Fitzpatrick, Daniel R. et al.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Dec 31, 2019

14264847 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Dec. 31, 2019)

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.
14/264,847 04/29/2014 Daniel R. Fitzpatrick TRM-S&T_025_US3 3512
156080 7590 12/31/2019
REFINITIV US ORGANIZATION LLC
c/o Intellectual Property
3 Times Square, 7th Floor
New York, NY 10036
EXAMINER
ROBINSON, KITO R
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
3695
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/31/2019 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):
katy.chanparsons@refinitiv.com
patents@refinitiv.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte DANIEL R. FITZPATRICK and
JAMES WORDEN TOFFEY

Appeal 2019-001272
Application 14/264,847
Technology Center 3600
____________

Before RICHARD M. LEBOVITZ, DAVID COTTA, and
MICHAEL A. VALEK, Administrative Patent Judges.

LEBOVITZ, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
The Examiner rejected the claims under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as reciting
patent ineligible subject matter and under the judicially-created doctrine of
obviousness-type double patenting. Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a),
Appellant1 appeals from the Examiner’s decision to reject the claims. 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 Thomson
Reuters Global Resources Unlimited Company. Appeal Br. 2.
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STATEMENT OF THE CASE
The claims stand finally rejected by the Examiner as follows:
Claims 1–5, 7–12, and 14–20 under 35 U.S.C. § 101 as directed to a
judicial exception to patent eligibility. Final Act. 10; Ans. 3.
Claims 1–5, 7–12, and 14–20 under judicially-created doctrine of
obviousness-type double patenting over claims 1–9 of U.S. Patent No.
8,732,063. Final Act. 14; Ans. 8.
With respect to the obviousness-type double-patenting rejection,
Appellant requested that the rejection “be held in abeyance pending a
finding of allowable subject matter.” Appeal Br. 6. Because the rejection
has not been withdrawn by the Examiner, and Appellant did not provide any
reason as to why the Examiner’s reasoning is erroneous, we summarily
affirm the obviousness-type double-patenting rejection.2
There are three independent claims on appeal, claims 1, 12, and 20.
Appellant did not provide separate arguments for the independent claims or
the dependent claims. The claims therefore stand or fall together. 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.37(c)(1)(iv). We select claim 1 as representative and reproduce it
below. Bracketed numbers have been added to the claim for reference to the
claim limitations, which are referred to throughout this decision.
1. A system for communicating an indication of interest
message for a financial instrument, comprising:
[1] a first computer element communicatively associated
with [2] one or more trade messaging systems, the first
computer element programmed and configured to receive from

2 “If a ground of rejection stated by the examiner is not addressed in the
appellant’s brief, appellant has waived any challenge to that ground of
rejection and the Board may summarily sustain it, unless the examiner
subsequently withdrew the rejection in the examiner’s answer.” Manual of
Patent Examining Procedure § 1205.02 (Rev. 8.2017, January 2018).
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the one or more trade messaging systems historical trading
activity and current trading activity associated with each of a
plurality of trading parties;
[3] a data analyzer module configured to compute a
trading posture for each of the plurality of trading parties using
the historical trading and current trading activity corresponding
to each of the plurality of trading parties;
[4] a database for storing the computed trading posture
for each of the plurality of trading parties;
[5] a second computer element communicatively
associated with [4] the database, [3] the data analyzer module,
and [6] at least one user computer, the second computer
element programmed and configured to
[7] receive an indication of interest message from
[6] the at least one user computer;
[8] compare at least one information in the
indication of interest message with information related to the
trading posture of each of the plurality of trading parties;
[9] transmit the indication of interest message to
the at least one of the plurality of trading parties if the at least
one of the plurality of trading parties is a trading counterparty
based on the trading posture; and
[10] block communication of the indication of
interest message to the at least one of the plurality of trading
parties if the at least one of the plurality of trading parties is not
a trading counterparty based on the trading posture.

REJECTION BASED ON § 101
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
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within an excluded category of invention. 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, 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
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 has 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, 51–57 (2019)
(“Eligibility Guidance”). This guidance provides additional direction on
how to implement 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
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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.” 84 Fed.
Reg. at 54 (2. 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. 84 Fed. Reg. at 56. In
making this 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.” 84 Fed. Reg. at 56
(footnote omitted).
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.

