Ex Parte FlickDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardJul 28, 201713826752 (P.T.A.B. Jul. 28, 2017) Copy Citation 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. 13/826,752 03/14/2013 Kenneth E. Flick 58311 6906 27975 7590 ADD&G - 27975 1401 CITRUS CENTER 255 SOUTH ORANGE AVENUE P.O. BOX 3791 ORLANDO, EL 32802-3791 EXAMINER MCPHERSON, JAMES M ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3669 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 08/01/2017 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): creganoa @ allendyer. com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte KENNETH E. FLICK1 Appeal 2016-003454 Application 13/826,752 Technology Center 3600 Before BRUCE R. WINSOR, AARON W. MOORE, and PHILLIP A. BENNETT, Administrative Patent Judges. MOORE, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL 1 This paper is captioned by inventor name according to our pre-AIA convention. The AIA Applicant/Appellant and real party in interest is Omega Patents, L.L.C. (See App. Br. 1.) Appeal 2016-003454 Application 13/826,752 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a Non-Final Rejection of claims 1—11, 13, 16-47, 50-60, 62, 65—80, and 82—91, which are all of the pending claims. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We affirm. THE INVENTION The application “relates to the field of vehicle control systems and, more particularly, to a remote function control system and related methods for vehicles.” (Spec. 11.) Claim 1, reproduced below, exemplifies the subject matter on appeal: 1. A remote function control system for a vehicle including a data communications bus extending throughout the vehicle and coupled to a plurality of vehicle devices, and a wired vehicle electrical power system, the system comprising: a wireless data bus device coupled to the wired vehicle electrical power system and comprising a wired interface coupled to the data communications bus in the vehicle, and a first wireless device coupled to said wired interface; and a remote function device coupled to the wired vehicle electrical power system and comprising a second wireless transceiver to wirelessly communicate within the vehicle with said first wireless device, a third wireless transceiver to wirelessly communicate with a cellular telephone away from the vehicle, and a controller coupled to said second and third wireless transceivers to permit communication between the cellular telephone and at least one vehicle device coupled to the vehicle data communications bus. 2 Appeal 2016-003454 Application 13/826,752 THE REFERENCES The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal is: Reinold et al. Flick (“Flick ’830”) Fein et al. Flick (“Flick ’278”) Flick (“Flick ’886”) US 6,747,365 B2 US 7,015,830 B2 US 2008/0039998 Al US 8,032,278 B2 US 8,362,886 B2 June 8, 2004 Mar. 21,2006 Feb. 14, 2008 Oct. 4,2011 Jan. 29, 2013 THE REJECTIONS 1. Claims 1-9, 16-19, 21-29, 34—37, 39-A7, 50-58, 65-68, 70- 78, 83—86, and 88—91, stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Flick ’886, Flick ’278, Reinold, and Fein. (See Final Act. 2-34.) 2. Claims 10, 11, 13, 30-33, 59, 60, 62, 79, 80, and 82 also stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Flick ’886, Flick ’278, Reinold, and Fein. (See Final Act. 34—37.) 3. Claims 20, 38, 69, and 87 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Flick ’886, Flick ’278, Reinold, Fein, and Flick ’830. (See Final Act. 37—38.2) 2 The Final Action omits Fein from the statement of this rejection, but the Examiner clarifies in the Answer that such omission was a typographical error. (See Ans. 16.) 3 Appeal 2016-003454 Application 13/826,752 ANALYSIS We agree with and adopt the Examiner’s findings in the Non-Final Action from which this appeal was taken and in the commendably thorough Answer, and concur in the conclusion that the appealed claims are obvious. Appellant’s argument that “THE EXAMINER’S PRIMARY REFERENCE . . . fails to disclose TEN (10) of the claim elements” (App. Br. 9) overstates the differences between Flick ’886 and the instant claims. Claim 1, for example, describes a system just like that shown in Figure 1 of the reference, except that (a) it recites power connections where the reference is silent about how the devices are powered, (b) the connection between the wired interface and the remote function device is wireless, not wired, and (c) the remote controller is cellular phone instead of a fob. We agree that it would have been obvious to (a) power the devices from the (already available) vehicle battery, as shown in Flick ’278, (b) substitute a wireless connection, like that shown in Reinold, for the wired connection, and (c) substitute a cellular phone for the fob as the remote controller, as shown in Fein. These are straightforward modifications that the Examiner supports with rational motivations. Appellant’s complaints about the number of references are unpersuasive. Although commonly used to refer to individual documents, the term “prior art” more generally refers to the wealth of knowledge of skilled artisans practicing in the relevant filed. It is of no moment that this knowledge is expressed in two, four, or a dozen different documents. See In re Gorman, 933 F.2d 982, 986 (Fed. Cir. 1991) (“The criterion ... is not the number of references, but what they would have meant to a person of ordinary skill in the field of the invention.”). 4 Appeal 2016-003454 Application 13/826,752 Appellant’s argument that the “Examiner is using Appellant’s specification as a roadmap to improperly and selectively combine disjoint pieces of the prior art” (App. Br. 10) is not persuasive because the Examiner provides specific motivations, which Appellant fails to address. The fact that a motivation is described in Appellant’s Specification does not mean that it may not properly be used in a rejection. Inclusion of a motivation in an application does not remove it from the prior art. We do not agree with Appellant’s argument that “[a] person having ordinary skill in the art would not couple the controller 12 and adapter 14 of [Flick ’886] with a wired power system as in [Flick ’272] and then turn to [Reinold] to ‘reduce complexity and cost associated with connecting vehicle devices through wired configurations.’” (App. Br. 11—12.) There is nothing inconsistent about making a power connection with wires and, at the same time, making a communication connection wireless. Finally, we find Appellant’s Rule 1.132 declaration unpersuasive because it is conclusory and does not address the Examiner’s stated reasons to combine. Because we find Appellant’s arguments and evidence insufficient to show Examiner error, we sustain the rejections of claims 1—11, 13, 16-47, 50-60, 62, 65-80, and 82-91 under 35 U.S.C. § 103. 5 Appeal 2016-003454 Application 13/826,752 DECISION The rejections of claims 1—11, 13, 16-47, 50—60, 62, 65—80, and 82— 91 are affirmed. No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l)(iv). AFFIRMED 6 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation