Ex Parte Kopansky et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Feb 24, 2016

12404043 (P.T.A.B. Feb. 24, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
12/404,043 03/13/2009
88792 7590 02/26/2016
Marger, Johnson -SRI International
888 SW 5th A venue, Suite 1050
Portland, OR 97204
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Arkady Kopansky
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.
7049-0044 1917
EXAMINER
LI, TRACYY
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2487
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
02/26/2016 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):
docketing@techlaw.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte ARKADY KOP ANSKY, YAN JUN XU, JAE-BEOM LEE, and
WILLIAM WEI-LIAN LIN
Appeal2014-003888
Application 12/404,043
Technology Center 2400
Before JASON V. MORGAN, DANIEL J. GALLIGAN, and
JOSEPH P. LENTIVECH, Administrative Patent Judges.
LENTIVECH, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants 1 seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner's final rejection of claims 1-21. Claims 22--42 have been
canceled. App. Br. 3. We have jurisdiction over the pending claims under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We AFFIRM.
1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is SRI International.
App. Br. 2.
Appeal2014-003888
Application 12/404,043
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants' Invention
Appellants' invention generally relates to a method for testing the
operation of a video decoder. Spec. i-f 2. An understanding of the invention
can be derived from claim 1, which is illustrative, and reads as follows:
1. A method for propagating data through a series of video
frames and facilitating display of the data, comprising the steps
of:
applying a stress to a video frame decoder for testing
operation and functionality of the decoder, wherein the stress
affects the data located within a first video frame, wherein the
stress is a task placing a demand on the operation and the
functionality of the decoder;
selecting only the data located in a last macro block of the
first video frame for prediction via inter-frame coding from the
first video frame to a test video frame;
facilitating the display of a visual representation of the
data within the test video frame; and
analyzing the visual representation of the data to detect
any errors.
Rejections
Claims 1-8 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Kim (US 2003/0031128 Al; published Feb. 13, 2003),
Alvarez Arevalo (US 2005/0123047 Al; published June 9, 2005), and Yu
(US 2004/0153956 Al; published Aug. 5, 2004). Final Act. 2-5.
Claims 9 and 10 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Kim, Alvarez Arevalo, Yu, and Chou (US 2006/0233259
Al; published Oct. 19, 2006). Final Act. 5-6.
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Application 12/404,043
Claims 11-18 and 21 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Kim, Alvarez Arevalo, Yu, and Chujoh (US 6,259,736
B 1; issued July 10, 2001 ). Final Act. 6-8.
Claims 19 and 20 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Kim, Alvarez Arevalo, Yu, Chujoh, and Chou. Final
Act. 8-9.
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner's rejections in light of Appellants'
arguments that the Examiner has erred. We disagree with Appellants'
conclusions. We adopt as our own the findings and reasons set forth by the
Examiner in the Final Office Action from which this appeal is taken and the
reasons set forth in the Examiner's Answer in response to Appellants'
Appeal Brief. Final Act. 2-9; Ans. 9-11. We highlight and address specific
findings and arguments for emphasis as follows.
Claim 1
Issue: Did the Examiner err by finding the combination of Kim, Alvarez
Arevalo, and Yu teaches or suggests facilitating the display of a visual
representation of the data within the test video frame; and analyzing the
visual representation of the data to detect any errors, as recited in claim 1?
Appellants contend the combination of Kim, Alvarez Arevalo, and Yu
does not teach or suggest the disputed limitations emphasized above. App.
Br. 4---6. Particularly, Appellants contend Yu does not teach or suggest the
disputed limitations because "while Yu does provide illustrations of the
performance of different decoding schemes, the analysis is not based upon
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Application 12/404,043
those representations." App. Br. 5. According to Appellants, Figures 7-15
of Yu illustrate simulation results related to the performance of a
communications decoder used in a digital communication system. App. Br.
