CHICAGO MERCANTILE EXCHANGE INC.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Dec 9, 2020

2020004717 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 9, 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.
14/245,593 04/04/2014 Daniel Grombacher 4672-11009CUS 4561
12684 7590 12/09/2020
Lempia Summerfield Katz LLC/CME
20 South Clark Street
Suite 600
Chicago, IL 60603
EXAMINER
KALINOWSKI, ALEXANDER G
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
3691
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/09/2020 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):
docket-us@lsk-iplaw.com
mail@lsk-iplaw.com
pair_lsk@firsttofile.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte DANIEL GROMBACHER,
JAMES BOUDREAULT,
FREDERICK STURM,
and JOHN LABUSZEWSKI

Appeal 2020-004717
Application 14/245,593
Technology Center 3600
____________

Before: DONALD E. ADAMS, RICHARD M. LEBOVITZ, and
MICHAEL A. VALEK, Administrative Patent Judges.

LEBOVITZ, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
The Examiner rejected claims 1–9, 13–23, and 27–30 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 101 as being directed to patent-ineligible subject matter. Pursuant to 35
U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant appeals from the Examiner’s Final decision to
reject the claims.1 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 Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc., as
the real party in interest. Appeal Br. 2.
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
The Examiner rejected claims 1–9, 13–23, and 27–30 in the Final
Office Action under 35 U.S.C. § 101. Final Act. 4. The Examiner found that
the claims are directed to an abstract idea. Id.
There are four independent claims involved in this appeal: claims 1,
15, 29 and 30. Appellant did not argue the claims separately. We select
claim 1 as representative. Claim 1 is reproduced below with annotations
added to number the limitations in the claim:
1. A computer implemented method of automatically
facilitating and simplifying settlement of one of a set of interest
rate futures contracts by a match engine of an electronic trading
system, each specifying a delivery obligation which may be
satisfied by at least the actual delivery of any of an associated
set of eligible interest rate securities within a specified delivery
period, the method comprising:
[1] monitoring, by a processor of the match engine,
changes in current market conditions comprising current yields
of each interest rate security of each associated set of eligible
interest rate securities;
[2] identifying, automatically by a processor, a selective
set of unique conversion factor yields based on the current
market conditions, the selective set of unique conversion factor
yields comprising less than all possible conversion factor
yields, each unique conversion factor yield of the set being
associated with a set of conversion factors, each unique
conversion factor of the set being associated with a different
interest rate security of one of the associated sets of interest rate
securities and which may be used, at a specified time of
delivery of an eligible interest rate security of the associated set
of eligible interest rate securities specified by each interest rate
futures contract of the set of interest rate futures contracts, to
compute a price to be paid in exchange for the delivery thereof,
the price being computed based on the conversion factor
associated therewith;
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[3] making, automatically by the processor based on the
identifying, the set of interest rate futures contracts available for
trading by the electronic trading system via the match engine
wherein each interest rate futures contract corresponds to and is
further characterized by one conversion factor yield of the
selective set of unique conversion factor yields and associated
set of conversion factors to be used, at the time that the
associated delivery obligation is satisfied at least by actual
delivery of an eligible interest rate security, to compute the
price to be paid upon satisfaction of the delivery obligation
thereof;
[4] facilitating, by the processor, the trading of one or
more of the set of interest rate futures contracts by the
electronic trading system via the match engine;
[5] receiving, by the processor at the time of the
associated delivery obligation of each of the one or more traded
interest rate futures contracts, a selection of any one of the set
of eligible interest rate securities associated therewith and
determining the unique conversion factor associated therewith
and calculated to result in a particular conversion factor yield,
of the selective set of unique conversion factor yields; and
[6] computing, by the processor based on the received
selection, a price to be paid in exchange for the actual delivery,
in satisfaction of the delivery obligation of the interest rate
futures contract, of the selected eligible interest rate security
based on the unique conversion factor associated therewith; and
[7] wherein a particular market condition at a time of the
computing comprises a yield of the selected eligible interest
rate security selected from the set of eligible interest rate
securities, the set of unique conversion factor yields including a
first conversion factor yield lower than the yield of the selected
eligible interest rate security selected from the set of eligible
interest rate securities and a second conversion factor yield
higher than the yield of the selected eligible interest rate
security selected from the set of eligible interest rate securities;
the method further comprising:
[8] monitoring, by the processor, changes in market
conditions; and
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[9] automatically performing, by the processor
responsive to a change in market conditions, the computing so
as to adjust the computed price to be paid in accordance
therewith at the actual delivery.

