Ex Parte Brown et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardOct 12, 2016

12982776 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 12, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 12/982,776 12/30/2010 46320 7590 10/14/2016 CRGOLAW STEVEN M. GREENBERG 7900 Glades Road SUITE 520 BOCA RATON, FL 33434 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Kevin C. Brown UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O. Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www .uspto.gov ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. RSW920100129US1 (675) 9032 EXAMINER CAMPBELL, SHANNON S ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3628 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 10/14/2016 ELECTRONIC Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address( es): docketing@crgolaw.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte KEVIN C. BROWN, JAMES BILLINGHAM, DAVID C. CONWAY-JONES, ROBERTS. SMART, and GRAHAM WHITE Appeal2014-002273 Application 12/982,776 Technology Center 3600 Before JOSEPH A. FISCHETTI, NINA L. MEDLOCK, and AMEE A. SHAH, Administrative Patent Judges. SHAH, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON REQUEST FOR REHEARING STATEMENT OF THE CASE The Appellants filed a Request for Rehearing/Reconsideration ("Request"), dated July 11, 2016, seeking reconsideration under 37 C.F.R. Â§ 41.52 of our Decision on Appeal entered May 11, 2016 ("Decision"), in which we affirmed the Examiner's rejection of claims 1-15 under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103(a). We have jurisdiction over the Request under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 6(b). Appeal2014-002273 Application 12/982,776 DISCUSSION The Appellants allege in the Request that "at least one finding of the Honorable Board appears to be unsupported by substantial evidence and further, the Honorable Board appears to have misapprehended or overlooked certain arguments presented by Appellants in the Appeal Brief of June 18, 2013 (hereinafter the "Appeal Br.")." Request 2. We have considered our Decision in light of the Appellants' arguments in the Request, and we find no error therein. We first note that in their Request, the Appellants do not point out which specific finding( s) of the Board are unsupported, nor present any argument or evidence as to why any findings are unsupported. The Appellants' arguments that claim 1 requires the determination of whether a contact also ordered a product "so that the e-commerce computing application prompt the purchaser to consolidate shipment of the product ordered by the purchaser with a product ordered by the contact," that "the purpose is to capitalize on the fortuitous circumstance of the purchaser and the contact known to the purchaser by way of the social network to achieve efficiencies through a consolidated shipment," and that "in Webb, there is no fortuitous circumstance because the orders of the individuals are coordinated in advance by the 'organizer"' (Request 4) are new arguments that were not presented in the Appeal Brief and thus not permitted. To the extent these arguments are not newly presented in the Request, they repeat the arguments on page 10 of the Appeal Brief. To this extent, these arguments were neither misapprehended nor overlooked because page 10 of the Appeal Brief presented the arguments: that claim 1 requires that "the 'contact' and 'purchaser' do not have knowledge about each other's orders;" that claim 1 2 Appeal2014-002273 Application 12/982,776 does not require "the product order by the 'contact' . . . to be the same type of product ordered by the 'purchaser';" and that "[i]n general, the Appellants' claimed invention is conceptually different from the [sic] Webb's invention." As we explained in the Decision on pages 5---6, these arguments were found unpersuasive. We further addressed the Appellants' argument presented on pages 9-10 of the Appeal Brief that claim 1 requires that "the purchaser, not the 'contact', is being prompted to consolidate the shipment," finding it unpersuasive. See Dec. 5. We are not persuaded that we misapprehended or overlooked any arguments presented in the Appeal Brief in rendering our Decision. Therefore, we decline to modify our original Decision. DECISION The Appellants' Request has been granted to the extent that we have reconsidered our Decision in light of the Appellants' Request, but is denied in all other respects. DENIED 3