Ex Parte Shondel

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardJul 30, 2018

14295725 (P.T.A.B. Jul. 30, 2018)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 14/295,725 06/04/2014 23446 7590 08/01/2018 MCANDREWS HELD & MALLOY, LTD 500 WEST MADISON STREET SUITE 3400 CHICAGO, IL 60661 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR James W. Shondel 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. 26713US02 7396 EXAMINER WONG, ALLEN C ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2488 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 08/01/2018 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): mhmpto@mcandrews-ip.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte JAMES W. SHONDEL Appeal2017-008886 Application 14/295, 725 Technology Center 2400 Before CARLA M. KRIVAK, JON M. JURGOV AN, and MICHAEL M. BARRY, Administrative Patent Judges. JURGOV AN, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellant seeks review under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 134(a) from the Examiner's Final Rejection of claims 1--4, 6-7, 9--24, and 26-30, constituting the only claims pending in this application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 6(b). We reverse. 1 1 Our Decision refers to the Specification ("Spec.") filed June 4, 2014, the Final Office Action ("Final Act.") mailed September 15, 2016, the Appeal Brief ("App. Br.") filed December 29, 2016, the Examiner's Answer ("Ans.") mailed April 3, 2017, and the Reply Brief ("Reply Br.") filed June 2, 2017. Appeal2017-008886 Application 14/295,725 CLAIMED INVENTION The claims are directed to using an unmanned aerial vehicle (UA V) to maintain an inventory record of shipping vessels at a storage facility. Spec. Abstract. Claim 1, which is representative of the claimed invention, is reproduced below with emphasis to show the claim limitation at issue in this case: 1. An aerial inventory system for maintaining an inventory record of shipping vessels at a storage facility, the aerial inventory system comprising: an unmanned aerial vehicle having a detector and a transceiver, the detector configured to detect an identifier of the shipping vessel, the transceiver configured to transmit information relating to the identifier detected by the detector; and an operator device having a processor and a display, the operator device being configured to receive information transmitted from the transceiver relating to the detected identifier and control display of at least a portion of the information on the display, the operator device being configured to control at least a portion of a flight path of the unmanned aerial vehicle, and the operator device being configured to determine a location of the identifier detected by the detector, wherein the location is determined at least in part on an altitude of the unmanned aerial vehicle. App. Br. ("Claims App 'x") (Emphasis added). REJECTIONS Claims 1--4, 6, 7, 9--24, and 26-29 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103 based on Ong (JinHock Ong, Mobile RFID System for Inventory Automation, Thesis Submission to the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, February 2 Appeal2017-008886 Application 14/295,725 2008) and Zimmerman (US 2008/0077511 Al, publ. March 27, 2008). Final Act. 5-19. Claim 30 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103 based on Ong, Zimmerman2 and Huck (Robert C. Huck et al., Aerial surveillance vehicles augment security at shipping ports, Unmanned/Unattended Sensors and Sensor Networks, Proc. ofSPIE Vol. 7112, 711201Â©2008 SPIE). Final Act. 19-20. ANALYSIS Â§ 103 Rejections Claims 1 and 17 Claim 1 recites "the operator device being configured to determine a location of the identifier detected by the detector, wherein the location is determined at least in part on an altitude of the unmanned aerial vehicle." App. Br. (Claims App'x) (emphasis added). Independent claim 17 recites a similar limitation. Id. The Examiner contends these features are obvious in view of the combination of Ong and Zimmerman. Final Act. 5- 7, 16; Ans. 14--21. To the contrary, Appellant contends the combination of Ong and Zimmerman fails to teach or suggest the above contested limitation. App. Br. 9-13; Reply Br. 3-8. Specifically, Appellant contends "Ong's only disclosure of altitude relates to navigation sensors needed for autonomous flight control including sonar sensors and altimeters to detect obstacles and to avoid crashing when landing." App. Br. 10 (citing Ong, p. 28, Â§ 3.2.2, 2 Although the rejection heading (Final Act. 19) mentions only Ong and Huck, the body of the rejection (Final Act. 19-20) makes clear the Examiner is relying on the combination of Ong, Zimmerman, and Huck. 3 Appeal2017-008886 Application 14/295,725 ,r 1 ). Appellant further contends "[ t ]he mere disclosure of an altimeter to avoid crashing when landing does not teach the claimed determination of the location of the detected identifier based at least in part on the altitude of the unmanned aerial vehicle." Id. at 10-11. Appellant further argues the rejection is deficient because "Zimmerman is wholly unrelated to aerial vehicles, let alone determining a location of a detected identifier based at least in part on an altitude of an unmanned aerial vehicle." Id. at 11. Appellant contends: Zimmerman discloses a mobile inventory robot that travels a store floor on wheels 340 to identify items on shelves by capturing a shelf image, decoding a product barcode from the captured shelf image, retrieving a product image for the decoded product barcode from a product database, segmenting the captured shelf image to detect an image of an item on the shelves, determining whether the detected image matches the retrieved image, and if not, setting an out-of-stock flag for an item." App. Br. 11 ( citing Zimmerman ,r,r 14, 62). We agree with Appellant that the combination of Ong and Zimmerman fails to teach or suggest the claimed limitation. Although Ong uses altimeters for collision avoidance, the cited parts of Ong do not mention using a UA V's altitude for determining the location of a shipping vessel's identifier. Thus, the Final Office Action errs in finding that Ong teaches or suggests this feature. Final Act. 7. Although Zimmerman's inventory robot "can travel the store floor and image the shelves with cameras to detect out-of-stock items and report on the appearance and placement of products on the shelves (Zimmerman - ,r 14 )" (Final Act. 7), the Final Office Action does not identify where in 4 Appeal2017-008886 Application 14/295,725 Zimmerman a UA V's altitude is used for determining the location of an identifier on a shipping vessel. "Rejections on obviousness cannot be sustained with mere conclusory statements; instead, there must be some articulated reasoning with some rational underpinning to support the legal conclusion of obviousness." KSR Int'!. Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398,418 (2007) (quoting In re Kahn, 441 F.3d 977, 988 (Fed. Cir. 2006)). Without a rational underpinning for the finding that the cited art teaches or suggests the disputed limitation, we agree with Appellant that the Examiner has not shown these claim limitations are taught or suggested by the prior art combination. Having decided the Appeal on this basis, we do not reach Appellant's remaining arguments for patentability. Claim 30 Claim 30 depends from claim 17 and thus incorporates its limitations. The Final Office Action rejects claim 30 over the combination of Ong, Zimmerman, and Huck. Final Act. 19--20; Ans. 24--25. Huck teaches an aerial surveillance vehicle (ASV) in semi-autonomous flight can use camcorders with optical zoom capability to resolve license plate numbers, container numbers, and personnel at a shipping port. Huck p. 8, ,r 3, 11. 5-7. However, there is no indication in the Final Office Action or Answer that Huck teaches or suggests use of a UA V's altitude to determine location of a 5 Appeal2017-008886 Application 14/295,725 shipping vessel's identifier. Accordingly, as Appellant contends (App. Br. 19), Huck fails to overcome the deficiencies of Ong and Zimmerman. Remaining Claims The remaining claims depend from independent claims 1 and 1 7. As we do not sustain the rejections of claims 1 and 17, we also do not sustain the rejections of the remaining dependent claims. DECISION We reverse the rejections of claims 1--4, 6, 7, 9--24, and 26-30 under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103. REVERSED 6