PRINCIPLES OF LAW
Under 35 U.S.C. § 101, an invention is patent-eligible if it claims a
“new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter.”
However, not every discovery is eligible for patent protection. Diamond v.
Diehr, 450 U.S. 175, 185 (1981). “Excluded from such patent protection are
laws of nature, natural phenomena, and abstract ideas.” Id. The Supreme
Court articulated a two-step analysis to determine whether a claim falls
within an excluded category of invention. Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int’l, 573
U.S. 208 (2014); Mayo Collaborative Servs. v. Prometheus Labs., Inc., 566
U.S. 66, 75–77 (2012).
In the first step, it is determined “whether the claims at issue are
directed to one of those patent-ineligible concepts.” Alice, 573 U.S. at 217. If
it is determined that the claims are directed to an ineligible concept, then the
second step of the two-part analysis is applied in which it is asked “[w]hat
else is there in the claims before us?” Id. The Court explained that this step
involves
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 (citing from Mayo, 566 U.S. at 75–77).
Alice, relying on the analysis in Mayo of a claim directed to a law of
nature, stated that in the second part of the analysis, “the elements of each
claim both individually and ‘as an ordered combination’” must be
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considered “to determine whether the additional elements ‘transform the
nature of the claim’ into a patent-eligible application.” Alice, 573 U.S. at
217.
The PTO published revised guidance on the application of 35 U.S.C.
§ 101. USPTO’s January 7, 2019 Memorandum, 2019 Revised Patent
Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 50 (Jan. 7, 2019)
(“Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg.”). This guidance provides direction on
how to apply the two-part analysis of Mayo and Alice.
Step 2A, Prong One, of the Eligibility Guidance, looks at the specific
limitations in the claim to determine whether the claim recites a judicial
exception to patent eligibility. In Step 2A, Prong Two, the claims are
examined to identify whether there are additional elements in the claims that
integrate the exception in a practical application, namely, is there a
“meaningful limit on the judicial exception, such that the claim is more than
a drafting effort designed to monopolize the judicial exception.” Eligibility
Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 54 (Prong Two).
If the claim recites a judicial exception that is not integrated into a
practical application, then as in the Mayo/Alice framework, Step 2B of the
Eligibility Guidance instructs us to determine whether there is a claimed
“inventive concept” to ensure that the claims define an invention that is
significantly more than the ineligible concept itself. Eligibility Guidance, 84
Fed. Reg. 56.
With these guiding principles in mind, we proceed to determine
whether the claimed subject matter in this appeal is eligible for patent
protection under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
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DISCUSSION
Claim 1 is directed to a “computer implemented method.” A method
is a “process” which is statutory category of patent-eligible subject matter
recited in 35 U.S.C. § 101. Thus, because the claim falls into a statutory
category of patent-eligible subject matter, following the first step of the
Mayo analysis, we proceed to Step 2A, Prong One, of the Eligibility
Guidance.
Step 2A, Prong One
In Step 2A, Prong One, of the Eligibility Guidance, the specific
limitations in the claim are examined to determine whether the claim recites
a judicial exception to patent eligibility, namely, whether the claim recites an
abstract idea, law of nature, or natural phenomenon. The Eligibility
Guidance directs examiners to search each limitation in the claim to
determine whether it recites abstract an abstract idea. Eligibility Guidance,
84 Fed. Reg. 54.
The Examiner found that the claims recite the “abstract idea of
facilitating a settlement of an interest rate futures contract that specifies a
delivery obligation by computing a price to be paid.” Final Act. 4–5. The
Examiner found that the claim “encompasses steps that can be performed by
a human and falls under the grouping of certain methods of organizing
human activity such as managing a commercial interaction or a transactional
interaction between different parties, therefore the claims recite an abstract
idea but for the generic computer processors.” Id. at 5. The Examiner further
stated that a “transaction where exchange of value or items takes places falls
well within a financial practice, managing a transaction and conducting a
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commercial interaction and thus falling under certain methods of organizing
human activity.” Ans. 3. The Examiner explained:
Equalizing difference between instruments is construed as a
means to mitigate the risk of loss or hedging against loss by
managing conducting computations as to what substitute or
group of nonidentical instruments best match the initial to
complete a transaction, and thus a financial or economic
princip[le] and practice.
Ans. 4.
Appellant argues that the claims are not abstract, “but instead are
directed to a novel improvement to a specific technology, e.g. selective
reduction and normalization of multiple varied transactions via an
automatically real time selective computed equalization component to
enable simplified processing by enabling more than one physical/actual
solution to completing a transaction.” Appeal Br. 9. Appellant also contends
that the Examiner oversimplified the claims and ignored steps [2] and [3] of
the claim. Reply Br. 2. Appellant also argues that the claims are not directed
to an abstract idea because they recite additional elements that “do not seek
to tie up the abstract idea.” Id. at 3 (quoting from MPEP § 2106.04(a)(l)(II).”
We agree with the Examiner that the claim recites a method of
organizing human activity. The preamble of claim 1 recites that the method
is for “automatically facilitating and simplifying settlement of one of a set of
interest rate futures contracts by a match engine of an electronic trading
system.” The preamble further recites that each future contract is “specifying
a delivery obligation which may be satisfied by at least the actual delivery of
any of an associated set of eligible interest rate securities within a specified
delivery period.” As explained in the Specification, “[i]nterest rate futures
contracts, and in particular, Treasury futures, are contracts to sell or buy
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debt instruments, such as U.S. Treasury bonds or notes, at a future date.”
Spec. ¶ 2 (emphasis added). According to the Specification, the system
“makes available multiple interest rate futures contracts for a given set of
interest rate securities, such as US Treasury Notes, which may be used to
satisfy the delivery obligation.” Spec. ¶ 17. The purchase and sale of
interest rate futures is described in the Specification as trading activity
which is governed by the Chicago Board of Trade Rulebook. Spec. ¶¶ 2, 5,
8, and 9.
Consistent with the claim preamble and Specification characterizing
the claims as security trading activity, the steps of the claimed method
compute and adjust the prices of interest rate security future contracts to be
offered and paid at delivery (steps [2], [5], [6], [9]), make them available for
trading (step [3] of “making . . . the set of interest rate futures contracts
available for trading by the electronic trading system via the match engine”),
and then facilitate the trade (step [4]). Trading securities is clearly a
fundamental economic activity and a method of organizing human activity.
Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 52. See also Trading Technologies
International, Inc. v. IBG LLC, 921 F.3d 1084, 1092 (Fed. Cir. 2019)
(“Claim 1 also recites sending an order by ‘selecting’ and ‘moving’ an order
icon to a location along the price axis. This does not change our
determination that the claims are directed to an abstract idea. As the Board
determined, placing an order based on displayed market information is a
fundamental economic practice.”).
Appellant did not point to any error in the Examiner’s determination.
The Examiner summarized the steps in the claim in the Answer for the
purpose of explaining why the claims recite a “financial practice” and a
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method of organizing human activity. Ans. 3. Appellant did not identify a
flaw in the Examiner’s reasoning. Appellant contends the claims are directed
to a technological improvement, but this argument is only pertinent once the
claim has been found to recite an abstract idea.
Thus, because the Examiner met the burden of establishing the claim
recites an abstract idea, and Appellant did not identify a flaw in this finding,
we proceed to Step 2A, Prong Two, of the eligibility analysis.