Discussion
Claim 1 is directed to a system “for communicating an indication of
interest message for a financial instrument.” The system comprises [1] first
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and [5] second “computer elements.” The Specification does not define
“computer element.” However, based on the description of the system in the
Specification, we interpret a “computer element” to be a computer or server
device. Spec. 11:6–18. A computer or server device is a “machine,” one of
the four categories of patent-eligible subject matter enumerated in 35 U.S.C.
§ 101. We thus proceed to Step 2A, Prong One, of the Eligibility Guidance.
Step 2A, Prong One
In Step 2A, Prong One, 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 Examiner found that the claim is
directed to system for organizing human activity (Final Act. 11), which is
one of the three groupings listed in the Eligibility Guidance as a patent-
ineligible abstract idea. 84 Fed. Reg. 52.
The Specification explains that the invention relates to methods and
systems for matching buyers and sellers of financial instruments based on
historical trading activity. Spec. 1–2 (“Field of the Invention”; “Background
of the Invention”). The system recited in claim 1 comprises: [1] a first
computer element; [2] a trade messaging system; [3] a data analyzer module;
[4] a database for storing trading posture; [5] a second computer element;
and [6] a user computer.
A [1] first computer element receives “historical trading activity and
current trading activity associated with each of a plurality of trading parties”
from [2] a trade messaging system. The historical trading activity and
current trading activity is used to compute “a trading posture” by [3] a data
analyzer module. The trading posture is stored in [4] a database.
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The system further comprises [5] a second computer element which
communicates with [3] the data analyzer module, [4] the database, and [6] a
user computer.
The [5] second computer element [7] “receive[s] an indication of
interest message from [6] the at least one user computer.” An “indication of
interest” or “IOI” is an indication that an entity is interested in buying or
selling a financial instrument. Spec. 2:3–6.
The [5] second computer element [8] “compare[s] at least one
information in the indication of interest message with information related to
the trading posture of each of the plurality of trading parties.” In other
words, [5] the second computer element determines whether a potential
trading partner of [6] the user is interested in purchasing or selling a
financial instrument that relates to the user’s IOI message. The
determination is based on the trading posture computed in step [3].
The [5] second computer element [9] transmits the IOI message of [6]
the user computer to a trading partner based on the trading partner’s trading
posture, i.e., when a trading partner is willing to buy or sell the financial
instrument to [6] the user. Messages in step [10] are blocked to trading
parties if they are “not a trading counterparty.” An entity who is a “not a
trading counterparty” is trading entity who, based on their historical trading
activity and current trading activity (see limitation [10]), is a not a likely
buyer or seller of the financial instrument or likely to have a
“complementary posture” with respect to the financial transaction. Spec.
8:10–21.
Thus, the system enables IOI messages to be sent to a trading party
who is a likely trading counterparty, and to block messages from being sent
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to a party who is not a likely trading counterparty. These steps fall into the
second group of abstract idea, “methods of organizing human activity”
because, as stated in the 2019 Eligibility Guidance, the claim limitations,
and claims as a whole, are “managing . . . relationships or interactions
between people” (84 Fed. Reg. 52) by sending IOI messages to likely
trading parties and blocking IOI messages to unlikely trading parties.
Appellant states that the Examiner’s finding that the claims recite an
abstract idea was conclusory. Appeal Br. 11. We disagree. The Examiner
expressly identified the steps in the claim that comprise the abstract idea and
found that “the focus of the claim and its character as a whole is on the idea
of managing the transmission of indication of interest messages, which is
implemented by a system that uses computer and networking components.”
The Examiner then explained that “[m]anaging the transmission of
indication of interest messages is according to the court a ‘method of
organizing human behavior’ that is similar to other concepts that have been
identified as abstract by the courts.” Final Act. 11. The Examiner thus
sufficiently identified the basis for finding that the claim recite an abstract
idea. Appellant does not identify a deficiency in the Examiner’s reasoning.
We therefore proceed to Step 2A, Prong 2 of the analysis to determine
whether the abstract ideas are integrated into a practical application.

Step 2A, Prong Two
Prong Two of Step 2A under the Guidance asks whether there are
additional elements that integrate the exception into a practical application.
As in the Mayo/Alice framework, we must look at the claim elements
individually and “as an ordered combination” to determine whether the
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additional elements integrate the recited abstract idea into a practical
application. As discussed in the Eligibility Guidance, “[a] claim that
integrates a judicial exception in 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.” 84 Fed. Reg. 54.
Integration into a practical application is evaluated by identifying
whether there are additional elements individually, and in combination, that
go beyond the judicial exception. Id. at 54–55. As explained in the October
2019 Update to Subject Matter Eligibility3 “first the specification should be
evaluated to determine if the disclosure provides sufficient details such that
one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize the claimed invention as
providing an improvement.” Eligibility Update 12. Furthermore, the 2019
Oct. PEG Update explains that the “specification need not explicitly set forth
the improvement, but it must describe the invention such that the
improvement would be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art.” Id.
The Specification teaches that, “[a]s is known in the art, an entity
interested in purchasing (or selling) financial instruments can communicate
its interest to other subscribing financial entities using an Indication of
Interest (‘IOI’) message transmitted over a messaging system such as, for
example, the Tradeweb Routing Network (‘TRN’) or Tradeweb’s AutEx
Network (‘AutEx’).” Spec. 2:3–6. The Specification teaches that a
disadvantage of sending IOI messages to a broad range of trading entities is

3 Available at
https://www.uspto.gov/sites/default/files/documents/peg_oct_2019_update.p
df (last accessed Nov. 15, 2019) (“Eligibility Update.”)
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that messages may be directed to entities who are not interested in buying or
selling the financial instrument, but may use the information in such a way
that it disadvantages the user, for example by altering the entity’s trading
behavior. Spec. 2–3. This is called “information leakage.” Spec. 3. On the
other hand, by sending the IOI to a narrow group of potential trading
entities, the user may prevent “information leakage,” but may also miss
opportunities to trade the financial instrument on favorable terms. Spec. 3–
4. The Specification explains:
As referenced, one technical problem with the prior art systems
of FIGS. 3 and 4 is the IOI sending user’s lack of relevant
information as to the trading posture of potential counterparties.
Another technical problem is that users are forced to choose
between (i) broadly casting indications of interest to potential
counterparties, which may result in information leakage and
thereby further result in adverse changes in the market prices of
the subject financial instruments, or (ii) narrowly casting
indications of interest, which may result is a number of missed
opportunities to trade the financial instrument on favorable
terms. In light of the foregoing, the present invention seeks to
address these and other problems.
Spec. 5:4–11.
The Specification teaches that this problem is addressed by
identifying “entities that have a high probability of possessing a
complementary posture (e.g., being on the opposite side of a hypothetical
transaction) with respect to the financial instrument at issue,” thus
minimizing information leakage. Spec. 8:15–21; see Claim 1, limitations
[3], [8]. The system can then [9] send IOI messages to the likely trading
entity and [10] block messages to entities determined not to be likely trading
counterparties.
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Appellant explains, with reference to the Specification, how
determining the trading posture in limitation [3], and comparing it in
limitation [8] to the information in the user’s IOI, minimizes information
leakage and constitutes an improvement to the prior art disclosed in Figures
3–4 of the Specification. Appeal Br. 12–14.
Having identified the improvement, it must next be determined
whether the “the judicial exception [is integrated into the claim] 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.” 84 Fed. Reg. 54. The Eligibility Guidance describes a
framework for this analysis as follows:
(a) Identifying whether there are any additional elements recited
in the claim beyond the judicial exception(s); and (b) evaluating
those additional elements individually and in combination to
determine whether they integrate the exception into a practical
application, using one or more of the considerations laid out by
the Supreme Court and the Federal Circuit.
84 Fed. Reg. 54–55.
In this case, the improvement described in the Specification resides in
the determination of trading posture in limitation [3] and the IOI messaging
in limitations [7]–[10]. See Appeal Br. 15–16. These steps are not
“additional elements of the claim beyond the judicial exception” because
they represent the judicial exception, itself. The claim steps and limitations
fall squarely into the abstract idea of “organizing human activity” because
determining trading posture and using that information to direct IOI
messages to the appropriate trading entity is managing relationships between
people. While the steps are performed on a computer, a judicial exception is
not integrated into a practical application when the additional element
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“merely uses a computer as a tool to perform an abstract idea.” 84 Fed. Reg.
55. “Steps that do nothing more than spell out what it means to ‘apply it on
a computer’ cannot confer patent-eligibility. Alice, 134 S.Ct. at 2359.”
Intellectual Ventures I LLC v. Capital One Bank (USA), 792 F.3d 1363,
1370–71 (Fed. Cir. 2015).
Appellant contends that the improvement is of the same type as in
Enfish, LLC v. Microsoft Corporation, 822 F.3d 1327 (Fed. Cir. 2016).
Appeal Br. 13. Appellant states, “[h]ere, like in Enfish, the claims comprise
improvements in computer capabilities, through a data analyzer module to
compute a trading posture using historical trading activity and current
trading activity to each of the trading parties, and processes for transmitting
an indication of interest message and blocking transmission if the potential
trading party is not a trading counterparty according to the determined
trading posture.” Appeal Br. 14.
In Enfish, the claims addressed by the court were directed to a data
storage and retrieval system for a computer system that comprised a logical
table including logical rows and logical columns for indexing data in the
table. Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1336. The court referred to the logical table as a
“self-referential table” and found that the table functioned differently from
conventional database and “is a specific type of data structure designed to
improve the way a computer stores and retrieves data in memory. Id. at
1336, 1339. Unlike the claims in Enfish, Appellant’s claim 1 does not recite
a particular improvement that improves operation of the computer.
Appellant argues that computing a trading posture using “historical trading
activity” and “current trading activity” is an improvement in computing
capabilities similar to that in Enfish. See Appeal Br. 13–14. But Appellant
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has not explained how the historical trading activity and current trading
activity used to determine the trading posture for transmitting or blocking of
an IOI message is a “specific type of data structure” that improves the
operation of a computer. Enfish, 822 F.3d at 1339. Indeed, given its
broadest reasonable interpretation, claim 1 would seem to encompass the use
of any data structure that includes data for such activity.
Appellant also states the case is similar to the patent-eligible claim in
McRO, Inc. v. Bandai Namco Games Am. Inc., 837 F.3d 1299 (Fed. Cir.
2016) because “it is the incorporation of the claimed rules, not the use of the
computer, that ‘improved [the] existing technological process’ of routing IOI
messages.” Appeal Br. 14. Appellant further states that “the present
disclosure is directed towards rendering information from different sources
(i.e., receiving from one or more trading messaging systems historical
trading activity and current trading activity) that is used to compute a trading
posture.” Id. Appellant argues that the “claimed limitations are designed to
achieve an improved technological result in conventional industry practice
of sending IOIs by using the determined trading posture and therefore, are
not directed to an abstract idea.” Id.
In McRO, the claims were directed to a method for automating 3-D
animator tasks to “produce accurate and realistic lip synchronization and
facial expressions in animated characters” that previously could only be
produced by human animators. McRO, 837 F.3d at 1307. The steps of the
claims comprised performing manipulations on ‘“output morph weights’ . . .
to produce lip synchronization and facial expression control of said animated
characters.” Id. at 1308. While the claims involved the manipulation of
data, e.g., generating morph weight sets to animate lip and facial expressions
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of three dimensional characters, the court found that “the automation goes
beyond merely ‘organizing [existing] information into a new form’ [as in
Digitech Image Technologies, LLC v. Electronics for Imaging, Inc., 758
F.3d 1344, 1348 (2014)], or carrying out a fundamental economic practice.”
McRO, 837 F.3d at 1315. Instead, the court found that the “claimed process
uses 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.” Id.
The rejected claims in this case are different because the “rules”
identified by Appellant are the judicial exception, itself, namely, managing
the trading relationship between the user and trading entity. The limitations
in the claims utilizing the trading posture results in directing the IOI
message to the appropriate entity and thus, contrary to Appellant’s
contention, is broadly directed to the abstract idea of managing the
interactions between trading entities. As explained in Inventor Holdings,
LLC v. Bed Bath & Beyond, Inc., 876 F.3d 1372, 1379 (Fed. Cir. 2017), the
claims that “involve implementations of economic arrangements using
generic computer technology” are patent-ineligible because such a claim “is
attempting to broadly monopolize an abstract idea as implemented using
generic computer technology.” Appellant has not provided evidence that the
computer technology is improved. Rather, as found by the Examiner, the
messages are transmitted “with generic technical components in a
conventional way.” Final Act. 8.
Moreover, Appellant’s claim 1 is distinguishable from the claims in
McRO by the extent to which steps [7]–[10] purport to preempt the recited
abstract idea. In McRO, the court held that the “limitations in claim 1
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prevent preemption of all processes for achieving automated lip-
synchronization of 3–D characters.” McRO, 837 F.3d at 1315. The court
explained that “[t]he specific structure of the claimed rules would prevent
broad preemption of all rules-based means of automating lip
synchronization.” Id. In contrast, steps [7]-[10] of Appellant’s claim 1 are
recited in such general terms – receiving an IOI ([7]), comparing the IOI
with trading postures ([8]), and transmitting ([9]) or blocking ([10]) the IOI
information to trading parties based on the trading posture – that utilizing the
computer trading posture to make the decision on whether to transmit or
block the IOI message poses a risk that the abstract idea embodied in the
claims would be largely preempted. Step [3] in which the trading posture is
computed is also not stated in specific terms as in McRO, but instead simply
states the result and not how it is computed. As stated in McRO, 837 F.3d at
1307, 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.” The recited limitations are
directed to a result. The steps of the claim are not recited with sufficient
specificity as to how the result is accomplished, e.g., by reciting a specific
was that the IOI messages are transmitted and received.
The claims in this appeal are like those in Trading Technologies
International, Inc. v. IBG LLC, 921 F.3d 1084 (2019) which involved
“displaying transactional information to a user regarding the buying and
selling of items in a system.” The claims were found to be patent-ineligible
because, while they “recite a purportedly new arrangement of generic
information that assists traders in processing information more quickly,” the
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court found that the claims as a whole were still directed to an abstract idea.
Trading Technology, 921 F.3d at 1093. Similarly, while it may be true that
the information about trading posture and its use to determine whether to
send an IOI message is new and facilitates the trading process, it is still an
abstract idea of organizing human activity. Appellant did not provide
adequate evidence that computer technology is improved. Instead, the
abstract idea is improved and such an improvement, even if new, is
insufficient to confer patent-eligibility on the claim.
For the foregoing reasons, we conclude that the abstract idea of
organizing human activity recited in claim 1 is not a patent-eligible
improvement to computer technology and is not integrated into a practical
application.
Step 2B
Because we determined that the judicial exception is not integrated
into a practical application, we proceed to Step 2B of the Eligibility
Guidance, which asks, 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.” 84 Fed.
Reg. at 56 (footnote omitted). We must also consider whether the
combination of steps in the claim perform “in an unconventional way and
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therefore include an ‘inventive step,’ rendering the claim eligible at Step
2B.” Id.
Appellant asserts that “the claimed purported improvements are more
than well-understood, routine, conventional activity previously known in the
industry.” Appeal Br. 17. However, while the recited steps are performed
on a computer, “a particular way of programming or designing the software”
is not recited. Apple, Inc. v. Ameranth, Inc., 842 F.3d 1229, 1241 (Fed. Cir.
2016). As discussed above, the solution provided by the claims is an
improvement to the abstract idea of organizing human activity. Appellant
has not identified any additional element which alone, or when considered as
an ordered combination with the other elements of the claim, is sufficient to
confer eligibility to the claims. SAP America, Inc. v. Investpic, LLC, 898
F.3d 1161, 1168–69 (Fed. Cir. 2018) explained:
What is needed is an inventive concept in the non-abstract
application realm. Here, all of the claim details identified by
InvestPic—including in the claims that emerged from
reexamination—fall into one or both of two categories: they are
themselves abstract; or there are no factual allegations from
which one could plausibly infer that they are inventive
Appellant also has not established that the system recited in claim 1,
comprising [1] a first computer element, [2] a trade messaging system, [3] a
data analyzer module, [4] a data for storing trading posture, [5] a second
computer element, and [6] a user computer, operate in an unconventional
way when considered as an ordered combination with the other claim
elements. Indeed, given its broadest reasonable interpretation, claim 1
merely recites conventional computer components (e.g., “database,”
“computer element,” etc.) used in conventional ways (e.g., to receive, send
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and process data) to automate the claimed abstract idea. This is insufficient
to confer patent eligibility under Step 2B.
Accordingly, under Step 2B, we are not persuaded that the Examiner
erred in determining that the limitations of claim 1 do not transform the
claim into significantly more than the abstract idea.

Summary
For the foregoing reasons, the rejection under 35 U.S.C. 101 of claim
1, and claims 2–5, 7–12, and 14–20 which were not separately argued, is
affirmed.

CONCLUSION
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C.
§
Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–5, 7–12,
and 14–20
Obviousness-type
double patenting
1–5, 7–12,
and 14–20

1–5, 7–12,
and 14–20
101 Eligibility 1–5, 7–12,
and 14–20

Overall
Outcome
1–5, 7–12,
and 14–20

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