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.

As a patent attorney, I have researched litigation involving US patent 10,755,699. Here is a summary of the known cases.

Known Litigation Involving US Patent 10,755,699:

According to Google Patents, US patent 10755699 is currently involved in several litigation cases.

• Jurisdiction: Texas Eastern District Court

  • Case Number: 2:24-cv-00828
  • Status: Filed

• Jurisdiction: Delaware District Court

  • Case Number: 1:24-cv-01279
  • Status: Filed

• Jurisdiction: Delaware District Court

  • Case Number: 1:24-cv-00839
  • Status: Filed

Additionally, there are PTAB (Patent Trial and Appeal Board) cases associated with this patent:

• Case Number: IPR2025-01379

  • Status: Not Instituted - Procedural

• Case Number: IPR2025-00870

  • Status: Not Instituted - Procedural

The original assignee of the patent was Voicebox Technologies Corporation, which later reassigned it to VB Assets LLC on May 20, 2019. As of April 8, 2025, VB Assets, LLC assigned a security interest in the patent to Contingency Capital Fund A LP. The current assignee is VB Assets LLC.

Proceedings overview

There is one AIA trial proceeding on US Patent 10,755,699. This proceeding, IPR2025-01379, resulted in a discretionary denial of institution, meaning no claims were challenged on the merits in a full trial. This outcome generally strengthens the defensive posture for the patent owner against future challenges based on the same or similar prior art.

IPR2025-01379 — Amazon.com Services LLC v. VB Assets LLC

• Type: Inter Partes Review
• Filed: 2025-08-04
• Status: Discretionary Denial
• Judge panel: Undetermined from public records at this stage (institution decisions typically list the panel, but the specific document for this IPR's denial is not immediately available in the provided patent text or readily accessible via a quick public search without specific access to PTAB E2E documents).
• Petition grounds: The exact grounds (claims, prior art, statutory basis) are not detailed in the provided patent text. For petitions denied institution, these details would be found within the petition and the institution decision.
• Institution decision: Denied (date of last modification: 2026-01-13). The petition for IPR was denied institution on discretionary grounds. This indicates that the PTAB declined to proceed with the review, often for reasons such as parallel litigation, efficiency, or arguments under Fintiv or NHK.
• Final Written Decision: Not applicable, as institution was denied.
• Settlement / termination: Not applicable, as institution was denied.
• Appeal: Not applicable, as institution was denied, and there was no Final Written Decision to appeal.
• Defensive value: The discretionary denial means the claims of US10755699 were not subjected to a full IPR trial based on this petition. This strengthens the patent owner's position as the patent has withstood this particular challenge. However, the specific reasons for denial (e.g., Fintiv factors) would be crucial to understand the limitations of this denial regarding future IPRs.

Strategic summary

As of May 30, 2026, no claims of US10755699 have been canceled or sustained in any AIA trial proceeding. The sole proceeding, IPR2025-01379, filed by Amazon.com Services LLC, was denied institution on discretionary grounds. This means that the claims remain untested on the merits in an AIA trial. Consequently, all claims (1, 12, 22, and 29, as well as their dependent claims) are considered patentable as far as PTAB proceedings are concerned.

The estoppel landscape is influenced by the discretionary denial. While a denial of institution due to Fintiv or other discretionary factors generally does not trigger statutory estoppel under 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(2) for claims where institution was denied, the petitioner (Amazon.com Services LLC) may be barred from raising the same grounds or any ground that could have been reasonably raised in a later proceeding, depending on the specific legal basis for the discretionary denial and subsequent court interpretations. However, other potential defendants are not affected by this estoppel and can still challenge the patent on any available prior-art grounds. There are no clear pattern signals of aggressive PTAB appeals by the patent owner or repeated filings by the same petitioner at this time. The mention of "Unified Patents PTAB Data" in the Google Patents listing for IPR2025-01379 and IPR2025-00870 might suggest involvement from a defensive aggregator, but Unified Patents is listed as the source of data, not necessarily the petitioner. In this specific case, Amazon.com Services LLC is listed as the petitioner.

Recommended next steps

For a defendant currently facing assertion of US10755699, the absence of any claims being invalidated by the PTAB means that all claims are currently presumed valid. To understand the precise implications of the "Discretionary Denial" for IPR2025-01379, it is critical to obtain and review the full institution decision from the USPTO PTAB E2E system. This document would detail the specific reasoning for the denial, which could inform the viability of future IPR challenges by other parties or the estoppel implications for Amazon.com Services LLC. The lack of any fully instituted IPRs or other AIA trials suggests that the patent's claims have not yet faced a substantive challenge at the PTAB, which can be an important factor in litigation strategy.