Step 2A, Prong Two
Prong Two of Step 2A under the 2019 Eligibility Guidance asks
whether there are additional elements that integrate the exception into a
practical application. Integration into a practical application is evaluated by
identifying whether there are additional elements individually, and in
combination, which go beyond the judicial exception. Eligibility Guidance,
84 Fed. Reg. 54–55. As explained in the Eligibility Guidance, integration
may be found when an additional element “reflects an improvement in the
functioning of a computer, or an improvement to other technology or
technical field” or “applies or uses the judicial exception in some other
meaningful way beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to
a particular technological environment, such that the claim as a whole is
more than a drafting effort designed to monopolize the exception.” Id. at 55.
Appellant describes several advantages of the claim method.
Appellant states that the claimed method is “simplifying, by enabling more
flexibility, situations where satisfaction of requirements, i.e. actual delivery
of a specific item, is more difficult without necessitating the offering of all
alternatives.” Appeal Br. 10. Appellant also contends that the claimed
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invention “is a modification to an electronic trading system which
implements a specific process for selectively reducing and normalizing
varied transactions, which are based on changing conditions, using an
automatically real-time computed equalization factor which allows for
simplified completion of transactions by providing alternative modes
therefore.” Id. Furthermore, Appellant states:
where a given transaction calls for physical/actual delivery of a
specific item, e.g. a specific treasury security, the claimed
invention modifies the electronic trading system such that the
obligation may be satisfied by delivery of any of a set of similar
items, e.g. similar treasury securities, by equalizing among
those items with regards to the exchange. Where the specific
item is scarce, the claimed invention broadens the scope of
items which may be used.
Appeal Br. 10.
Appellant also states:
By utilizing the claimed invention, the electronic trading system
is enabled to automatically and dynamically account for
variations in the characteristics of the selected underlier to be
delivered such that the transactional value is maintained as
claimed. This is necessarily an improvement to such electronic
trading systems enabling them do what they could not do
before.
Appeal Br. 11.
Appellant states that the “claimed invention . . . comprises a technical
improvement to the processing architectures of electronic trading systems.”
Appeal Br. 13. Appellant contends the claimed method “improves upon the
ability thereof to dynamically adjust to changing conditions, i.e., the
arbitrary selection of an underlier to be delivered to satisfy an obligation
being facilitated by the system.” Id. at 14. Thus, Appellant asserts that the
claim “solves the technical problem of scarcity among physical items needed
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to satisfy an obligation by providing an automated system which equalizes
among a set of similar items and thereby broadens the availability.” Id. at
13–14.
These statements by Appellant do not point to the specific steps in the
claim which impart the asserted “technical improvement” to the electronic
trading system. Appellant states that the claim “solves” the problem of
scarcity “via a novel automated conversion process . . . by broadening the set
of available items for actual delivery in satisfaction of the obligation via
conversion/equalization to ensure an equivalent exchange is enacted,” but do
not guide us to which limitations in the claim provide the solution. Appeal
Br. 14. Appellant asserts that the claims recites significantly more than the
judicial exception, itself, but simply lists all the steps of the claim as
providing significantly more. Id. at 14–15.
In the Reply Brief, Appellant identifies steps [2] and [3] of the claim
as being requirements of the claim that the Examiner ignored, but does not
specifically identify these steps as the improvement to an electronic trading
system. Reply Br. 2–3. Appellant further explains, with reference to the
Specification, but not the claims:
By utilizing the claimed invention, the electronic trading system
is enabled to automatically generate, price and list multiple
futures with various conversion factor yield values to provide
market participants with the option to utilize contracts for
which cheapest-to-deliver status may attach to different
members of the ensemble of securities that are eligible for
delivery into such futures.
Reply Br. 4.
We do not agree with Appellant that the stated “improvements” are
the type of technical improvements, invoking additional elements, which
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confer patent eligibility on the claimed method of reciting a fundamental
economic practice of trading interest rate securities.
Step [2] of the claim identifies conversion factor yields that are
computed for different interest rate securities using the conversion factors.
The securities are automatically made available for trading in steps [3] and
[4]. Steps [5] and [6] perform price calculations after receiving the selection
of one of the eligible interest rate securities. While it may be true that these
steps, as well as step [7]–[9] of the claim, provide an improvement to
electronic trading of interest rate securities, not all improvements confer
patent-eligibility on a judicial exception recited the claims. As explained
above, there must an additional element in the claim “beyond the judicial
exception” which serves to integrate the exception into an application.
Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 54–55.
The above-mentioned steps in the claim are involved in the
calculation of a price to be paid for the delivery of an interest rate future
contract using a conversion factor and in making the contracts available for
trading. See, e.g., steps [2] and [3] of claim 1. The calculations (called
“computing” in the claim) are done automatically and provide a set of
interest rate future contracts available for trading. The improvement that
Appellant identifies as making the claim patent-eligible is calculating a set
of yields and prices using conversion factors and then making this
information available to a trader. These steps are a part of the financial
practice of security trading, i.e., the abstract idea identified by the Examiner.
We have not been pointed to an additional element in the claim that
integrates these calculations (e.g., steps [2], [5], [6], [9]) and the
corresponding set of securities made available for trading (e.g., steps [3],
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[4]) into a practical application that “imposes a meaningful limit on the
judicial exception.” Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 54.
The claims in this appeal can be distinguished from claims which
were found by our reviewing court to be patent-eligible under 35 U.S.C.
§ 101. In each of the cases below, the court found that the recitation of a
specific element in the claim that provided a functionality to the claimed
system or method served as a basis for patent eligibility when a claim recites
an abstract idea.
In BASCOM Glob. Internet Servs. v. AT&T Mobility LLC, 827 F.3d
1341, 1350 (Fed. Cir. 2016), the claim recited a customized filtering element
placed at a remote location which the court determined provided a patent-
eligible technical improvement. In Finjan, Inc. v. Blue Coat Sys., Inc., 879
F.3d 1299, 1305 (Fed. Cir. 2018), the court considered the recitation in the
claim of “a new kind of file that enables a computer security system to do
things it could not do before” as conferring eligibility on the claim. In DDR
Holdings, LLC v. Hotels.com, L.P., 773 F.3d 1245, 1249 (Fed. Cir. 2014),
the patent-eligible claim comprised a link that enabled the e-commerce
outsourcing system “to serve a composite web page to the visitor computer
wit[h] a look and feel based on the look and feel description in the data store
and with content based on the commerce object associated wit[h] the link.”
The court in Core Wireless Licensing S.A.R.L. v. LG Electronics, Inc., 880
F.3d 1356, 1359, 1362–1363 (Fed. Cir. 2018), determined that a claim
directed to a computing device comprising a display screen “configured to
display on the screen a menu listing one or more applications” and “to
display on the screen an application summary that can be reached directly
from the menu” was patent-eligible because the claim “restrains the type of
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data that can be displayed in the summary window” and specified “a
particular manner by which the summary window must be accessed.”
Further, the claim in Core Wireless improved “efficiency of using the
electronic device by bringing together ‘a limited list of common functions
and commonly accessed stored data,’ which can be accessed directly from
the main menu.” Id. at 1363.
In another case involving trading securities, Trading Technologies
International, Inc. v. CQG, INC., 675 Fed. Appx. 1001, 1014 (Fed. Cir.
2017), the court found the disputed claims to be patent-eligible because they
“require a specific, structured graphical user interface paired with a
prescribed functionality directly related to the graphical user interface’s
structure that is addressed to and resolves a specifically identified problem in
the prior state of the art.”
The hallmark of these cases is the recitation of a specific element or
elements with a defined functionality that is distinct from the abstract idea
itself. Such hallmark is missing from the claims here. Appellant argues that
the improvement here solves the problem of “scarcity” using “a novel
automated conversion process . . . by broadening the set of available items
for actual delivery in satisfaction of the obligation via
conversion/equalization to ensure [that] an equivalent exchange is enacted,”
but the claim does not recite a functional element that is used to accomplish
the automated calculations and trading implementation. This distinguishes
the claim here from those like Trading Technologies International, Inc. v.
CQG, INC in which a specific interface with a defined functionality was
provided by the claim. The improvement, if any, described by Appellant
resides in automatically computing the yields of various interest rate security
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contracts that a trader may accept for delivery. However, as explained in
Data Engine Technologies LLC v. Google LLC, 906 F.3d 999, 1013 (Fed.
Cir. 2018), “mere automation” of a “process does not negate its abstraction.”
Appellant asserts that the claim comprises “a technical improvement
to the processing architectures of electronic trading systems and which
improves upon the ability thereof to dynamically adjust to changing
condition.” Appeal Br. 14. But, Appellant did not identify what element in
the claim improves the “architecture” of the trading system. For example, in
BASCOM, the claims were deemed patent-eligible because they “carve out a
specific location for the filtering system (a remote ISP server) and require
the filtering system to give users the ability to customize filtering for their
individual network accounts.” BASCOM, 827 F.3d at 1351. While filtering
content was “already a known concept,” the court found that the claims
“recite a specific, discrete implementation of the abstract idea of filtering
content.” Id. at 1350. In contrast, Appellant has not directed us to a specific
element that “carves out” a specific way of trading interest rate futures
contracts; instead, the claim would preempt all ways of doing so using the
conversion factor calculations. Id. at 1352 (“As explained above, construed
in favor of BASCOM as they must be in this procedural posture, the claims
of the ’606 patent do not preempt the use of the abstract idea of filtering
content on the Internet or on generic computer components performing
conventional activities.”).
In our view, the computations performed in the claim are exactly the
type of abstract idea that the Supreme Court has found to be an exception to
patent eligibility under 35 U.S.C. § 101 because the computations are the
abstract principle, itself. And, unlike the claims in McRO, Inc. v. Bandai
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Namco Games Am. Inc., 837 F.3d 1299, 1313, 1315 (Fed. Cir. 2016) which
were found to be “limiting” in the way they produce the lip synchronization
and facial expression control of the animated characters, Appellant did not
establish that there was any other way to compute the interest rate security
yields than the way recited in the claim
Because we conclude that the Examiner correctly found that the
abstract idea recited in claim 1 is integrated into a practical application, we
look at whether the steps provide an inventive concept.

