Ex Parte KawaiDownload PDFBoard of Patent Appeals and InterferencesFeb 24, 201009981696 (B.P.A.I. Feb. 24, 2010) Copy Citation 1 UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE 2 ____________________ 3 4 BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS 5 AND INTERFERENCES 6 ____________________ 7 8 Ex parte EIJI KAWAI 9 ____________________ 10 11 Appeal 2009-009093 12 Application 09/981,696 13 Technology Center 3600 14 ____________________ 15 16 Decided: February 24, 2010 17 ____________________ 18 19 20 Before: MURRIEL E. CRAWFORD, ANTON W. FETTING, and JOSEPH 21 A. FISCHETTI, Administrative Patent Judges. 22 23 CRAWFORD, Administrative Patent Judge. 24 25 26 DECISION ON APPEAL27 Appeal 2009-009093 Application 09/981,696 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE 1 Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134 (2002) from a final rejection 2 of claims 1 to 5, 8 to 14, 19 to 21, 24 to 32, and 35 to 45. We have 3 jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b) (2002). Appellant appeared for oral 4 hearing on February 4, 2010. 5 Appellant invented an electronic guide information processing system 6 for electronically processing guide information (Spec. 1). 7 Claim 1 under appeal reads as follows: 8 1. An electronic guide information 9 processing system for electronically processing 10 guide information about a customers attracting 11 facility having an entrance and an exit, the system 12 comprising: 13 an information distributing apparatus for 14 converting the guide information into electronic 15 guide information, encrypting the electronic guide 16 information, and then distributing the encrypted 17 electronic guide information; 18 a portable terminal apparatus for recording 19 the encrypted electronic guide information, 20 decrypting the encrypted electronic guide 21 information at the entrance, and presenting the 22 electronic guide information to an information 23 user; and 24 an information processing apparatus 25 comprising an information collecting apparatus for 26 collecting the electronic guide information from 27 the portable terminal apparatus at the exit, the 28 information processing apparatus erasing the 29 electronic guide information from the portable 30 terminal apparatus at the exit and writing in the 31 portable terminal apparatus information about the 32 information user's use of the customers attracting 33 facility at the exit. 34 Appeal 2009-009093 Application 09/981,696 3 The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on 1 appeal is: 2 Gershman US 6,401,085 B1 Jun. 4, 2002 3 Treyz US 6,587,835 B1 Jul. 1, 2003 4 The Examiner rejected claims 1 to 5, 8 to 14, 19 to 21, 24 to 32, 5 and 35 to 45 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Treyz in 6 view of Gershman. 7 8 ISSUE 9 Has Appellant shown that the Examiner erred in finding that Treyz 10 discloses an information processing apparatus that erases electronic guide 11 information from a portable terminal apparatus at the exit of a customer 12 attracting facility and writes, on the portable terminal apparatus, information 13 about the user’s use of the customer attracting facility at the exit? 14 15 FINDINGS OF FACT 16 Treyz discloses a system based on handheld computing devices that 17 assist users in shopping and in performing wireless transactions (col. 1, ll. 6 18 to 9). The system allows users to obtain information regarding products 19 offered for sale using local and remote wireless links (col. 1, ll. 41 to 45). 20 The system may provide shopping assistance service which provides 21 information about current events through an information screen provided on 22 the handheld device (col. 2, ll. 57 to 63). The shopping assistance service 23 may be used to make financial transactions (col. 3, ll. 37 to 38). The 24 financial transactions may be monitored by continuously sending financial 25 transaction information to the handheld device (col. 46, ll. 9 to 42). The 26 Appeal 2009-009093 Application 09/981,696 4 shopping assistance service turns on automatically when the service detects 1 the handheld device’s presence (col. 49, ll. 41 to 44). 2 The Examiner stated: 3 Treyz discloses . . . an information processing 4 apparatus comprising an information collecting 5 apparatus for collecting the electronic guide 6 information from the portable terminal apparatus at 7 the exit (colleting data is equivalent to 8 deleting/erasing the data as claimed in the next 9 step; C49, shopping assistance link 10 deleted/collected along with icon/descriptive 11 information—once user out of range or has exited 12 the facility). . . . Treyz does not expressly disclose 13 sending information to the user in a “batch” format 14 at a specific location (exit), Treyz does disclose 15 continuously sending financial transaction 16 information to the user device, indicating where 17 and what the user did with the system (C46 L9-18 42). . . . Therefore, it would have been obvious to 19 one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the 20 invention was made to send the information to the 21 user at specific times and locations as a way to 22 decrease transmission costs. 23 (Ans. 3 to 4). 24 25 PRINCIPLES OF LAW 26 In rejecting claims under 35 U.S.C. § 103, it is incumbent upon the 27 Examiner to establish a factual basis to support the legal conclusion of 28 obviousness. See In re Fine, 837 F.2d 1071, 1073 (Fed. Cir. 1988). 29 Appeal 2009-009093 Application 09/981,696 5 ANALYSIS 1 We will not sustain the Examiner’s rejection. Although the Examiner 2 is correct that in the Treyz device information may be written to the 3 handheld device in batches and erased once the device is out of range, the 4 Examiner has not established that the writing to the device and the erasing of 5 the device occur at the exit. Treyz discloses that the information is erased 6 when the device is out of range but does not disclose that the device is out of 7 range at the exit. In addition, once out of range, it is not possible to write to 8 the device. Therefore, the erasing and writing does not occur at the same 9 location. 10 11 CONCLUSION OF LAW 12 On the record before us, Appellant has shown that the Examiner erred 13 in rejecting the claims. 14 15 DECISION 16 The Examiner's decision is reversed. 17 18 REVERSED 19 Appeal 2009-009093 Application 09/981,696 6 hh 1 2 3 FINNEGAN, HENDERSON, FARABOW, GARRETT & DUNNER 4 LLP 5 901 NEW YORK AVENUE, NW 6 WASHINGTON, DC 20001-4413 7 Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation