Ex Parte Lakhani et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Nov 29, 2016

13371508 (P.T.A.B. Nov. 29, 2016)

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.
13/371,508 02/13/2012 Samir Lakhani H0030636/4874/114247 4150
92556 7590
HONEYWELL/HUSCH
Patent Services
115 Tabor Road
P.O.Box 377
MORRIS PLAINS, NJ 07950
12/01/2016 EXAMINER
WONG, ALLEN C
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2488
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/01/2016 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):
patentservices-us @ honey well, com
amy. hammer @ hu schblackwell .com
pto-chi@huschblackwell.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte SAMIR LAKHANI, SANDEEP PATIL PUNDLIK, and
ADITYA SHRIVASTAVA
Appeal 2016-000467
Application 13/371,508
Technology Center 2400
Before JEAN R. HOMERE, JOHN F. HORVATH, and
JOSEPH P. LENTIVECH, Administrative Patent Judges.
LENTIVECH, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants1 seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) of the
Examiner’s final rejection of claims 1—4, 6—15, 17, and 18. Claim 5 has
been canceled. See App. Br. 13 (Claims App’x). The rejection of claim 16
is not appealed. App. Br. 2 (“The rejections of claims 1—4, 6—15, 17, and 18
are the subject of this appeal”). Accordingly, the Examiner is directed to
cancel claim 16. See MPEP § 1215.03; see also Ex parte Ghuman, 88
USPQ2d 1478 (BPAI 2008). We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
1 According to Appellants, the real party in interest is Honeywell
International, Inc. App. Br. 2.
Appeal 2016-000467
Application 13/371,508
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Appellants ’ Invention
Appellants’ invention generally relates to retrieving images from
security cameras of a security system. Spec. 1. Claim 1, which is
illustrative, reads as follows:
1. An apparatus comprising:
a plurality of security cameras;
a user interface that allows security personnel including at
least one guard to view images from each of the plurality of
security cameras in real time through a respective window of the
user interface including a high resolution window that defines a
focus of attention of the at least one guard;
a monitoring processor programmed to track the focus of
attention of the at least one guard as the at least one guard
changes focus via selection of cameras one at a time from among
the plurality of security cameras for display of video in the
enhanced window; and
a collection processor programmed to detect an evidence
collection request from the user, opens an evidence file in
response thereto and saves a sequence of video images from at
least some of the plurality of video cameras into the evidence file
based upon the tracked focus of attention of the user.
Rejection
Claims 1—4, 6—15, 17, and 18 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
as being unpatentable over the combination of Chuang et al. (WO
2012/082127 Al; published June 21, 2012) (“Chuang”) and Cilia (US
8,228,364 B2; issued July 24, 2012). Final Act. 7—16.
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Application 13/371,508
ANALYSIS
Claim 1
Issue 1: Did the Examiner err in finding that the combination of Chuang and
Cilia teaches or suggests “a collection processor programmed to detect an
evidence collection request from the user, opens an evidence file in response
thereto and saves a sequence of video images from at least some of the
plurality of video cameras into the evidence file based upon the tracked
focus of attention of the user,” as recited in claim 1?
Appellants contend the combination of Chuang and Cilia fails to teach
or suggest the disputed limitation. App. Br. 6—10; Reply Br. 3—6. In
particular, Appellants contend the cited references fail to teach or suggest
the disputed limitation because neither reference teaches or suggests
“sav[ing] a sequence of video images from at least some of the plurality of
video cameras into the evidence file based upon the tracked focus of
attention of the user,” as required by claim 1. App. Br. 7. According to
Appellants, “Chuang et al. is merely directed to a fisheye view 1102 where a
user drags a mouse across the fisheye view to generate pan, tilt and zoom
images from the fisheye view that are shown within a separate window
1104” and “Cilia is merely directed to an omnidirectional camera on a police
vehicle that automatically detects activity and records that activity.” App.
Br. 7. Appellants further contend
[T]he claimed invention has a different functionality than that of
Chuang et al. and Cilia. In this regard, Chuang et al. and Cilia
save all images. Cilia merely saves different regions of interest
(ROIs) with different resolutions of compression. Neither
reference “saves a sequence of video images from at least some
of the plurality of video cameras into the evidence file based
upon the tracked focus of attention of the user.”
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App. Br. 7. Appellants contend “[njeither reference discloses an evidence
collection request from a user” (Reply Br. 3) and “[there] is no disclosure of
receiving an evidence request from a user and then tracking the user’s focus
of attention in either Cilia or Chuang et al.” (Reply Br. 5). According to
Appellants “Chuang et al. collects all evidence” and “Cilia allows a user to
select a region of interest (ROI) but then collects all evidence from that
location” or, alternatively, “uses face recognition to determine the ROI
independent of any user preferences.” Reply Br. 5.
