Ex Parte Levine et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Dec 28, 2012

10939644 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 28, 2012)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________________

Ex parte JACOB LEVINE, JOHN MULLER,
CHRISTOPHER PASSARETTI, and CHINGFA WU
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Appeal 2010-008284
Application 10/939,644
Technology Center 2600
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Before KALYAN K. DESHPANDE, DAVID M. KOHUT, and LARRY J.
HUME, Administrative Patent Judges.

DESHPANDE, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appeal 2010-008284
Application 10/939,644

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STATEMENT OF CASE
1

The Appellants seek review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of a final
rejection of claims 1-48, the only claims pending in the application on
appeal. We have jurisdiction over the appeal pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM.

The Appellants invented a diagnostic tool that enables collection of
multiple recorded speech sessions and search capabilities for various failure
points common to one or more of the recorded sessions. Specification 1:6-9.
An understanding of the invention can be derived from a reading of
exemplary claim 1, which is reproduced below [bracketed matter and some
paragraphing added]:
1. A method of increasing an efficiency of a speech recognition
application comprising:
[1] recording on a storage device, a plurality of sessions with
a speech recognition application;
[2] determining if said recorded sessions include a common
attribute;
[3] grouping said recorded sessions determined to have said
common attribute; and
[4] providing access to at least 2 of said grouped recorded
sessions for review.

REFERENCES
The Examiner relies on the following prior art:
Hill US 2004/0162724 A1 Aug. 19, 2004
Williams US 2005/0105712 A1 May 19, 2005

1
Our decision will make reference to the Appellants’ Appeal Brief (“App.
Br.,” filed January 4, 2010) and Reply Brief (“Reply Br.,” filed May 10,
2010), and the Examiner’s Answer (“Ans.,” mailed March 9, 2010), and
Final Rejection (“Final Rej.,” mailed September 10, 2008).
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McCarthy
Shaffer
US 7,003,079 B1
US 2006/0050658 A1
Feb. 21, 2006
Mar. 9, 2006

REJECTIONS
Claims 1-2, 11-12, 21-22, 31-32, and 41 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C. §103(a) as being unpatentable over Williams.
Claims 3, 13, 23, and 33 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. §103(a) as
being unpatentable over Williams and Shaffer.
Claims 4-5, 10, 14-15, 20, 24-25, 30, 34-35, 40, 42-43, and 48 stand
rejected under 35 U.S.C. §103(a) as being unpatentable over Williams and
Hill.
Claims 6-9, 16-19, 26-29, 36-39, and 44-47 stand rejected under 35
U.S.C. §103(a) as being unpatentable over Williams and McCarthy.

ISSUE
The issue of whether the Examiner erred in rejecting claims 1-48 turns
on whether Williams teaches or suggests limitations [2], [3], and [4] of
independent claim 1, and as recited in independent claims 11, 21, 31, and 41.

ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner’s rejections in light of Appellants’
contentions that the Examiner has erred.
We disagree with Appellants’ conclusions. We adopt as our own
(1) the findings and reasons set forth by the Examiner in the action from
which this appeal is taken and (2) the reasons set forth by the Examiner in
the Examiner’s Answer in response to Appellants’ Appeal Brief. We concur
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Application 10/939,644

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with the conclusion reached by the Examiner. We highlight the following
arguments for emphasis.

Independent claims 1, 11, 21, 31, and 41
Appellants first contend that Williams fails to teach or suggest
“determining if said recorded sessions include a common attribute” and
“grouping said recorded sessions determined to have said common
attribute,” as recited in limitations [2] and [3] of claim 1 and as similarly
recited by independent claims 11, 21, 31, and 41. App. Br. 19-22. We
disagree with Appellants. As found by the Examiner, Williams describes
machine learning in an automated response system that uses agent
communications that are captured in a set of previously recorded agent-
caller communications. Ans. 13 (citing Williams ¶ 0007). Williams
explicitly describes applying a set of classifiers to categorize
communications to identify common communication patterns (Williams ¶¶
0015 and 0017), where the selection criteria used for categorization includes
a requirement that a communication be followed by a number of
successful subsequent communication exchanges between the person
and an agent, a requirement that a communication be included within
a conversation in which the person responded positively to a
satisfaction question posed by an agent, a requirement that a
communication in a first conversation be confirmed by similar
communications occurring in a number of other conversations, or a
requirement that a communication not cause a set of classifiers built
using the communication to misclassify communications that a
previous set of classifiers had classified correctly.

Williams ¶ 0022. That is, criteria that classifiers use to categorize
communications are an attribute that is common amongst that category of
communications and the actual categorization of the communications is the
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same as grouping the communications. Accordingly, we agree with the
Examiner that Williams teaches or suggests limitations [2] and [3] of claim 1
and as similarly recited by the other independent claims.
Appellants argue that Williams only describes grouping
communications based on party type (App. Br. 21), but we are unpersuaded
by this argument because Appellants fail to provide any evidence or
rationale to distinguish the categorization of communications based on
selection criteria. Appellants also argue that the claimed invention requires
a common attribute to include “a common failure between two sessions,”
“an opt-out of an application,” or a “non-speech.” App. Br. 21. However,
this argument is not persuasive because neither the claims nor the
Specification narrow the scope of a “common attribute” and as such this
argument is not commensurate with the scope of the claimed invention.
Appellants also contend that Williams fails to teach or suggest
“providing access to at least 2 of said grouped recorded sessions for review,”
as recited by limitation [4] of claim 1 and as similarly recited by independent
claims 11, 21, 31, and 41. App. Br. 22-23. Appellants specifically argue
that “clustering is done based on the agent marking a call, but not based on a
recorded sessions having a common attribute.” App. Br. 22. We disagree
with Appellants. As discussed supra, we agree with the Examiner (Ans. 13)
that Williams teaches or suggests that the recorded sessions have a common
attribute. As such, we agree with the Examiner (Ans. 13) that Williams’s
description of categorizing communications based on a common attribute
and marking these communications for later review, by topic, suggests
limitation [4] such that a person with ordinary skill in the art would have
found it obvious.
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Dependent claims 2-10, 12-20, 22-30, 32-40, and 42-48
Appellants contend that that it is improper to combine Williams and
Shaffer because Williams relates to recording caller agent sessions and
Shaffer relates to conference calls via an interactive voice response (IVR)
and as such there is no motivation to combine Williams and Shaffer. App.
Br. 23-24. We disagree with Appellants. “Two separate tests define the
scope of analogous prior art: (1) whether the art is from the same field of
endeavor, regardless of the problem addressed and, (2) if the reference is not
within the field of the inventor's endeavor, whether the reference still is
reasonably pertinent to the particular problem with which the inventor is
involved.” In re Klein, 647 F.3d 1343, 1348 (Fed. Cir. 2011).
Appellants’ argument is tantamount to an argument that Williams and
Shaffer are not analogous prior art because they are in different fields of
endeavor. However, Williams is concerned with improving the cost
effectiveness of customer service by recording conversations between agents
and customers and mining this data to improve training techniques.
Williams ¶¶ 0005 and 0007. Shaffer is concerned with a system that uses an
IVR system at a call center that allows live agents to participate on
conference with a call, where the IVR allows direct interaction between
callers and the system thus reducing the need for assigning a separate agent
to handle an incoming call. Shaffer ¶ 0003. That is, both Williams and
Shaffer are concerned with reducing costs at a call center through the use of
automating some portion of the call center system, similar to the claimed
invention concern about labor costs and automation of activities to reduce
these costs. Specification 3:5-8. As such, both Williams and Shaffer are
analogous prior art and the Examiner has properly combined them.
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Appellants further contend that Shaffer fails to teach or suggest
“recording of any session between callers and agents,” the combinations of
Williams/Hill and Williams/McCarthy fail to teach or suggests “determining
if said recorded sessions include a common attribute, grouping said recorded
sessions determined to have said common attribute, and providing access to
at least 2 of said grouped recorded sessions for review.” We disagree with
Appellants. As discussed supra, we agreed with the Examiner that Williams
teaches or suggests these limitations. As such, Appellants’ contention does
not persuade us of error on the part of the Examiner because Appellants are
responding to the rejection by attacking the references separately, even
though the rejection is based on the combined teachings of the references.
Nonobviousness cannot be established by attacking the references
individually when the rejection is predicated upon a combination of prior art
disclosures. See In re Merck & Co. Inc., 800 F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir.
1986).

CONCLUSION
The Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 1-48.

DECISION
To summarize, our decision is as follows.
 The rejection of claims 1-48 is sustained.

Appeal 2010-008284
Application 10/939,644

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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) (2011).

AFFIRMED

ELD