Ex Parte Hagan

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jun 22, 2017

13792516 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 22, 2017)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
131792,516 03/11/2013
28395 7590 06/26/2017
BROOKS KUSHMAN P.C./FG1L
1000 TOWN CENTER
22NDFLOOR
SOUTHFIELD, MI 48075-1238
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Daniel Lee Hagan Jr.
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.
83195152 7745
EXAMINER
ZIAEIANMEHDIZADEH, NA VID
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
3669
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
06/26/2017 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@brookskushman.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte DANIEL LEE HAGAN JR.
Appeal 2016-006223
Application 13/792,516 1
Technology Center 3600
Before THU A. DANG, JAMES W. DEJMEK, and JOYCE CRAIG,
Administrative Patent Judges.
CRAIG, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's
Final Rejection of claims 1, 3-12, 14--16, and 18-22, which are all of the
claims pending in this application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C.
§ 6(b ).
We affirm.
1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is Ford Global
Technologies, LLC. App. Br. 3.
Appeal2016-006223
Application 13/792,516
INVENTION
Appellant's application relates to a potential chassis damage
identification and notification system. Abstract. Claim 1 is illustrative of
the appealed subject matter and reads as follows:
1. A potential chassis damage notification system for a vehicle
compnsmg:
an accelerometer configured to provide a vertical
acceleration data of a component of the vehicle; and
a controller programmed to receive the data, compare the
data to a potential damage range having a lower limit indicating
normal operation of the vehicle and an upper limit that would
set-off a supplemental restraint, and send a potential-chassis-
damage signal when the data is within the potential-damage
range.
REJECTIONS
Claims 1, 3---6, 14--16, 18, 19, 21, and 22 stand rejected under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over the combination of Hopp et al. (DE
102009053404 Al; published May 19, 2011) ("Hopp"), Harada (US
2012/0053791 Al; published Mar. 1, 2012), and Carlstedt et al. (US
2007 /0032952 Al; published Feb. 8, 2007) ("Carlstedt").
Claim 7 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over
the combination of Hopp, Harada, Carlstedt, and Gloos et al. (US
2013/0158779 Al; published June 20, 2013) ("Gloos").
Claims 8-12 and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over the combination of Hopp, Harada, Carlstedt, and Adachi
(US 7,973,653 B2; issued July 5, 2011).
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Application 13/792,516
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner's rejections in light of Appellant's
contentions that the Examiner has erred. We disagree with Appellant's
contentions. Except as noted below, we adopt as our own: (1) the findings
and reasons set forth by the Examiner in the action from which this appeal is
taken and (2) the reasons set forth by the Examiner in the Examiner's
Answer in response to Appellant's Appeal Brief. We concur with the
conclusions reached by the Examiner. We highlight the following additional
points.
Appellant contends the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 over the
prior art for several reasons. First, Appellant argues that the Examiner
provided an insufficient rationale to combine Harada with Hopp. App. Br.
9. Appellant argues that Harada does not concern chassis damage at all. Id.
Appellant further argues that "none of the prior art discloses any potential-
chassis-damage signals based on vertical movement data." Id.
Appellant's arguments do not persuade us of Examiner error. The
Examiner provided "articulated reasoning with some rational underpinning
to support the legal conclusion of obviousness." Final Act. 3; In re Kahn,
441 F.3d 977, 988 (Fed. Cir. 2006). Moreover, in the Answer, the Examiner
explained that it is reasonable to combine Hopp, which is directed to
detecting potential damage based on a vehicle's lateral acceleration to a
vehicle chassis, with Harada's vertical acceleration sensors to achieve the
claimed invention because an artisan of ordinary skill would have known
that a vertical accelerometer is better suited "to detect damage to chassis due
to bumps on the road while a longitudinal accelerometer is better suited to
detect damage caused by direct and side impact to a vehicle." Ans. 4.
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Application 13/792,516
Appellant has not presented sufficient persuasive argument or objective
evidence to rebut the Examiner's findings. See Reply Br. 2.
Second, Appellant argues that there is no teaching in the cited art of
the limitation "a controller programmed to receive the data, compare the
data to a potential damage range having a lower limit indicating normal
operation of the vehicle and an upper limit that would set-off a supplemental
restraint, and send a potential-chassis-damage signal when the data is within
the potential-damage range." App. Br. 9. Appellant argues that "the entire
control strategy of Hopp evaluates vehicle speed" (id.), and, thus, even if the
vertical accelerometers of Harada were included in the vehicle of Hopp,
"nothing in Hopp would provide the claimed control strategy of receiving,
comparing, and sending potential-chassis-damage signals based all based on
vertical acceleration data" (id. at 9--10).
