Ex Parte Beckham

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jun 13, 2013

11551339 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 13, 2013)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte JAMES P. BECKHAM
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Appeal 2012-001292
Application 11/551,339
Technology Center 3700
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Before LORA M. GREEN, FRANCISCO C. PRATS, and
SHERIDAN K. SNEDDEN, Administrative Patent Judges.

GREEN, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON REQUEST FOR REHEARING

Appellant has requested rehearing of the decision entered March 29,
2013 (“Decision”), which affirmed rejections of claims 61-97, 99, and 100
as being provisionally rejected on the grounds of nonstatutory obviousness-
type double patenting over claims 1-36 of USSN 10/954,886. The request
for rehearing is granted.

Appeal 2012-001292
Application 11/551,339

2
DISCUSSION
Appellant argues that USSN 10/954,886 was abandoned as of January
23, 2010 (Req. Reh’g 2). Appellant thus asserts that the obviousness-type
double patenting rejection is moot as the underlying application on which it
was based was abandoned (id. at 4).
We agree with Appellant. We thus vacate the obviousness-type
double patenting rejection as moot.
We note that Appellant did not request rehearing of our affirmance-in-
part of the rejection of claims 61-97, 99, and 100 as being rendered obvious
by the combination of Hamilton et al. (US 5,797,877, issued Aug. 25, 1998)
and Rau et al. (WO 95/18647 A2, published Jul. 13, 1995), in which we
affirmed the rejection as to claims 82-88 and 90-94, but reversed as to
claims 61-81, 89, 95-97, 99, and 100 (Decision 13). Thus, our grant of
Appellant’s request for rehearing has no effect on the portion of the Decision
that deals with that rejection.

Appeal 2012-001292
Application 11/551,339

3
SUMMARY
The rejection of claims 61-97, 99, and 100 as being provisionally
rejected on the grounds of nonstatutory obviousness-type double patenting
as being unpatentable over claims 1-36 of USSN 10/954,886 is vacated as
moot.

REHEARING GRANTED

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