Ex Parte FarhaDownload PDFPatent Trials and Appeals BoardMay 17, 201914477912 - (D) (P.T.A.B. May. 17, 2019) Copy Citation UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE 14/477,912 09/05/2014 28395 7590 05/21/2019 BROOKS KUSHMAN P.C./FG1L 1000 TOWN CENTER 22NDFLOOR SOUTHFIELD, MI 48075-1238 FIRST NAMED INVENTOR Eid Farha 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. 83461167 8236 EXAMINER ZENG, LINGWEN R ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 1723 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 05/21/2019 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): docketing@brookskushman.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte EID FARRA Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 Technology Center 1700 Before LINDA M. GAUDETTE, JEFFREY B. ROBERTSON, and LILAN REN, Administrative Patent Judges. ROBERTSON, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL 1 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant2 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's Final Rejection of claims 1-6 and 17-30. (Appeal Br. 3-4.) We have jurisdiction pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 6(b ). We REVERSE. 1 This Decision includes citations to the following documents: Specification filed September 5, 2014 ("Spec."); Final Office Action dated August 24, 2017 ("Final Act."); Appeal Brief filed January 17, 2018 ("Appeal Br."); Examiner's Answer dated May 31, 2018 ("Ans."); and Reply Brief filed June 20, 2018 ("Reply Br."). 2 Appellant is the Applicant, Ford Global Technologies LLC, who is identified as the real party in interest. (Appeal Br. 2.) Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 THE INVENTION Appellant states that the invention relates to traction batteries for motor vehicles. (Spec. ,i 1.) Claim 1 is representative and reproduced below from the Claims Appendix to the Appeal Brief: 1. A traction battery assembly comprising: a tray; and a pair of adjacent cell arrays disposed on the tray, each array including a plurality of stacked cells and a plurality of cell spacers interleaved with the cells, and a portion of each of the spacers of one of the arrays being inserted into one of the spacers of the other of the arrays to form a plurality of end-to- end connected spacer pairs configured to secure the arrays together. (Appeal Br., Claims Appendix.) REJECTIONS The Examiner rejected claims 1-6 and 17-30 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as follows: 1. Claims 1, 2, 5, 6, and 17-19 as obvious over Okada et al. (US 2009/0142650 Al, published on June 4, 2009 "Okada I") and Okada et al. (US 2008/0160395 Al, published on July 3, 2008 "Okada II"); 2. Claims 3, 4, and 20 as obvious over Okada I, Okada II, and Jung (US 2014/0356664 Al, published on December 4, 2014); and 3. Claims 1 and 21-30 as obvious over Suzuki (US 2014/0045027 Al, published on February 13, 2014) and Okada II. 2 Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 We limit our discussion to claim 1, which is sufficient for disposition of this appeal. Rejection 1 ISSUE The Examiner found that Okada I discloses a battery system containing, inter alia, a plurality of battery cell rows, which the Examiner interpreted to be "a pair of adjacent cell arrays" as recited in claim 1. (Ans. 3.) The Examiner found that Okada I discloses "two battery cells 1 and two spacers 2 interleaved with the battery cells l." (Id., citing Okada I ,-J,-J 45, 53; Figs. 2, 10, 12, and 13.) The Examiner found that Okada I fails to disclose a battery system, wherein a portion of the spacers of one of the arrays is inserted into one of the spacers of the other of the arrays to form a plurality of end-to-end connected spacer pairs configured to secure the arrays together. (Id. at 4.) The Examiner found that Okada II teaches a battery pack including a plurality of separators 20, where a portion of each separator is inserted into an adjacent separator to form a plurality of end to end connected separator pairs configured to secure the battery cells together. (Id., citing Okada II ,-J 47, Figs. 1-3.) The Examiner determined that it would have been obvious to have replaced spacers 2 of Okada I with separators 20 of Okada II, and further that it would have been obvious to have modified a portion of each of the spacers of one of the arrays being inserted into one of the spacers of the other of the arrays to form a plurality of end-to-end connected spacer pairs configured to secure together the arrays from Okada II in order to have "a means such with the external case of each battery cell 10 covered by separators 20 while exposing electrode terminals 12, those electrode 3 Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 terminals 12 are connected together; as a result, excluding required regions, battery cells 10 can be enclosed and unintended events such as short circuits can be effectively prevented." (Id. at 4-5, citing Okada II, Abstr.) Appellant argues that that the Examiner has interpreted the term "cell array" as recited in claim 1 in a manner that is inconsistent with the broadest reasonable interpretation of the term, and as a result, the Examiner has erred in finding that certain battery cells disclosed in Okada I constitute a "cell array." (Appeal Br. 4-6.) Appellant contends that any modification of Okada I in view of Okada II would allow connection between spacers in a single array, and not connections between adjacent arrays as recited in claim 1. (Id. at 6-7.) Accordingly, the dispositive issue as to this ground of rejection is: Has Appellant identified reversible error in the Examiner's position that Okada I in view of Okada II renders obvious the cell array and spacers arranged as recited in claim 1? DISCUSSION We are persuaded that the Examiner erred in rejecting claim 1 as obvious over the combination of Okada I and Okada II. In particular, we agree with Appellant that the Examiner's interpretation of the arrangement in cell arrays with spacers as recited in claim 1 and findings with respect to Okada I related thereto constitute reversible error. We reproduce the Examiner's annotated Figure 12 of Okada I below to better illustrate the Examiner's position. 4 Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 F1G.12 "'"' ... ,. .... 51 10 · '~---'" -~"_..,,;10 '-·50B (50) Annotated Figure 12 is a top plan view showing the interior structure of a battery system, including battery blocks 3 including battery cells 1 (not labeled), spacers 2 (not labeled), end face plates 50A and 50B, and end plates 10. (See Okada I ,i,i 35, 42, 47, 59.) The Examiner has annotated Figure 12 by drawing an oval around certain battery cells 1 with text indicating that such battery cells constitute a "battery cell row or array." The Examiner's position is that claim 1 does not require the spacers interleaved with cells to be cells within the same array, rather claim 1 only requires a plurality of spacers interleaved with any two adjacent cells. (Ans. 16-17.) However, claim 1 recites "a pair of adjacent cell arrays" where "each" array includes "a plurality of stacked cells and a plurality of cell spacers interleaved with the cells." Thus, claim 1 expressly requires that each cell array includes stacked cells, where the stacked cells include a plurality of cell spacers interleaved with the cells, which are the plurality of 5 Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 stacked cells in the same array. (See Reply Br. 2.) Thus, the Examiner's interpretation that the cell spacers interleaved with the cells recited in claim 1 need not be interleaved with cells in the same array is inconsistent with the plain language of the claim. Therefore, even if the cells encapsulated within the oval in annotated Figure 12 of Okawa I constitute an array, the substitution of the spacers 20 in Okada II for the spacers 2 in Okada II as proposed by the Examiner in the rejection, although arguably functioning to "secure the arrays together" as the term "array" has been interpreted by the Examiner, would not meet the recitation that "each array including a plurality of stacked cells and a plurality of cell spacers interleaved with the cells" as recited in claim 1. Rather, the spacers would be located between cells of different cell arrays and not interleaved with cells in each array as recited in claim 1. Therefore, we reverse the Examiner's decision to reject claim 1 and independent claim 17, which contains similar language, and claims 2, 5, 6, 18, and 19 dependent therefrom. Rejection 2 We also reverse the Examiner's rejection of claims 3, 4, and 20, which depend either from claim 1 or claim 17, for the same reasons as for Rejection 1, as the Examiner's further reliance on Jung does not cure the deficiencies identified above with respect to Okada I and Okada II. 6 Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 Rejection 3 ISSUE Regarding claim 1, the Examiner found that Suzuki discloses cell arrays including unit batteries 100, which the Examiner found to be cell arrays, stacked cells, and cells. (Ans. 12.) The Examiner also found that Suzuki discloses protective members 400, which the Examiner found to correspond to the cell spacers. (Id.) The Examiner found that Suzuki does not teach a portion of each of the spacers being inserted into one of the spacers in another cell array to secure the arrays together. (Id.) The Examiner found that Okada II discloses plurality of separators, a portion of each separator being inserted into an adjacent separator to secure the battery cells together. (Id. citing Okada II, ,i 65, Figs. 14 and 15.) Accordingly, the Examiner determined that it would have been obvious to modify a battery protective member 400 as disclosed in Suzuki to have a portion being inserted into an adjacent battery protective member in order to hold each component together. (Id.) Appellant contends that the unit batteries 100 in Suzuki are not cell arrays, but a single battery cell, such that a collection of unit batteries 100 form one cell array. (Appeal Br. 9-10.) Appellant contends that under the Examiner's construction of array, the protective members 400 in Suzuki are bookends of the arrays and are not interleaved with the cells of each array as recited in claim 1. (Reply Br. 4-5.) Accordingly, the dispositive issue on appeal for this rejection is: Has Appellant identified reversible error in the Examiner's finding that a unit battery 100 is a cell array? 7 Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 DISCUSSION We agree with Appellant that Suzuki fails to disclose a pair of cell arrays, where each array has a plurality of cells with spacers interleaved with the cells as recited in claim 1. The Examiner has annotated Figure 17 of Suzuki as reproduced below (Ans. 18): Annotated Figure 17 depicts a diagram of a battery pack having unit batteries 100 and protective member 400. (Suzuki, ,-J,-J 28, 44, 82, 118.) The Examiner has annotated Figure 17 to include multiple "cell array[ s ]" (collections of unit batteries 100) and "Spacers" (protective members 400). We agree with Appellant that rather than depicting arrays where each array includes a plurality of cells spacers interleaved with stacked cells as recited in claim 1, the Examiner's annotated drawing of Suzuki at best discloses cell arrays with "spacers" at the ends of each array. The Examiner's proposed modification of Suzuki with Okada II does not explain or account for the missing limitation that a plurality of cells spacers are 8 Appeal 2018-007281 Application 14/477,912 interleaved with stacked cells in the combination of prior art as applied by the Examiner. Accordingly, we reverse the Examiner's rejection of claim 1 and independent claim 27, which contains similar language, and claims 21-26, and 28-30 dependent therefrom. DECISION We reverse the Examiner's decision rejecting claims 1-6 and 17-30. REVERSED 9 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation