Eric Y. Chan et al.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Sep 23, 2019

13896430 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Sep. 23, 2019)

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.
13/896,430 05/17/2013 Eric Y. Chan 13-0307-US-
NP (24691-635)
4482
60476 7590 09/23/2019
PATENT DOCKET DEPARTMENT
ARMSTRONG TEASDALE LLP
7700 Forsyth Boulevard
Suite 1800
St. Louis, MO 63105
EXAMINER
DANG, PHONG H
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2185
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/23/2019 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):
USpatents@armstrongteasdale.com
patentadmin@boeing.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte ERIC Y. CHAN, HENRY B. PANG,
and TUONG KIEN TRUONG
____________

Appeal 2018-008875
Application 13/896,430
Technology Center 2100
____________

Before JOHN A. EVANS, CARL L. SILVERMAN, and
STEVEN M. AMUNDSON, Administrative Patent Judges.

EVANS, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appellant1 seeks our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner’s Final Rejection of all pending claims, i.e., claims 1–4 and 6–20.
App. Br. 1–2. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).

1 We refer collectively to the inventors as “Appellant.” The Appeal Brief
identifies The Boeing Company as the real party in interest. App. Br. 1.
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Application 13/896,430

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We REVERSE.2
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
The claims relate to a data communications system. See Abstract.

INVENTION
Claims 1, 8, and 17 are independent. An understanding of the
invention can be derived from a reading of illustrative claim 1, which is
reproduced below with some formatting added:
1. A data communication system comprising:
a plastic optical fiber (POF) data bus;
a line replacement unit comprising:
a terminal controller configured to transmit and
receive electrical signals for communication with said
POF data bus; and
a plastic optical fiber serial interface module
(POFSIM) coupled directly to said terminal controller
and further coupled to said POF data bus,
wherein said POFSIM comprises
a mating connector that extends from said
POFSIM and comprises a transmit metal hermetic feed-
through tube within which a transmit light pipe is

2 Rather than reiterate the arguments of Appellant and the Examiner, we
refer to the Appeal Brief (filed March 28, 2018, “App. Br.”), the Reply Brief
(filed September 13, 2018, “Reply Br.”), the Examiner’s Answer (mailed
July 13, 2018, “Ans.”), the Final Action (mailed August 25, 2017, “Final
Act.”), and the Specification (filed May 17, 2013, “Spec.”) for their
respective details.
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mounted, and a receive metal hermetic feed-through tube
within which a receive light pipe is mounted,
and wherein said POFSIM is configured to:
transmit digital optical signals based on the
electrical signals received from said terminal controller
through said transmit light pipe; and
transmit electrical signals, to said terminal
controller, based on digital optical signals received from
said receive light pipe;
a transmit POF coupled to said mating connector and
optically coupled, within said transmit metal hermetic feed-
through tube, to said transmit light pipe and further optically
coupled to said POF data bus; and
a receive POF coupled to said mating connector and
optically coupled, within said receive metal hermetic feed-
through tube, to said receive light pipe and further optically
coupled to said POF data bus.

References and Rejections
Irwin US 5,930,428 July 27, 1999
Takahashi US 2003/0006429 A1 Jan. 9, 2003
Czubarow US 6,901,203 B1 May 31, 2005
Yu US 2007/0258722 A1 Nov. 8, 2007
Chan US 2012/0027415 A1 Feb. 2, 2012
Wilcox US 2012/0306351 A1 Dec. 6, 2012
Donofrio US 2012/0305949 A1 Dec. 6, 2012

The Claims stand rejected as follows:
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1. Claims 1–4, 6–11, 13, and 17–20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103 as being unpatentable over Irwin, Chan, and Czubarow. Final
Act. 3–11.
2. Claim 12 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable
over Irwin, Chan, Czubarow, and Takahashi. Final Act. 11–12.
3. Claim 14 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable
over Irwin, Chan, Czubarow, and Donofrio. Final Act. 12.
4. Claim 15 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable
over Irwin, Chan, Czubarow, and Wilcox. Final Act. 12–13.
5. Claim 16 stands rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable
over Irwin, Chan, Czubarow, and Yu. Final Act. 13–14.

ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the rejections of Claims 1–4 and 6–20 in light of
Appellant’s arguments that the Examiner erred. We consider Appellant’s
arguments as they are presented in the Appeal Brief, pages 7–23.