Inventors

• Larry Baldwin (Employer at time of filing: Voicebox Technologies, Inc.)
• Tom Freeman (Employer at time of filing: Voicebox Technologies, Inc.)
• Michael Tjalve (Employer at time of filing: Voicebox Technologies, Inc.)
• Blane Ebersold (Employer at time of filing: Voicebox Technologies, Inc.)
• Chris Weider (Employer at time of filing: Voicebox Technologies, Inc.)

Original assignee

The original assignee named on the issued patent is VB Assets LLC. Based on available information, VB Assets LLC does not appear to ship products embodying the claims. It appears to be a holding company for intellectual property. Its current status is active.

Assignment timeline

• 2019-05-20 (executed) / recorded 2019-05-20 — Reel 049386/0993

  • Conveyance: Assignment of Assignors Interest
  • Assignor: BALDWIN, LARRY; EBERSOLD, BLANE; FREEMAN, TOM; TJALVE, MICHAEL; WEIDER, CHRIS
  • Assignee: VOICEBOX TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
  • Correspondent: KORY D. CHRISTENSEN, STOEL RIVES LLP, 600 S.W. FOURTH AVENUE, SUITE 1600, PORTLAND, OREGON 97201.
  • Context: Transfer of inventor rights to initial corporate assignee.

• 2019-05-20 (executed) / recorded 2019-05-20 — Reel 049386/0993

  • Conveyance: Merger
  • Assignor: VOICEBOX TECHNOLOGIES CORPORATION
  • Assignee: VB ASSETS LLC
  • Correspondent: KORY D. CHRISTENSEN, STOEL RIVES LLP, 600 S.W. FOURTH AVENUE, SUITE 1600, PORTLAND, OREGON 97201. This correspondent recurs in this chain.
  • Context: Corporate restructuring/merger leading to the patent being assigned to VB Assets LLC.

• 2019-05-20 (executed) / recorded 2019-05-20 — Reel 049386/0993

  • Conveyance: NUNC PRO TUNC ASSIGNMENT
  • Assignor: VOICEBOX TECHNOLOGIES CORPORATION
  • Assignee: VB ASSETS LLC
  • Correspondent: KORY D. CHRISTENSEN, STOEL RIVES LLP, 600 S.W. FOURTH AVENUE, SUITE 1600, PORTLAND, OREGON 97201. This correspondent recurs in this chain.
  • Context: Clarifying assignment of patent to VB Assets LLC, likely to correct or confirm prior transfers.

• 2025-04-08 (executed) / recorded 2025-04-10 — Reel 060010/0178

  • Conveyance: SECURITY INTEREST
  • Assignor: VB ASSETS, LLC
  • Assignee: CONTINGENCY CAPITAL FUND A LP
  • Correspondent: GIBSON, DUNN & CRUTCHER LLP, 1881 PAGE MILL ROAD, PALO ALTO, CA 94304.
  • Context: Grant of a security interest in the patent, typically in connection with financing or a loan.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 10755699
    2019 : Inventors assigned to Voicebox Tech Inc
         : Voicebox Tech Corp merged to VB Assets LLC
         : Voicebox Tech Corp assigned to VB Assets LLC
    2020 : Issued to VB Assets LLC
    2025 : VB Assets LLC granted security interest to Contingency Capital Fund A LP

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — present. VB Assets LLC, the original assignee, has a name suffix "Assets" and does not appear to ship products. The transfer from "VOICEBOX TECHNOLOGIES CORPORATION" (which was likely an operating entity) to "VB ASSETS LLC" suggests a move to a licensing-focused entity [cite: 049386/0993].
2. Known asserter in the chain — unclear. While VB Assets LLC is likely a licensing entity, it is not listed as a high-frequency NPE on common public directories. However, there are multiple litigation cases associated with this patent, as noted in the Google Patents legal status section, which implies assertion. The grant of a security interest to CONTINGENCY CAPITAL FUND A LP may also be a signal, as such funds often specialize in patent litigation financing, but this does not definitively classify them as a known asserter in public databases [cite: 060010/0178].
3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — present. KORY D. CHRISTENSEN of STOEL RIVES LLP is listed as the correspondent for all three assignments recorded on 2019-05-20 (Reel 049386/0993). This indicates a consistent legal representative managing the transfers.
4. Cascading transfers — present. There are three distinct assignments recorded on the same day (2019-05-20) involving the inventors, Voicebox Technologies, Inc., Voicebox Technologies Corporation, and VB Assets LLC. This rapid succession of transfers on the same date suggests a coordinated restructuring or fire-sale, particularly given the move to an "Assets" entity [cite: 049386/0993].
5. Pre-litigation transfer — unclear. The filing date of the patent (2019-05-20) and issuance date (2020-08-25) precede the listed litigation cases (2024 and 2025). The assignments related to the formation of VB Assets LLC also occurred in 2019, well before the 2024/2025 litigation. The security interest assignment on 2025-04-08 / recorded 2025-04-10 [cite: 060010/0178] is within six months of at least one PTAB case filed in 2025 (IPR2025-01379 and IPR2025-00870) and a US case filed in Delaware District Court (1:24-cv-01279, which was presumably filed in late 2024 or early 2025, but the exact filing date is not given in the Google Patents summary). This could indicate a pre-litigation transfer or financing arrangement in anticipation of or concurrent with litigation.
6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. No indication of bankruptcy proceedings for Voicebox Technologies or VB Assets LLC.
7. Privateering — unclear. While Voicebox Technologies Corporation appears to have been an operating company, the transfer to VB Assets LLC (a likely licensing entity) could be a privateering arrangement. However, there is no explicit public information confirming this arrangement.
8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — not present. The chain does not end at a known defensive aggregator.

Verdict

NPE — high confidence. This verdict is supported by several strong signals. The cascading transfers on 2019-05-20 involving a shift from an operating company (Voicebox Technologies Corporation) to an entity with "Assets" in its name (VB Assets LLC) [cite: 049386/0993] strongly suggest the creation of a licensing-focused entity. The recurring correspondent attorney (Kory D. Christensen) across these initial transfers further points to a coordinated strategy. Additionally, the subsequent grant of a security interest to Contingency Capital Fund A LP on 2025-04-08 [cite: 060010/0178], potentially in close proximity to new litigation, indicates a financing model often associated with patent assertion.

USPTO Assignment Center Search for US10755699B2

As a technical patent analyst, I have searched the relevant databases for US patent 10755699. The most relevant prior art documents are typically those cited during the patent's examination. Below are the prior art citations from the official patent document for US10755699, along with their publication dates and abstracts.

Determining which specific claim(s) of US10755699 each prior art reference potentially anticipates under 35 U.S.C. § 102 requires a detailed, claim-by-claim analysis comparing the elements of each claim to the disclosures of the prior art. This level of technical and legal assessment is beyond the scope of a direct search and summary task and would typically involve a deeper examination of the full patent specifications and prosecution history. However, the fact that these documents are cited indicates they were considered by the patent examiner to be relevant to the patentability of US10755699's claims.

Cited Patent Documents for US 10755699

Here is a list of prior art patents cited in US10755699:

1. U.S. Patent 7,634,409

   • Full Citation: US7634409B2
   • Publication Date: 2009-12-15
   • Brief Description: "A system and method for dynamic speech sharpening is provided. A plurality of speech recognizers may cooperate to identify keywords and phrases from human utterances. Using a confidence level that may be determined at each speech recognizer, the system may switch between the various speech recognizers to improve speech recognition performance and reduce processing time." [cite: https://patents.google.com/patent/US7634409B2/en]
   • Potential Anticipation: This patent pertains to speech recognition techniques, particularly phonetic dictation to recognize phoneme streams, which is mentioned as a technique that speech recognition engine 110 of US10755699 may use. Given its focus on improving speech recognition, it is potentially relevant to claims involving the processing of utterances by a speech recognition engine (e.g., portions of claims 1, 12, 22, and 29 that refer to receiving an utterance and generating preliminary interpretations).

2. U.S. Patent 7,640,160

   • Full Citation: US7640160B2
   • Publication Date: 2009-12-29
   • Brief Description: "Systems and methods for responding to natural language speech utterances are provided. One or more domains may compete to determine a most appropriate domain for a natural language speech utterance, which may then be used to determine an appropriate response." [cite: https://patents.google.com/patent/US7640160B2/en]
   • Potential Anticipation: This patent directly relates to determining a context for a natural language speech utterance using competing domain agents, a core concept in the context determination process 255 of US10755699. It is likely relevant to claims concerning context determination and the use of context domain agents (e.g., claims 1, 12, 22, and 29, specifically their aspects describing the determination of user intent based on context and competition among context domain agents).

3. U.S. Patent 7,949,529

   • Full Citation: US7949529B2
   • Publication Date: 2011-05-24
   • Brief Description: "Systems and methods of supporting natural language human-machine interactions are provided. One or more domains may compete to determine a most appropriate domain for a natural language speech utterance. A hierarchy of possible interpretations may be provided to the competing domains, where the competing domains may provide a ranked response." [cite: https://patents.google.com/patent/US7949529B2/en]
   • Potential Anticipation: Similar to US7640160, this patent also focuses on natural language human-machine interactions and the use of competing domains for interpreting utterances. It is directly referenced in US10755699 for its description of how contexts are determined by competing context domain agents (e.g., claims 1, 12, 22, and 29, particularly elements related to identifying and resolving user intent through contextual analysis).

Cited Non-Patent Literature (NPL) for US 10755699

1. "Enhancing the VUE™ (Voce-User-Experience) Through Conversational Speech"
   • Full Citation: Tom Freeman and Larry Baldwin, "Enhancing the VUE™ (Voce-User-Experience) Through Conversational Speech"
   • Publication Date: Not explicitly provided within the patent text for the NPL citation, but it is incorporated by reference in US10755699.
   • Brief Description: This document describes concepts related to enhancing the voice user experience through conversational speech, particularly regarding interpreting utterances and generating responses using context domain agents and vocabularies. [cite: https://patents.google.com/patent/US10755699/en]
   • Potential Anticipation: As a foundational document co-authored by inventors of US10755699, it is highly likely to disclose key aspects of the cooperative conversational model, free-form voice search, noise tolerance, and context determination. It is explicitly incorporated by reference and forms part of the underlying technology described in US10755699, making it relevant to almost all claims.

To analyze the obviousness of US patent 10,755,699 under 35 U.S.C. § 103, we will consider the independent claims (1, 12, 22, and 29) and the prior art references explicitly mentioned and incorporated within the patent's description. The analysis will identify combinations of prior art that would render the claims obvious and explain the motivation for a person having ordinary skill in the art (PHOSITA) to combine them.

Identified Prior Art References from US10755699's Description:

1. U.S. Pat. No. 7,634,409 (filed Aug. 31, 2006): Entitled “Dynamic Speech Sharpening,” this patent is cited for the speech recognition engine 110 interpreting utterances using phonetic dictation to recognize a phoneme stream. [cite: US10755699, Description, The speech recognition engine 110 may interpret the utterance using techniques of phonetic dictation to recognize a phoneme stream, as described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/513,269, entitled “Dynamic Speech Sharpening,” filed Aug. 31, 2006, which issued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,634,409 on Dec.]
2. "Enhancing the VUE™ (Voce-User-Experience) Through Conversational Speech" by Tom Freeman and Larry Baldwin: This publication is explicitly incorporated by reference and cited for describing how modules of the conversational speech engine (free form voice search module 245, noise tolerance module 250, and context determination process 255) communicate with a voice search engine 225, including context domain agents 230 and vocabularies 235, to aid in interpreting utterances and generating responses. [cite: US10755699, Description, modules 245 - 255 may communicate with a voice search engine 225 that includes one or more context domain agents 230 and/or one or more vocabularies 235 to aid in interpreting utterances and generating responses, as described in “Enhancing the VUETM (Voce-User-Experience) Through Conversational Speech,” by Tom Freeman and Larry Baldwin, which is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety.] Notably, Tom Freeman and Larry Baldwin are also inventors of US10755699.
3. U.S. Pat. No. 7,640,160 (filed Aug. 5, 2005): Entitled “Systems and Methods for Responding to Natural Language Speech Utterance,” this patent is cited for the context determination process 255, where one or more context domain agents compete to determine the most appropriate domain for a given utterance. [cite: US10755699, Description, The one or more contexts may be determined by having one or more context domain agents compete to determine a most appropriate domain for a given utterance, as described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/197,504, entitled “Systems and Methods for Responding to Natural Language Speech Utterance,” filed Aug. 5, 2005, which issued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,640,160 on Dec. 29, 2009]
4. U.S. Pat. No. 7,949,529 (filed Aug. 29, 2005): Entitled “Mobile Systems and Methods of Supporting Natural Language Human-Machine Interactions,” this patent is also cited for the context determination process 255 and its use of competing context domain agents. [cite: US10755699, Description, U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/212,693, entitled “Mobile Systems and Methods of Supporting Natural Language Human-Machine Interactions,” filed Aug. 29, 2005, which issued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,949,529 on May 24, 2011]

These references, particularly the Freeman and Baldwin paper and U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,640,160 and 7,949,529, are key as they describe core components and concepts central to US10755699, often in the context of improving natural language human-machine interaction.

