Ex parte Savescu

Informative decision only: persuasive authority, not binding precedent. Applying the 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, the Board held that when a claim recites a judicial exception (here, a method of organizing human activity: managing relationships or interactions between people through workflow stages and phases), it must next ask whether additional elements integrate the exception into a practical application, and only if not, whether they supply an inventive concept. A generic server that creates and stores web pages, merely automating a manual process, is a field-of-use link that neither integrates the abstract idea nor supplies an inventive concept, and narrowing the claim or showing novelty over the art does not change that result. The listing describes the decision as applying the 2019 revised guidance, and the text shows the Board adopting that guidance in place of a pure two-step Alice/Mayo recitation; it names no prior Board precedent that it overrules. For examiners, it shows that a rejection can be sustained by (1) identifying a recited grouping, such as certain methods of organizing human activity, (2) finding no practical-application integration, and (3) citing the specification's own admissions that the hardware is well known. For applicants, it shows that arguing a workflow architecture, efficiency of electronic workflows, narrower dependent-type limitations, allowability over the prior art, or lack of complete preemption will not carry the appeal unless the claim recites a technological improvement. The Board relied on Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank Int'l, Mayo, Credit Acceptance Corp. v. Westlake Services, Accenture Global Services v. Guidewire Software, Inc., In re TLI Comms. LLC Patent Litig., and Amdocs (Israel), Ltd. v. Openet Telecom, Inc. as authority bearing on the analysis. LEGAL TEST OR STANDARD: Under the 2019 Guidance the Board first looks to whether the claim recites (1) any judicial exceptions, including certain groupings of abstract ideas (i.e., mathematical concepts, certain methods of organizing human activities such as a fundamental economic practice, or mental processes); and (2) additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application. Only if the claim recites a judicial exception and does not integrate it into a practical application does the Board look to whether the claim (3) adds a specific limitation beyond the judicial exception that is not well-understood, routine, conventional in the field; or (4) simply appends well-understood, routine, conventional activities previously known to the industry, specified at a high level of generality, to the judicial exception. TRIGGERING FACTS: Claim 1 recited creating workflow stages and phases, with a stage identifier, plus project detail web pages on a server computer. The Board found the stage and phase steps were activities people perform when starting, managing and planning a project, and that the stage identifier was analogous to labeling or cross-referencing. The only additional elements were a server and creation of web pages, which merely automated a manual process. The specification described the server generically (it said the devices are well known in the art), and appellants argued only workflow efficiency, novelty, and non-preemption. Claim 20, a computer-readable storage device claim adding selections such as check-in and business impact, was treated the same way. KEY QUOTE: "In this way, the server's involvement is merely a field of use, which does not integrate the abstract idea into a practical application." (p. 10) PRIOR PRECEDENT AFFECTED: No prior precedential or informative decision of the Board is directly affected. The Board applied the 2019 Revised Patent Subject Matter Eligibility Guidance, 84 Fed. Reg. 50 (USPTO Jan. 7, 2019), and followed or distinguished Federal Circuit cases, including Accenture Global Services v. Guidewire Software, Inc., 728 F.3d 1336 and Credit Acceptance Corp. v. Westlake Services, 859 F.3d 1044 (followed), and Amdocs (Israel), Ltd. v. Openet Telecom, Inc., 841 F.3d 1288 (distinguished). PRACTICE TIP: In an appeal brief, do not rest on novelty, allowability over the prior art, narrowness, or absence of complete preemption. Instead, point to claim language reciting a specific technological improvement in how the computer or technology operates, and challenge any examiner finding that the additional elements are well-understood, routine and conventional by addressing the specification's own generic description of the hardware.