Appellant's arguments are unpersuasive because combining the
teachings of Hopp and Harada does not mandate bodily incorporation of
their embodiments. See In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425 (CCPA 1981) ("The
test for obviousness is not whether the features of a secondary reference may
be bodily incorporated into the structure of the primary reference .... Rather,
the test is what the combined teachings of the references would have
suggested to those of ordinary skill in the art."). Moreover, Appellant has
not persuaded us that combining the respective familiar elements of the cited
references in the manner proffered by the Examiner would have been
"uniquely challenging or difficult for one of ordinary skill in the art" at the
time of Appellant's invention. Leapfrog Enters., Inc. v. Fisher-Price, Inc.,
485 F.3d 1157, 1162 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (citing KSR, 550 U.S. at 418).
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Appeal2016-006223
Application 13/792,516
Third, Appellant argues that the combination of Carlstedt with Hopp
and Harada would only teach sending a potential damage signal when the
acceleration rises to the level necessary to set off the supplemental restraints.
App. Br. 10. Appellant argues that "[n]othing in Carlstedt teaches doing
anything if potential-damage is done to the vehicle that is not large enough
to set-off the supplemental restraint system." Id.
Appellant's argument is unpersuasive at least because it is based on
the premise that claim 1 requires sending a potential-chassis-damage signal
when the damage does not rise to the level necessary to activate the
supplemental restraint system. See id. at 11. The plain language of claim 1,
however, recites "a potential damage range having a lower limit indicating
normal operation of the vehicle and an upper limit that would set-off a
supplemental restraint." Claim App 'x 1. Claim 1 also recites a controller
programmed to send a potential-chassis-damage-signal "when the data is
within the potential-damage range." Id. Appellant has not presented claim
construction arguments sufficient to persuade us that a data value equal to
the "upper limit" is not "within the potential-damage range" in claim 1.
Even assuming, however, that claim 1 requires sending a potential-
chassis-damage signal when the damage does not rise to the level necessary
to activate the supplemental restraint system, the Examiner found that
Carlstedt at least suggests that a warning is given to the driver before
potential damage occurs that is not large enough to set-off the supplemental
restraints. Ans. 6 (citing Carlstedt i-fi-136, 45--46). Appellant does not
persuasively rebut the Examiner's findings based on Carlstedt. See Reply
Br. 3--4. Instead, Appellant further argues that in claim 1 an "actual" impact
event is sensed by the accelerometer and compared to the range, whereas
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Application 13/792,516
Carlstedt merely sends warnings based on potential upcoming impact events.
Id. at 3. The plain language of claim 1, however, does not recite an "actual"
impact event, and we decline Appellant's invitation to import those terms
into the claim.
For these reasons, we are not persuaded that the Examiner erred in
finding that the combination of Hopp, Harada, and Carlstedt teach the
disputed limitations of claim 1.
Accordingly, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection of
independent claim 1 and of dependent claims 3-12, 14, 15, and 21, for
which Appellant makes no separate arguments for patentability.
Turning to independent claim 16, Appellant makes arguments similar
to those presented for claim 1. See App. Br. 11. We find those arguments
unpersuasive for the reasons given above for claim 1. In addition, Appellant
argues that "even the combined teachings of the prior art fail to teach
comparing sprung-mass and un-sprung mass data from two different
accelerometers in order to detect potential-chassis damage." Id. at 12.
We are not persuaded by Appellant's arguments. The Examiner
found that Harada teaches two different accelerometers and that the values
of the two different accelerometers are compared to one another in order to
perform subsequent vehicle control. Final Act. 6; Ans. 8 (citing Harada,
items 10, 11, Figs. 1, 2, i-fi-126-28, 53). Appellant presents insufficient
persuasive argument or objective evidence to rebut the Examiner's findings.
Appellant also argues that the Examiner engaged in impermissible
hindsight because the Examiner used Appellant's own teachings as a
motivation to combine Harada with Hopp. App. Br. 11.
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Application 13/792,516
We disagree. The Examiner found that Harada teaches measuring
both sprung and unsprung mass accelerations and calculating their
difference. Ans. 8 (citing Harada i-fi-126-28, 53). The Examiner noted that
an artisan of ordinary skill would have appreciated that measuring the
difference in vertical accelerations rather than only one of the vertical
acceleration components provides a more realistic metric of relative
movement between the two vehicle components (i.e., sprung and unsprung
masses). Id. Appellants failed to persuasively rebut the Examiner's
findings. We are also not persuaded the combination of Hopp and Harada is
based upon improper hindsight because the Examiner has set forth
articulated reasoning with rational underpinnings for the combination. Id.
For these reasons, we are not persuaded that the Examiner erred in
finding that the combination of Hopp, Harada, and Carlstedt teach the
disputed limitations of claim 16.
Accordingly, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection of
independent claim 16, as well as the 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection of
independent claim 22, which Appellant argues is patentable for similar
reasons. App. Br. 12. We also sustain the Examiner's rejection of
dependent claims 18-20, for which Appellant makes no separate arguments
for patentability.
DECISION
We affirm the decision of the Examiner rejecting claims 1, 3-12,
14--16, and 18-22.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l )(iv).
AFFIRMED
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