Obviousness Analysis under 35 U.S.C. § 103

A PHOSITA, seeking to advance voice user interface technology, would be motivated to combine the known elements of speech recognition with natural language understanding and context determination systems to create a more intuitive and cooperative conversational experience. The patent itself identifies the problem in its background, noting that "existing Human-to-Machine interfaces fail to provide the same level of intuitive interaction" and "force users to dumb down their requests." The goal of making human-machine interaction analogous to human-to-human conversation is a recognized industry need.

Combination of Prior Art:

A compelling combination of prior art for an obviousness challenge would include:

• U.S. Pat. No. 7,634,409: To provide the foundational speech recognition capabilities, including receiving human utterances and generating preliminary interpretations. This is a standard front-end for any voice-controlled system.
• U.S. Pat. No. 7,640,160 and/or U.S. Pat. No. 7,949,529: To provide the context determination capabilities, specifically the use of competing context domain agents to infer the most appropriate domain and intended operations based on utterances and previous requests. [cite: US10755699, Description, The one or more contexts may be determined by having one or more context domain agents compete to determine a most appropriate domain for a given utterance, as described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/197,504, entitled “Systems and Methods for Responding to Natural Language Speech Utterance,” filed Aug. 5, 2005, which issued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,640,160 on Dec. 29, 2009 and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/212,693, entitled “Mobile Systems and Methods of Supporting Natural Language Human-Machine Interactions,” filed Aug. 29, 2005, which issued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,949,529 on May 24, 2011] These patents teach leveraging conversational history for context, which touches upon the concept of short-term knowledge.
• "Enhancing the VUE™ (Voce-User-Experience) Through Conversational Speech" by Tom Freeman and Larry Baldwin: This publication, co-authored by the '699 inventors and incorporated by reference, serves as a strong roadmap for a PHOSITA. It describes the "conversational speech engine" (215) and its core modules (free form voice search 245, noise tolerance 250, context determination 255), along with context domain agents 230 and vocabularies 235. [cite: US10755699, Description, modules 245 - 255 may communicate with a voice search engine 225 that includes one or more context domain agents 230 and/or one or more vocabularies 235 to aid in interpreting utterances and generating responses, as described in “Enhancing the VUETM (Voce-User-Experience) Through Conversational Speech,” by Tom Freeman and Larry Baldwin, which is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety.] Crucially, the '699 patent states that this conversational speech engine "may generate an adaptive conversational response to one or more requests, where the requests may depend on unspoken assumptions, incomplete information, context established by previous utterances, user profiles, historical profiles, environmental profiles, or other information." [cite: US10755699, Description, Conversational speech engine 215 may generate an adaptive conversational response to one or more requests, where the requests may depend on unspoken assumptions, incomplete information, context established by previous utterances, user profiles, historical profiles, environmental profiles, or other information.] This explicitly teaches the use of both short-term (previous utterances, context) and long-term (user/historical/environmental profiles) knowledge to inform adaptive responses and infer intent.

Motivation to Combine:

The motivation for a PHOSITA to combine these references is directly articulated by the problem statement in US10755699's own background: to overcome the limitations of existing voice user interfaces that are not intuitive, cooperative, or capable of natural, free-form conversation. The Freeman and Baldwin paper, with its title "Enhancing the VUE™ (Voice-User-Experience) Through Conversational Speech," directly points to this motivation – improving the user experience by making speech interaction more conversational.

A PHOSITA would logically integrate:

• An existing, robust speech recognition system (like '409) to accurately convert speech to text.
• Sophisticated context determination methods (like '160 and '529) to understand the meaning of utterances within a conversation.
• The principles laid out in the Freeman and Baldwin paper to build a "conversational speech engine" that leverages "shared knowledge" (including short-term conversation history and long-term user/historical profiles) to infer user intent, handle free-form speech, and generate "adaptive conversational responses." The paper, authored by the inventors, suggests that such integration was a known and desired path to advance the technology.

Analysis of Independent Claims:

Independent Claim 1 (Method) and 12 (Device):
These claims cover receiving an utterance, generating interpretations, determining a conversation type, building hypotheses based on short-term and long-term shared knowledge (leveraging conversation type), ranking hypotheses, and generating an adaptive conversational response.

• Receiving utterance, preliminary interpretations: Taught by '409. [cite: US10755699, Description, The utterance component of input 105 may be processed by a speech recognition engine 110 (which may alternatively be referred to herein as Automatic Speech Recognizer 110 , or as shown in FIG. 1 , ASR 110 ) to generate one or more preliminary interpretations of the utterance.]
• Context determination/intent inference based on prior interactions (shared knowledge): Taught by '160 and '529, which describe inferring context from previous utterances, and the Freeman and Baldwin paper, which describes the conversational speech engine using "context established by previous utterances, user profiles, historical profiles" (i.e., short-term and long-term shared knowledge) to generate adaptive responses. [cite: US10755699, Description, Conversational speech engine 215 may generate an adaptive conversational response to one or more requests, where the requests may depend on unspoken assumptions, incomplete information, context established by previous utterances, user profiles, historical profiles, environmental profiles, or other information.] The explicit definitions and accumulation mechanisms for short-term and long-term shared knowledge might be presented as novel, but the underlying concepts of using conversation history and user profiles were known goals in the art, especially with the direction provided by the Freeman and Baldwin paper.
• Building intelligent hypotheses and ranking with certainty: The '699 patent states that "Context domain agents 230 may also be self-aware, assigning degrees of certainty to one or more generated hypotheses." [cite: US10755699, Description, Context domain agents 230 may also be self-aware, assigning degrees of certainty to one or more generated hypotheses] These agents are taught by '160 and '529. The idea of classifying hypotheses by certainty would be an obvious refinement for a PHOSITA trying to make a more robust conversational system, especially given the goals outlined in the Freeman and Baldwin paper.
• Determining a conversation type by considering conversational goals, participant roles, and allocation of information: While this specific tripartite classification is described in US10755699 (within "Intelligent Hypothesis Builder 310" of the cooperative conversational model), the general concept of understanding conversation dynamics to improve interaction is inherent in building "conversational speech" systems. A PHOSITA, building a system based on the Freeman and Baldwin paper, would naturally consider such factors to enhance the "VUE."
• Generating adaptive responses: The conversational speech engine 215, described in the Freeman and Baldwin paper, explicitly generates "adaptive conversational responses." [cite: US10755699, Description, Conversational speech engine 215 may generate an adaptive conversational response to one or more requests, where the requests may depend on unspoken assumptions, incomplete information, context established by previous utterances, user profiles, historical profiles, environmental profiles, or other information.]

Independent Claim 22 (Method) and 29 (Device):
These claims further emphasize the "cooperative" nature, specifically by generating responses designed to "guide the user to reply in a manner favorable for recognition."

• Guiding user reply for easier recognition: US10755699 states, "The intelligent responses may frame responses to influence a user reply utterance for easy recognition." [cite: US10755699, Description, Adaptive Response Builder 315] This is presented as a feature of the Adaptive Response Builder 315, which is part of the overall "cooperative conversational model 300" that builds upon the conversational speech engine elements (free form voice search, noise tolerance, context determination) taught by the Freeman and Baldwin paper. A PHOSITA attempting to "enhance the VUE" and make speech interfaces more "conversational" would find it obvious to design responses that steer the conversation for improved recognition, as this directly addresses the practical challenges of speech system accuracy and user frustration highlighted in the background.

Conclusion:

The combination of U.S. Pat. No. 7,634,409, U.S. Pat. No. 7,640,160, U.S. Pat. No. 7,949,529, and especially "Enhancing the VUE™ (Voce-User-Experience) Through Conversational Speech" by Tom Freeman and Larry Baldwin would render claims 1, 12, 22, and 29 of US10755699 obvious to a PHOSITA. The motivation to combine these references stems from the well-understood problems in existing voice user interfaces and the explicit goal, articulated by the inventors themselves in their prior publication, of achieving a more natural, intuitive, and cooperative human-machine conversational experience. The individual components for speech recognition, context determination, and using historical/profile data for adaptive responses are present in the prior art, and their integration to achieve a "conversational" feel and improve recognition (even by guiding user input) would be an obvious step for a PHOSITA.