmagnarelli 8 11 103 Zamer, Zarghami, Baril, Miyuki 11 13 103 Zamer, Zarghami, Baril, Raff 13 15–17 103 Zamer, Baril 15–17 18 103 Zamer, Baril, Zarghami 18 19 103 Zamer, Baril, Zarghami, Mmagnarelli, Arvanitis 19 20 103 Zamer, Baril, Zarghami, Mmagnarelli, Arvanitis, Fujimoto 20 Overall Outcome 1–20 REVERSED Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation