Ex Parte Park et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 25, 2012

11683306 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 25, 2012)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte SE KI PARK and GI CHERL KIM
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Appeal 2010-005439
Application 11/683,306
Technology Center 2800
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Before JOHN A. JEFFERY, STANLEY M. WEINBERG, and JENNIFER
L. MCKEOWN, Administrative Patent Judges.

JEFFERY, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
rejection of claims 1-14. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We
affirm.

STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants’ backlight assembly includes (1) plural light-emitting
diode (LED) packages arranged on a substrate, and (2) a lens unit with
partially overlapping lenses. See generally Abstract; ¶ 0050; Figs. 2-4.
Claim 1 is illustrative:
1. A light source module, comprising:

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a substrate;

a plurality of light-emitting diode (LED) packages arranged on the
substrate; and

a lens unit comprising a plurality of lenses partially overlapping with
each other, the lens unit disposed on the plurality of LED packages,

wherein a first lens corresponding to a first LED package partially
overlaps with a second lens corresponding to a second LED package.

THE REJECTIONS
1. The Examiner rejected claims 1-6 and 9 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
as unpatentable over Aoyama (US 5,694,246; Dec. 2, 1997) and Harrah (US
6,498,355 B1; Dec. 24, 2002). Ans. 4-5, 8.1,2
2. The Examiner rejected claims 7 and 8 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Aoyama, Harrah, and Hamada (US 2005/0141244 A1;
June 30, 2005). Ans. 5-6, 8-9.
3. The Examiner rejected claims 10-13 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Hamada, Aoyama, and Harrah. Ans. 6-7, 9-11.
4. The Examiner rejected claim 14 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Hong (US 2005/0007516 A1; Jan. 13, 2005), Aoyama,
and Harrah. Ans. 7, 11-12.

1 Throughout this opinion, we refer to (1) the Appeal Brief filed June 8,
2009 (supplemented July 31, 2009 (“Supp. Br.”)); (2) the Examiner’s
Answer mailed November 2, 2009; and (3) the Reply Brief filed January 4,
2010.
2 Since the Examiner provides additional “detailed rationale” in connection
with the grounds of rejection (Ans. 8-12), we cite that rationale here in
connection with the rejections.
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THE OBVIOUSNESS REJECTION OVER AOYAMA AND HARRAH
The Examiner finds that Aoyama discloses a substrate and a lens unit
with partially overlapping lenses, but lacks first and second lenses
corresponding to respective LED packages, but cites Harrah as teaching this
feature in concluding that the claim would have been obvious. Ans. 4-5, 8,
12-14.
Appellants argue that since Aoyama’s microlens array is in a different
“art unit” than that of Harrah, a reference that is said to confront the problem
of LED arrays’ inferior heat dissipation and bendability, skilled artisans
would not look to Harrah to modify Aoyama as proposed. Supp. Br. 3-43;
Reply Br. 4-5. According to Appellants, since Aoyama’s intended purpose
is to not have an integral light source, modifying Aoyama to have integral
light sources would change Aoyama’s principle of operation and render
Aoyama’s lens array unsuitable for its intended purpose. Supp. Br. 4-5;
Reply Br. 6-7. Appellants add that the cited prior art does not teach the
recited lens unit with partially overlapping lenses corresponding to
respective LED packages. Supp. Br. 5; Reply Br. 7-8.

ISSUES
(1) Under § 103, has the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 by
finding that Aoyama and Harrah collectively would have taught or suggested
a lens unit disposed on plural LED packages, where the lens unit has

3 Since Appellants’ Supplemental Brief replaces the Appeal Brief’s
arguments section (compare Supp. Br. 2-7 with App. Br. 6-12), we refer to
the Supplemental Brief in connection with these arguments for clarity.
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partially overlapping lenses such that first and second lenses correspond to
respective LED packages?
(2) Is the Examiner’s reason to combine the teachings of these
references supported by articulated reasoning with some rational
underpinning to justify the Examiner’s obviousness conclusion? This issue
turns on whether (a) the references constitute analogous art, and (b)
combining the references renders Aoyama unsuitable for its intended
purpose.

ANALYSIS
On this record, we find no error in the Examiner’s obviousness
rejection of representative claim 1. As the Examiner indicates (Ans. 4, 8,
12-13), Aoyama’s lens unit in Figures 7 and 8 has partially overlapping
lenses 11, 12. Aoyama, col. 6, ll. 7-15. And these lenses are used with
corresponding “light emitting elements” such that beams emitting from these
elements are coupled to the lenses for collimation. Ans. 12-13 (citing
Aoyama, col. 10, ll. 51-57).
Although the Examiner acknowledges that Aoyama’s light emitting
elements are not LED packages that respectively correspond to particular
lenses in the array, the Examiner nonetheless cites Harrah for teaching this
feature in concluding that the claim would have been obvious. Ans. 4-5, 8,
12-14. We see no error in this reasoning, for Harrah disposes lenses 26 over
LEDs to collect and direct emitted light (Harrah, col. 4, ll. 1-11; )—a
teaching that is readily applicable to Aoyama’s array of partially-
overlapping lenses associated with light emitting elements as noted above.
Even assuming, without deciding, that Aoyama’s system is limited to light
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sources that are not integral with the lenses as Appellants contend, that
hardly persuasively rebuts the Examiner’s position that using LED light
sources that correspond to respective lenses in Aoyama would have been
obvious. In short, providing lenses associated with respective LED
packages in view of Aoyama’s and Harrah’s collective teachings merely
predictably uses prior art elements according to their established functions—
an obvious improvement. See KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398,
417 (2007). That Aoyama arranges each lens of array 30 to correspond with
respective photodiode elements 41 (Aoyama, col. 10, l. 13; Fig. 21) only
bolsters our conclusion that providing first and second lenses corresponding
to respective LED packages as claimed would have been obvious.
Appellants’ combinability arguments are unavailing. First,
Appellants’ contention that Aoyama and Harrah are in different “art units”
(Supp. Br. 3; Reply Br. 5) is puzzling, since no information regarding the
USPTO’s administrative division of technologies into art units is disclosed
in those references. In any event, to the extent that Appellants’ argument
pertains to the references’ different classifications on the references’ front
pages, that is hardly persuasive evidence that the references constitute
analogous art4 which must be either (1) from the same field of endeavor
regardless of the problem addressed, or (2) reasonably pertinent to the
particular problem with which the inventor is involved. In re Bigio, 381
F.3d 1320, 1325 (Fed. Cir. 2004). Both references are at least in the same
field of endeavor as Appellants’ invention, namely light sources.

4 See In re Mlot-Fijalkowski, 676 F.2d 666, 670 n.5 (CCPA 1982) (noting
that evidence of divergent classification “is inherently weak . . . because
considerations in forming a classification system differ from those relating
to a person of ordinary skill seeking solution for a particular problem”).
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Second, Appellants’ contention that modifying Aoyama to include
integral light sources would allegedly render Aoyama unsuitable for its
intended purpose (Supp. Br. 4-5; Reply Br. 6-7) is not only speculative and
unsubstantiated, but is unpersuasive for the reasons noted above.
Lastly, leaving aside Appellants’ somewhat puzzling reference to
Harrah’s non-overlapping “lenses 70 and 71 and LED packages 10 and 11”
(Supp. Br. 5; Reply Br. 8)—reference numerals that either do not exist in
Harrah or refer to different elements5—Appellants’ argument nonetheless
ignores the Examiner’s reliance on Aoyama for teaching partially
overlapping lenses as noted above. In short, we find that Aoyama and
Harrah collectively teach or suggest the limitations of claim 1, and that the
Examiner’s reason to combine these teachings is supported by articulated
reasoning with some rational underpinning to justify the Examiner’s
obviousness conclusion.
We are therefore not persuaded that the Examiner erred in rejecting
representative claim 1, and claims 2-6 and 9 not separately argued with
particularity.

THE OTHER OBVIOUSNESS REJECTIONS
We also sustain the Examiner’s obviousness rejections of claims 7, 8,
and 10-14. Ans. 7, 8, 10-14. Despite nominally arguing these claims
separately, Appellants reiterate similar arguments made in connection with
claim 1 and allege that the additional cited references fail to cure those
purported deficiencies. Supp. Br. 5-7; Reply Br. 8-10. We are not

5 See, e.g., Harrah, col. 2, l. 52 (referring to dielectric layer 10).
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persuaded by these arguments, however, for the reasons previously
discussed.

CONCLUSION
The Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 1-14 under § 103.

ORDER
The Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1-14 is affirmed.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED

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