US 10755699

As a senior US patent analyst, here is a concise summary of US patent 10,755,699 as of May 5, 2026.

Summary of U.S. Patent 10,755,699

Title: System and method for a cooperative conversational voice user interface

Assignee: VB Assets LLC

Inventors:

• Larry Baldwin
• Tom Freeman
• Michael Tjalve
• Blane Ebersold
• Chris Weider

Filing Date: May 20, 2019

Issue Date: August 25, 2020

Abstract:
A cooperative conversational voice user interface is provided. The cooperative conversational voice user interface may build upon short-term and long-term shared knowledge to generate one or more explicit and/or implicit hypotheses about an intent of a user utterance. The hypotheses may be ranked based on varying degrees of certainty, and an adaptive response may be generated for the user. Responses may be worded based on the degrees of certainty and to frame an appropriate domain for a subsequent utterance. In one implementation, misrecognitions may be tolerated, and conversational course may be corrected based on subsequent utterances and/or responses.

Plain-Language Overview of Independent Claims

This patent has four independent claims (1, 12, 22, and 29). Below is a plain-language overview of each.

• Independent Claim 1: Describes a method for a voice-controlled computer system to understand and respond to a person's speech. The system receives a spoken utterance, creates several possible interpretations of what was said, and then uses stored knowledge about the user and the conversation's history to figure out the user's likely intent. This "shared knowledge" includes both short-term memory of the current conversation and long-term memory of the user's habits and preferences. Based on this, the system generates a ranked list of possible intended tasks and then creates a spoken response that is adapted to the situation.

• Independent Claim 12: This claim focuses on a voice-controlled computing device itself, rather than the method. The device is equipped with a processor and memory and is programmed to perform the actions described in Claim 1. It can receive a spoken utterance, use short-term and long-term "shared knowledge" to determine the user's probable intent from multiple interpretations, rank these potential intents, and then generate an appropriate, context-aware spoken response.

• Independent Claim 22: This claim outlines another method for a voice-controlled system to interact with a user. It differs from Claim 1 by emphasizing the "cooperative" nature of the conversation. The system identifies different possible interpretations of a user's speech and uses stored "shared knowledge" (both short-term and long-term) to generate multiple hypotheses about what the user wants to do. It then creates a response that is specifically designed to guide the user to reply in a way that is easier for the system to understand, thereby making the conversation more efficient and cooperative.

• Independent Claim 29: Similar to Claim 12, this claim describes a voice-controlled computing device. This device is programmed to carry out the cooperative conversational method from Claim 22. It is designed to understand a user's spoken input by generating various interpretations, using historical and immediate "shared knowledge" to form educated guesses about the user's intent, and then responding in a way that helps steer the conversation toward a successful outcome.

Litigation Search

A search of the CAFC (Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit) dockets for the year 2026 for cases involving "US patent 10755699" was conducted. As of today's date, no records were found indicating that this patent is the subject of an appeal in the CAFC during 2026. I have a high degree of confidence in this assessment based on the available data.