Initially I thought the "hole" was meant to be enclosed within the airframe, but it is there. See Fig 2 - Fig 8 in the patent application. They have even diagrammed a method for boarding passengers using retractable escalators from parallel hatches located on the forward and aft planes of the inner-torus, as well as using an elevator to board passengers from within the hole! Fig 9 - Fig 16 diagram the invention applied to a more conventional airframe (without the hole).

The patent title is "aircraft including a passenger cabin extending around a space defined outside the cabin and inside the aircraft." My understanding is that the patent covers the torus-shaped passenger cabin within any larger aerodynamic envelope as a method of reducing constraints related to cabin pressurization (the "hole" is incidental). Very interesting stuff. I'm not an aeronautical engineer or patent attorney.