Step 2B
Under Step 2B of the Eligibility Guidance, we ask, as in the
Mayo/Alice framework, whether there is an inventive concept. In making
this Step 2B determination, we must consider whether there are specific
limitations or elements recited in the claim “that are not well-understood,
routine, conventional activity in the field, which is indicative that an
inventive concept may be present” or whether the claim “simply appends
well-understood, routine, conventional activities previously known to the
industry, specified at a high level of generality, to the judicial exception,
indicative that an inventive concept may not be present.” Eligibility
Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 56 (footnote omitted). We must also consider
whether the combination of steps in the claim perform “in an unconventional
way and therefore include an ‘inventive step,’ rendering the claim eligible at
Step 2B.” Id. In this part of the analysis, we consider “the elements of each
claim both individually and ‘as an ordered combination’” must be
considered “to determine whether the additional elements ‘transform the
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nature of the claim’ into a patent-eligible application.” See Alice, 573 U.S. at
217.
The asserted “inventive concept” is described as follows by
Appellant:
a specific process by which a match engine of an electronic
trading system may automatically, and in real time with
changing conditions, normalize a selective set of settlement
transaction options to facilitate simplified settlement of a
transaction, that is generate an equivalent set of instruments
which may be used to satisfy an actual delivery requirement for
a specific instrument. Thus, the claim amounts to significantly
more than the judicial exception and is neither routine or
conventional in the field.
Appeal Br. 15.
The “match engine” in the claim is not recited to have a particular
structure or algorithm which performs the recited functions of the claim
(such as monitoring market conditions (step [1]), making contracts available
for trading (step [3]), and facilitating trading (step [4])). Appellant has not
established that the market engine is anything more than a generic computer
with a processor programmed to carry out the step in the claim. As explained
in McRO, 837 F.3d at 1314, we must “look to whether the claims in these
patents focus on a specific means or method that improves the relevant
technology or are instead directed to a result or effect that itself is the
abstract idea and merely invoke generic processes and machinery.” Id.
Here, Appellant has not identified any information or guided us to anything
in the Specification that would distinguish the recited match engine from a
generic computer.
The “inventive concept,” asserted by Appellant (e.g., “normalize a
selective set of settlement transaction options to facilitate simplified
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settlement of a transaction, that is generate an equivalent set of instruments
which may be used to satisfy an actual delivery requirement for a specific
instrument”) are simply computations recited at a high level of generality.
Appeal Br. 15. Such computations are part of the abstract idea itself and do
not specify any nonconventional activity.
Appellant did not separately argue claims 2–9, 13–23, and 27–30.
These claims therefore fall with claim 1. 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(iv).

CONCLUSION
In summary:

Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–9, 13–23,
27–30
101 Subject matter
eligibility
1–9, 13–23,
27–30

TIME PERIOD
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)(iv).

AFFIRMED