Chuang relates to an Imaging System for Immersive Surveillance
(ISIS) that combines multiple cameras into a single device to provide a 360-
degree view of an area on a single screen. Chuang, Abstract. Chuang
teaches that the ISIS system allows operators to tag and follow targets,
monitor restricted areas, and sound an alert when detecting an intruder. Id.
Chuang further teaches that a user can configure a view of the ISIS system
to scan an angular region for activity, both on live data as well as stored
data. Chuang, p. 25,11. 1—2. Chuang teaches that to configure the ISIS
system to scan a particular region for activity, the user can choose a
detection option in a main menu of a toolbar and then select a direction of
motion that the user wants to detect. Chuang, p. 25,11. 5—8. Chuang further
teaches after the user specifies the type of motion to be detected, “the
interface/client prompts the user to specify the subregion within the field of
view for which activity detection is desired.” Chuang, p. 25,11. 11—13.
Chuang teaches that the user can select a sub-region “by drawing a box by
depressing the right mouse button.” Chuang, p. 25,11. 13—14. In response to
the selection of the sub-region, Chuang teaches that the interface/client
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Application 13/371,508
breaks out a second window from the main window to show the selected
sub-region. Chuang, p. 25,11. 14—15.
The Examiner finds, and we agree, the selection of the sub-region and
the breaking out of the second window by the interface/client teaches or
suggests “a collection processor programmed to detect an evidence
collection request from the user” and displaying a sequence of video images
from at least some of the plurality of video cameras based upon the tracked
focus of attention of the user. Ans. 14. As found by the Examiner (Ans. 12—
13) and acknowledged by Appellants (Reply Br. 5), Cilia teaches an
omnidirectional camera that allows a user to select a region of interest (Cilia,
col. 7,11. 20-22) and, in response to the selection, stores images of the
region of interest on a recordable medium such as a DVD (Cilia, col. 7,11.
58—59). Based on these findings, the Examiner concludes that the combined
teachings of Chuang and Cilia teach or suggest the disputed limitation.
Ans. 13. Appellants’ contentions fail to address the Examiner’s findings
regarding the combined teachings of the references. Instead, Appellants’
contentions address the individual teachings of each reference separately
and, therefore, are unpersuasive of error. See In re Merck & Co. Inc., 800
F.2d 1091, 1097 (Fed. Cir. 1986).
Accordingly, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred in finding the
combination of Chuang and Cilia teaches or suggests the disputed limitation.
Issue 2: Did the Examiner err in combining the teachings of Chuang and
Cilia?
Appellants contend the combination of Chuang and Cilia is improper.
App. Br. 8—10. Appellants contend “there is no teaching or suggestion
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Application 13/371,508
whatsoever in Chuang et al. or Celia of [an] apparatus that ‘saves a sequence
of video images from at least some of the plurality of video cameras into the
evidence file based upon the tracked focus of attention of the user.’” App.
Br. 9. Appellants further contend:
However, there is an even more fundamental reason
why the rejections are improper. The reason that the
rejections are improper is because none of the cited
references are directed to the problem solved by the
claimed invention. The problem solved is that of
providing a mechanism for tracking a user’s focus of
attention and automatically saving video from that focus
of attention into an evidence file. Since the problem is not
recognized, there would be no reason to combine the
references.
In general, the Office Action has failed to establish
any credible basis why one skilled in the art would have
been led by the relevant teachings of the applied references
to make the claimed invention.
App. Br. 10.
We do not find Appellants’ contentions persuasive. We find the
Examiner has articulated a rational reason as to why it would be obvious to
combine the two references. SeeKSR Int’l. Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S.
398, 418 (2007). Specifically, the Examiner finds that “it would have been
obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of [the] invention to
apply the ROI recording of Cilia to the surveillance system of Chuang, to
collect evidence, the motivation being as described in Cilia that recording
only the region of interest for evidence saves space, as suggested in Cilia’s
column 1, lines 45—60.” Ans. 13. Further, modifying the system of Chuang
to include the ROI recording of Cilia merely involves the combination of
familiar elements according to known methods thereby yielding predictable
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results—an obvious improvement. KSRInt’l Co., 550 U.S. at 416. We are
also unpersuaded by Appellants’ argument that the Examiner’s rejection was
improper because none of the cited references are directed to the problem
solved by the claimed invention, for “[i]n determining whether the subject
matter of a patent claim is obvious, neither the particular motivation nor the
avowed purpose of the patentee controls.” Id. at 419. Rather, “any need or
problem known in the field of endeavor at the time of the invention and
addressed by the patent can provide a reason for combining the elements in
the manner claimed.” Id. at 420.
Accordingly, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred in combining
Chuang and Cilia.
For the foregoing reasons, we are not persuaded the Examiner erred in
rejecting claim 1; or in rejecting claims 2-4, 6—15, 17, and 18, which are not
separately argued. See App. Br. 10.
DECISION
We affirm the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1—4, 6—15, 17, and 18
under 35 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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