5 (citing Yu i-fi-13, 5, 87, 97, and 98). Appellants contend "[t]he simulation
results are compared in the figures, [but] they are not analyzed by looking at
the figures" and, therefore, Yu does not teach "analyzing the visual
representation of the data to detect any errors .... " App. Br. 5. Appellants
contend Yu' s "frame" applies to frames of information in a digital
communications system, not frames of video data and, therefore, Yu fails to
teach or suggest "facilitating the display of a visual representation of the
data within the test video frame .... " App. Br. 5.
We do not find Appellants' contentions persuasive. Figures 7-15 of
Yu depict graphs illustrating the bit error rate (BER) and frame error rate
(FER) performance of a turbo decoder decoding a particular encode packet
(EP) using different algorithms. See Yu i-fi-136-40. The Examiner finds, and
we agree, Yu's teaching (i-f 87) regarding evaluating the simulations in terms
of Bit Error Rate (BER) and Frame Error Rate (FER) and evaluating
decoding performance with respect to Eb/No offset to investigate the impact
of SNR mismatch combined with Yu' s graphs depicted in Figures 7-15
teach or suggest the disputed limitation. Ans. 10 (citing Yu i187; Figs. 7-
15). Appellants' contentions regarding Yu not teaching the claimed
"facilitating" are unpersuasive because the Examiner relies on Kim, not Yu,
for teaching or suggesting this limitation. See Final Act. 3 (citing Kim i1 8);
Ans. 10-11.
Appellants offer additional contentions for the first time in the Reply
Brief. Reply Br. 1-2. To be considered for the purposes of this appeal, the
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Application 12/404,043
contentions must either be responsive to a finding or argument presented for
the first time in the Examiner's Answer or be supported by good cause
showning why the contentions were not earlier presented. 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.41(b)(2) (2013). Appellants do not identify, and we do not discern, any
newly presented argument or finding in the Examiner's Answer to which
these contentions are responsive but, instead, rely on a showing of good
cause for not previously presenting these contentions. See Reply Br. 2.
Specifically, Appellants state:
Since Kim does not teach the elements of the claimed
invention, Appellant[s] had turned to analysis of Yu to see if it
cured the deficiency. The statement that Yu does not teach this
invention as claimed is true, but was made to further support the
argument that the combination of references does not teach the
claimed invention.
Reply Br. 2.
With respect to Appellants' statement for showing good cause, we
note that the limitations addressed in the Reply Brief with respect to the
teachings of Kim are different than the limitations addressed in the Appeal
Brief with respect to the teachings of Yu. Appellants' statement fails to
account for this discrepancy. As such, we find Appellants' statement to be
insufficient to show the requisite good cause. Accordingly, we do not
address these additional contentions.
For the foregoing reasons, we are unpersuaded the Examiner erred in
rejecting claim 1.
Claims 2-21
Appellants' contentions regarding claims 2-21 merely include a
recitation of the corresponding limitations recited in the claims and
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respective statements contending that, because the applied references do not
disclose the limitations discussed supra with respect to claim 1, the applied
references do not teach or suggest these limitations. See App. Br. 6-9.
Because Appellants do not provide any explanation or reasoning as to how
or why the applied references fail to teach or suggest the respective
limitations, these contentions are unpersuasive. See 37 C.F.R.
§ 41.37(c)(l)(iv) (2013) ("The arguments shall explain why the examiner
erred as to each ground of rejection contested by appellant. . . . [A ]ny
arguments or authorities not included in the appeal brief will be refused
consideration by the Board for purposes of the present appeal.") (emphasis
added). Moreover, arguments not made are deemed waived. See id.; cf In
re Baxter Travenol Labs., 952 F.2d 388, 391 (Fed. Cir. 1991) ("It is not the
function of this court to examine the claims in greater detail than argued by
an [A]ppellant, looking for nonobvious distinctions over the prior art.").
Accordingly, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred in rejecting
claims 2-21.
DECISION
We affirm the Examiner's rejections of claims 1-21under35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a).
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
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