U.S. Patent Position Review — 19/476,586
DATA COMMUNICATIONS NETWORK AND METHOD FOR PROVIDING TASK SCHEDULES TO SERVICE PROVIDERS
Published international application: PCT/AU2024/050370 / WO2024216337A1
Section 10 — TR-10
Provider Filtering & Identification
The computational steps by which a candidate provider population is reduced to a presented set, kept strictly separate from ranking, from customer selection and from final scheduling.
Executive Finding
Taskrabbit publicly evidences eligibility filtering by category, work area and availability and indicates ranking factors including rate and business metrics, corresponding to the patent's identification of a subset of suitable providers — while final selection remains with the customer.
Observed Workflow
- All Providers
- Category Eligibility
- Work Area Eligibility
- Availability Eligibility
- Ranked Candidate Set
- Presented to Customer
Patent Question
How does Taskrabbit produce the customer-visible Tasker population, and how does that compare with the patent's generation of a subset of suitable providers?
Patent Architecture Sequence
- Task + Provider Information
- Capability & Geographic Assessment
- Suitable Provider Subset
Patent Position
United States Patent Application No. 19/476,586 — "DATA COMMUNICATIONS NETWORK AND METHOD FOR PROVIDING TASK SCHEDULES TO SERVICE PROVIDERS"
Claimed Patent Element
- A subset of service providers suitable for the task is identified from the provider records using task requirements, skills, geographic region and availability.
Specification / Embodiment Disclosure
- The specification contemplates the identified subset being ordered or assessed, including by reference to historical performance information.
- Embodiments describe the system proceeding from the identified subset to generation of a task schedule.
Potential Future Patent Evolution
Potential Future Patent Development — Subject to Patent Attorney Review.
- Predictive suitability scoring, completion-probability ranking and system-determined assignment without customer choice.
Taskrabbit Position
- Provider-facing material indicates that the ordering of Taskers may reflect availability, work area, selected categories, hourly rate and business performance metrics.
- Only providers eligible on category, area and requested time are presented to the customer.
- The presented set is a ranked list of candidates from which the customer chooses.
Public Evidence
Each record below opens the full source entry — extract, publication and access dates, direct URL and archived URL where available — without leaving this analysis.
Technical Alignment
- Eligibility: strong alignment. The three constraints the architecture specifies — capability, geography, availability — are the three constraints publicly evidenced.
- Ranking: partial alignment. Ordering exists and is influenced by stated factors, but the function is undisclosed and may be heuristic rather than predictive.
- Customer selection: a material difference. The architecture contemplates system identification culminating in a schedule; here identification culminates in a choice presented to a human.
- Final scheduling: separate again — the schedule is created only once the customer commits, not as the output of identification.
Difference / Gap
- Identification does not itself determine the provider; it determines who may be chosen.
- No public evidence establishes that the candidate set is scored for suitability to the specific task beyond category eligibility.
Where Public Evidence Is Incomplete
- Whether ranking is model-driven and which signals are weighted is not publicly disclosed.
- Whether any category or partner channel uses automatic assignment rather than customer choice is not established.
Patent \u2194 Taskrabbit Mapping
| Patent element | Taskrabbit position | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Provider subset generation | Algorithmically determined Tasker list using availability, Work Area, category, price and business metrics | Material Technical Correspondence |
| Eligibility determination | Availability, Work Area and category operate as eligibility constraints | Strong Observed Correspondence |
| Threshold logic applied to suitability | Not disclosed | Not Publicly Established |
Three Stages Assessed Separately
- 1 — ELIGIBILITY: who can potentially perform the task.
- 2 — RANKING / RECOMMENDATION: in what order eligible providers are presented.
- 3 — FINAL SELECTION: who ultimately performs the task.
- Taskrabbit evidence is analysed against each stage independently; evidence for one does not carry to the others.
Historical Performance Input
- Taskrabbit has previously disclosed that past performance affects client search position; that material is dated in the Evidence Register.
- More recent Elite functionality calculates provider performance based on invitations and invoiced tasks within skill and metro groupings.
- Search ranking is not automatically equivalent to future task-schedule adjustment.
Patent Architecture Beyond Publicly Observed Functionality
The following matters are contemplated by the patent architecture and have not been established from Taskrabbit's public material. Absence of public evidence is not evidence that the functionality is absent from the company's internal technology stack.
- System-determined selection producing a schedule without a human choice step is contemplated architecturally and is not publicly established.
Evidence Confidence
Eligibility inputs are directly evidenced; ranking factors are described qualitatively in provider-facing material, but the ranking function itself is not disclosed.
Strategic Interpretation
- Conflating eligibility, ranking, selection and scheduling is the most common analytical error in this field; keeping them apart is essential to a defensible position.
- The architecture's reach is greatest precisely where the human step currently sits.
Page Conclusion
Strong / Material Technical Correspondence
Provider subset generation shows material technical correspondence with the patent architecture. The exact patent threshold logic is not publicly established.