Ex Parte Ismail et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 29, 2016

10866432 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 29, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
10/866,432 06/10/2004
102383 7590 10/03/2016
Trellis IP Law Group/ Sony Corp.
1900 Embarcadero Road, Suite 109
Palo Alto, CA 94303
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Samir Ismail
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.
020699-101700US 1746
EXAMINER
BRANDT, CHRISTOPHER M
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2645
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
10/03/2016 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):
docket@trellislaw.com
megan@trellislaw.com
ann@trellislaw.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte SAMIR ISMAIL and TADAMASA KITSUKA WA
Appeal2014-001311
Application 10/866,432
Technology Center 2600
Before JOHN A. EV ANS, NATHAN A. ENGELS, and KAMRAN JIV ANI,
Administrative Patent Judges.
ENGELS, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Final Rejection
rejection of claims 1--4, 6-16, 19, 23, 35-37, and 39. No other claims are
pending. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
Appeal2014-001311
Application 10/866,432
ILLUSTRATIVE CLAIM
Claim 1, reproduced below with disputed limitations italicized, is
illustrative of the claimed subject matter. Appellants state that "claim 1
recites a method for initiating and establishing a voice link in a wireless
device." App. Br. 14.
1. A method for initiating and establishing a voice link in a
wireless device, the method comprising:
establishing a data link in the wireless device;
providing a machine-readable voice link address to the
wireless device over the data link; and
initiating and establishing the voice link between the
wireless device and an entity associated with the voice link;
wherein the established voice link is independent of and
separate from the established data link.
THE REJECTIONS
Claims 1, 2, 7-13, 15, 16, 19, 23, 35-37, and 39 stand rejected under
35 USC§ 103(a) as being unpatentable in view ofFreishtat et al. (US
2005/0097000 Al; May 5, 2005) and Jiang et al. (US 2002/0057678 Al,
May 16, 2002).
Claims 3, 4, 6, and 14 stand rejected under 35 USC§ 103(a) as being
unpatentable in view of Freishtat, Jiang, and Hung et al. (US 6,760,429 Bl,
July 6, 2004).
ANALYSIS
Addressing claim 1 as representative of each of the claims on Appeal,
Appellants contend the Examiner erred in the findings and conclusions
relating to the limitations shown above in italics. See App. Br. 14--8. The
Examiner finds Freishtat teaches "providing a machine-readable voice link
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Application 10/866,432
address to the wireless device over the data link" with its disclosure of a
telephone number provided by a communication bridge via instant
messaging, web collaboration, web conferencing, or e-mail (i.e. data link).
Ans. 4--5. Specifically, the Examiner interprets a "voice link address" to
include a telephone number and states "[a] telephone number is in 'machine-
readable form' in its current state as a user enters the telephone number into
a machine (i.e. telephone device), the machine then reads/processes the
telephone number to initiate communication with the party associated with
the telephone number." Ans. 5 (citing Spec. i-f 43 ("A voice link connection
can be established by using a phone number or any other type of voice link
address such as an IP address for voice-over-IP (VoIP) communications,
speed-dial number, etc.")). Further, the Examiner cites dependent claim 10,
which states "[ t ]he method of claim 1, wherein the link address includes a
telephone number," as additional evidence that a telephone number falls
within the scope of claim 1.
Appellants do not dispute that "voice link address" includes a
telephone number, but Appellants argue the issue is whether the telephone
number taught in Freishtat "is provided in machine-readable form." App.
Br. 15-16. Appellants argue a telephone number is human readable, but not
intrinsically machine readable, as a user must convert or transform a phone
number into a machine-readable form. Reply Br. 5. Further, while
Appellants acknowledge the Specification does not define "machine
readable," and Appellants cite two definitions from general-purpose
dictionaries to argue "machine readable" requires data directly usable by a
computer or data encoded in a form suitable for processing by a computer.
Reply Br. 5.
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Application 10/866,432
We disagree with Appellants. While none of the intrinsic evidence
directly addresses the meaning of "machine readable," intrinsic evidence in
Appellants' Specification and the claim language itself support the
Examiner's interpretation. As noted by the Examiner, dependent claim 10
provides that the voice link address includes a telephone number. Consistent
with the Examiner's interpretation, Appellants' Specification describes
initiating a voice link connection as a "standard call." Spec. i-f 10 ("The data
link provides the [customer service representative] phone number to the
mobile device and the mobile device can use the phone number to make the
voice link connection as a standard call within, e.g., a cellular phone
network.") (emphasis added); accord Spec. i-fi-1 15 ("receiving a phone
number via a data link; accepting a signal from the user device to initiate a
phone call to the phone number") (emphasis added); 21 ("A typical voice
link connection can be a link between a mobile phone and a hardwired
phone or 'land line."'); 42 ("an incoming phone call (or other voice link) is
established with the CSR"). Further, the Specification states that "[a] voice
link connection can be established by using a phone number" (Spec. i-f 43
(emphasis added)), and we find nothing in the Specification that describes
"using a phone number" beyond the ordinary sense of the phrase, e.g.,
dialing a telephone number on a telephone.
Moreover, separate from the "providing" step, claim 1 recites
"initiating and establishing the voice link," with no requirement of
automation or other exclusions of a user's manual entry (dialing) of a
telephone number. In fact, where Appellants' Specification describes
"automatic" initiation of a voice link, such descriptions do not mention a
phone number, and the Specification additionally states that the initiation
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Application 10/866,432
process may be either automatic or manual. See Spec. if 40 (providing that
initiation of a voice link can be manual or automatic, with no mention of a
phone number); see also Spec. if 18 ("Steps or functions or other actions
discussed in connection with the invention may be performed manually,
automatically, or by a combination of manual and automated means.").
Accordingly, we disagree with Appellants' arguments and reliance on
extrinsic evidence.
We also disagree with Appellants' arguments that the cited references
fail to teach or suggest the requirement of claim 1 that "the established voice
link is independent of and separate from the established data link." See App.
Br. 16-18; Reply Br. 5---6. Contrary to Appellants' argument that Freishtat's
teachings are limited to communications on a "single bridge," in contrast to
the claimed separate and independent voice and data links, Freishtat
describes a clear distinction between voice communications and data
communications. Among other things, as the Examiner finds (Ans. 6),
Freishtat at minimum suggests separate and independent voice and data links
by describing different sets of equipment for the "telephony side" and the
"instant message and web collaboration side" of the communication bridge.
Freishtat if 59. Indeed, a person of ordinary skill would understand
Freishtat' s disclosure of "telephone" communications to be separate and
independent of e-mail communications, for example, notwithstanding
Freishtat's broad use of the term "communication bridge 234." See id.
Moreover, we agree with the Examiner that Jiang additionally evidences that
separate and independent voice and data links were known and well within
the a routine exercise for a skilled artisan. See Ans. 6-8 (citing Jiang
Abstract, Fig. 8e, if 142).
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Having considered the Examiner's rejections in light of Appellants'
arguments and the evidence of record, we disagree with the Appellants and
agree with the Examiner's rejections. We adopt as our own the Examiner's
findings, conclusions, and reasons in the Final Rejection and the Examiner's
Answer.
DECISION
We affirm the Examiner's rejections of claims 1--4, 6-16, 19, 23, 35-
37, and 39.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended. 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(l )(iv).
AFFIRMED
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