CLAIMS 1–4 AND 6–20: OBVIOUSNESS OVER
IRWIN, CHAN, TAKAHASHI, DONOFRIO, WILCOX, AND YU.
Line Replacement Unit.
Independent Claim 1 recites, inter alia, “a line replacement unit
comprising: a terminal controller configured to transmit and receive
electrical signals for communication with said POF data bus; and a plastic
optical fiber serial interface module (POFSIM) coupled directly to said
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terminal controller and further coupled to said POF data bus.” Independent
Claim 8 contains commensurate recitations, i.e., “said POFSIM comprising:
a terminal controller interface electronic circuit (TCIEC) configured to be
coupled directly to a terminal controller and to receive electrical signals
from the terminal controller.” Independent Claim 17 also contains
commensurate recitations, i.e., “receiving, at a plastic optical fiber serial
interface module (POFSIM) mounted inside a line replacement unit, an
electrical signal from the terminal controller.”
The Examiner finds Irwin teaches a data communication system
comprising a data bus, i.e., fibers 140 and a line replacement unit, LRU 110.
Final Act. 3. The Examiner further finds LRU 110 comprises a terminal
controller, specifically, LRU 110, configured to transmit and receive electric
signals for communication with the data bus. Id.
As argued by Appellant, the Examiner equates Irwin’s device 110 as
both the claimed Line Replacement Unit (LRU) and the claimed terminal
controller. App. Br. 8 (“[t]he Final Office Action goes further and construes
LRU (310) as both the claimed LRU and the claimed terminal controller,
which are ‘directly coupled’ to optoelectronic devices (210).”). Appellant
argues: “[s]uch a construction ignores the structure recited in Claim 1,
namely, an LRU that comprises a terminal controller and a POFSIM coupled
directly to the terminal controller.” Id.
The Answer fails to engage Appellant’s argument that the Examiner
has cited a single device in the Irwin reference as corresponding to two
devices cited in the claims. See Ans. 4–6.
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The “Federal Circuit has held that ‘[w]here a claim lists elements
separately, the clear implication of the claim language’ is that those elements
are ‘distinct component[s]’ of the patented invention.” Becton, Dickinson &
Co. v. Tyco Healthcare Grp., LP, 616 F.3d 1249, 1254 (Fed. Cir. 2010)
(quoting Gaus v. Conair Corp., 363 F.3d 1284, 1288 (Fed. Cir. 2004)); see
Engel Indus., Inc. v. Lockformer Co., 96 F.3d 1398, 1404–05 (Fed.Cir.1996)
(concluding that where a claim provides for two separate elements, a
“second portion” and a “return portion,” these two elements “logically
cannot be one and the same”). There is nothing in the claims to suggest that
the claimed LRU and the claimed terminal controller can be the same
structure. See CAE Screenplates, Inc. v. Heinrich Fiedler GmbH & Co., 224
F.3d 1308, 1317 (Fed. Cir. 2000) (“In the absence of any evidence to the
contrary, we must presume that the use of . . . different terms in the claims
connotes different meanings.”).
We find in view of the Examiner’s mapping, the prior art fails to teach
a terminal controller as distinct from an LRU.
Terminal Controller.
Claim 1 recites, inter alia, “a terminal controller configured to
transmit and receive electrical signals for communication with said POF data
bus.” To teach this limitation the Examiner finds “[o]ptoelectronic devices
210 [a sub-component of LRU 110] can, for example, convert electrical
signals from LRU 110 into optical signals for transmission over fibers 140.”
Final Act. 3. In light of the Specification, the Examiner finds the claimed
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terminal controller is “any device that transmits and receive [sic] electric
signals is in light of the Specification.” Ans. 4 (citing Spec. ¶ 3).
Appellant contends the broadest reasonable interpretation of the
claims must be taken in terms of the Specification disclosure. App. Br. 8
(citing Spec. ¶¶ 3, 33); Reply Br. 1.
The Examiner finds the argued features of the terminal controller are
not given patentable weight as they are not recited in the claims. Id.
The Examiner’s citation to Paragraph 3 relates to the prior-art glass
optical system wherein a prior-art terminal controller communicates with a
Fiber Optic Serial Interface Module (FOSIM), not the claimed POFSIM
(Plastic Optic Serial Interface Module (POFSIM)). Spec. ¶ 3 (“One existing
solution for implementing an optical fiber data bus incorporates glass optical
fibers (GOFs). This system utilizes 850 nm wavelength transmitters and
receivers that are packaged individually in a pair, called a Fiber Optic Serial
Interface Module (FOSIM).”).
Appellant discloses: “[t]he POFSIM includes a terminal controller
interface electronic circuit (TCIEC) configured to receive electrical signals
from a terminal controller, an optical source coupled to the TCIEC and
configured to transmit digital optical signals to a data bus based on the
received electrical signals.” Spec. ¶ 6. Appellant further discloses:
“POFSIM 400 includes a terminal controller interface electronic circuit
(TCIEC) 412 that interfaces with a terminal controller, such as terminal
controller 306 . . . . TCIEC 412 is coupled to at least a portion of a plurality
of pins 414. The TXO, TXE, RICK, TXHB, PWRS, and VCC pins are
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inputs from the terminal controller for supplying power to POFSIM 400 and
sending Manchester bi-phase electrical signals to POFSIM 400. More
specifically, the TXO pin receives bi-phase Manchester encoded data in an
ARINC629 format from the terminal controller.” Spec. ¶ 33 (citied by the
Examiner).
In view of the Specification, the Examiner’s finding that the claimed
terminal controller is “any device that transmits and receive [sic] electric
signals is in light of the Specification.” (Ans. 4) is unreasonably broad.
Because we find the cited art fails to teach at least one claim
limitation, we decline to sustain the rejections of claims 1–4 and 6–20 under
35 U.S.C. § 103.

DECISION
The rejections of claims 1–4 and 6–20 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103 are REVERSED.
REVERSED