Ex Parte Thompson et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Aug 11, 2017

12905937 (P.T.A.B. Aug. 11, 2017)

United States Patent and Trademark Office
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
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
12/905,937 10/15/2010 David Scott Thompson 61083US010 9078
32692 7590 08/15/2017
3M INNOVATIVE PROPERTIES COMPANY
PO BOX 33427
ST. PAUL, MN 55133-3427
EXAMINER
PAYNE, SHARON E
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2875
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
08/15/2017 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):
LegalUSDocketing@mmm.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte DAVID SCOTT THOMPSON, CRAIG R. SCHARDT, BRIAN W.
OSTLIE, SCOTT J. KIENITZ, and JOHN A. WHEATLEY
Appeal 2016-006979
Application 12/905,937
Technology Center 2800
Before TERRY J. OWENS, JULIA HEANEY, and
MICHAEL G. McMANUS, Administrative Patent Judges.
HEANEY, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL1
Appellants2 seek our review pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner’s decision finally rejecting claims 1—11 and 14—19 of Application
12/905,937. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We reverse.
1 This Decision refers to the Specification dated Oct. 15, 2010 (“Spec.”),
Final Rejection dated June 6, 2015 (“Final Act.”), Examiner’s Answer dated
May 5, 2016 (“Ans.”), and Reply Brief dated July 5, 2016 (“Reply Br.”).
2 Appellants identify the real parties in interest as 3M Company and its
affiliate 3M Innovative Properties Company. App. Br. 2.
Appeal 2016-006979
Application 12/905,937
BACKGROUND
The subject matter on appeal relates to a direct-lit backlight suitable
for use in a liquid crystal display (LCD) display. Spec. 1. The backlight
includes a back reflector and a curved transflector that forms a concave
structure facing the back reflector to provide a light recycling cavity. App.
Br. 2. According to the Specification, the concavity of the transflector
effectively provides uniform illumination throughout the area of the
recycling cavity, even when using sparsely arranged discrete light sources
such as LEDs, and also effectively mixes light from different colored LEDs.
Spec. 3,11. 3-7.
Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of the subject matter:
1. A direct-lit backlight having an output area,
comprising:
a back reflector;
a curved transflector that partially transmits and
partially reflects incident light, the curved transflector
being shaped to form at least one concave structure facing
the back reflector to provide one or more recycling cavities
therebetween, the one or more recycling cavities
substantially filling the output area of the backlight; and
at least one light source disposed behind the output
area to inject light into the one or more recycling cavities;
wherein the curved transflector consists essentially
of a structure selected from the group of a semi-reflective
film and a light deflecting film.
App. Br. 8, Claims Appx.
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Appeal 2016-006979
Application 12/905,937
THE REJECTIONS
1. Claims 1—11 and 15—19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
as unpatentable over the combination of Marshall,3 Nakayama,4
and Holman.5
2. Claim 14 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable
over the combination of Marshall, Nakayama, Holman, and
Kalt.6
DISCUSSION
The Examiner finds that Marshall’s collimator 187 corresponds to the
curved transflector recited in claim 1, and is shaped to form a recycling
cavity having basically the same structure as shown in Figs. 3a and 3b of the
Specification. Final Act. 3; Ans. 3. The Examiner further finds that the top
wall 20 of Marshall’s collimator corresponds to claim 1 ’s “output area of the
backlight” and that LED chips 16G, 16R, 16B are disposed behind the
output area and inject light into the recycling cavity. Id. The Examiner
relies on Nakayama’s teaching of a back reflector as corresponding to the
back reflector recited in claim 1, and Holman’s teaching of a reflective
multi-layer prism film as corresponding to “a structure selected from the
group of semi-reflective film and a light-detecting film” recited in claim 1.
3 Marshall et al. (US 2003/0076034 Al, published Apr. 24, 2003)
(“Marshall”).
4 Nakayama et al. (US 2001/0021110 Al, published Sept. 13, 2001)
(“Nakayama”).
5 Holman et al. (US 2004/0218390 Al, published Nov. 4, 2004) (“Holman”).
6 Kalt (US 5,638,084, issued June 10, 1997) (“Kalt”).
7 Labels to elements are presented in bold font, regardless of their
presentation in the original document.
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Appeal 2016-006979
Application 12/905,937
Final Act. 3^4 (providing citations to Nakayama and Holman). The
Examiner determines it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary
skill in the art to use Nakayama’s back reflector in Marshall’s structure “to
reflect light coming down from the light source up to the lens” and to use
Holman’s reflective film in Marshall’s apparatus to “make the apparatus
more compact.” Id.
Appellants argue inter alia that the Examiner erred because Marshall
provides one-directional high collimation that a person of ordinary skill in
the art would have known to be “extremely undesirable for a backlight for a
display” because of its unacceptably narrow viewing angle. App. Br. 5;
Reply Br. 5—6. Appellants further argue that a person of ordinary skill
would not have used Holman’s prism film with Marshall’s collimator
because if the light deflecting prism film were optically coupled to a light
guide as Marshall teaches, the prism film would no longer act as a light
detecting film. App. Br. 6.
Appellants’ argument is persuasive of reversible error. The Examiner
has the initial duty of supplying the requisite factual basis for obviousness
and may not “resort to speculation, unfounded assumptions, or hindsight
reconstruction to supply deficiencies in [the] factual basis.” In re Warner,
379 F.2d 1011, 1016—17 (CCPA 1967). Here, the findings underlying the
determination of obviousness are based on an unfounded assumption that
Marshall’s collimator would partially transmit and partially reflect incident
light within a recycling cavity formed by the concave structure of the
collimator. We find persuasive Appellants’ argument that Marshall’s
collimator would provide an unacceptably narrow viewing angle for a direct-
lit backlight as recited in claim 1. Further, the Examiner’s response that
Marshall suggests the use of its collimator for a backlight (Ans. 3, citing
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Appeal 2016-006979
Application 12/905,937
Marshall 123) is not persuasive because Marshall explains that its LED
package is primarily intended for edge lit (not direct lit) backlights.
Marshall 23—24. Further, the Examiner’s Answer does not address the
incompatibility of Marshall and Holman, as raised by Appellants.
Accordingly, we cannot sustain the rejection of claim 1. Our
conclusion also applies to all of the rejections of independent and dependent
claims because each of the rejections is based on a combination of Marshall
and Holman for the same reason.
DECISION
We reverse the rejections of claims 1—11 and 14—19.
REVERSED
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