Ex Parte Redmer et alDownload PDFBoard of Patent Appeals and InterferencesJul 1, 201111643367 (B.P.A.I. Jul. 1, 2011) 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. 11/643,367 12/20/2006 Claus-Dieter Redmer 06-723 3095 34704 7590 07/01/2011 BACHMAN & LAPOINTE, P.C. 900 CHAPEL STREET SUITE 1201 NEW HAVEN, CT 06510 EXAMINER TAWFIK, SAMEH ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 3721 MAIL DATE DELIVERY MODE 07/01/2011 PAPER 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. PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE BOARD OF PATENT APPEALS AND INTERFERENCES ____________ Ex parte CLAUS-DIETER REDMER, EBERHARD KRIEGER, and HAGEN WETZEL ____________ Appeal 2009-012645 Application 11/643,367 Technology Center 3700 ____________ Before WILLIAM F. PATE III, LINDA E. HORNER, and KEN B. BARRETT, Administrative Patent Judges. HORNER, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appeal 2009-012645 Application 11/643,367 2 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Claus-Dieter Redmer et al. (Appellants) seek our review under 35 U.S.C. § 134 of the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1-4. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We REVERSE. THE INVENTION Appellants’ claimed invention is directed to a folding device for forming a folding line in a sheet. Spec. 1, para. [0001]. Claim 1, reproduced below, is representative of the subject matter on appeal. 1. A folding device comprising a sheet transporting device for transporting sheets in a sheet support plane and a stationary folding knife arranged opposite said sheet support plane in a sheet running direction, said folding knife comprising, at a side facing said sheet support plane, folding edge means contacting a sheet during a transport for forming a folding line in said sheet, wherein said folding edge means comprises several folding rollers being arranged one after the other in said sheet running direction and each being supported rotatably about a rotation axis extending perpendicularly to said sheet running direction. THE REJECTION Appellants seek review of the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-4 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Appellants’ Admitted Prior Art (AAPA) 1 and Ishii (US 5,137,505; issued August 11, 1992). 1 The Examiner identifies the AAPA as being the prior art described in page 1 of Appellants’ Specification and shown in Figures 1 and 2. Ans. 4. Appeal 2009-012645 Application 11/643,367 3 CONTENTIONS AND ISSUE The Examiner found that the AAPA discloses the claimed folding device except for the claimed folding edge means comprising several folding rollers arranged one after the other in the sheet running direction and each being supported rotatably about a rotation axis extending perpendicularly to the sheet running direction. Ans. 4. The Examiner found that Ishii discloses this folding edge means having the claimed folding rollers (pressing rollers 51 and creasing rollers 52 of Ishii) and that it would have been obvious to modify the AAPA with the folding rollers of Ishii “in order to fold the sides of the bag easily and change the bag width in shorter time.” Id. Appellants contend that “[a] folding knife as claimed sets forth a specific combination of elements for folding a sheet about folding line formed by a folding edge means of the folding knife and folding about the folding line by a plurality of folding rollers arranged one behind another.” Br. 11. Appellants contend that Ishii’s pressing rollers 51 and creasing rollers 52 are not the claimed folding rollers. Br. 10-11. The issue presented by this appeal is whether Ishii discloses the folding rollers as called for in claim 1. ANALYSIS Independent claim 1 recites a folding device comprising a sheet transporting device for transporting sheets in a sheet support plane and a stationary folding knife “arranged opposite said sheet support plane.” Claim 1 defines the folding knife as having “folding edge means” disposed Appeal 2009-012645 Application 11/643,367 4 “at a side facing said sheet support plane.” The folding edge means perform the function of “contacting a sheet during a transport for forming a folding line in said sheet.” When a claim uses the term “means” to describe a limitation, a presumption inheres that the inventor used the term to invoke 35 U.S.C. § 112, sixth paragraph. Altiris, Inc. v. Symantec Corp., 318 F.3d 1363, 1375 (Fed. Cir. 2003). “This presumption can be rebutted when the claim, in addition to the functional language, recites structure sufficient to perform the claimed function in its entirety.” Id. (citation omitted). Claim 1 recites structure for the folding edge means sufficient to perform the above-identified claimed function in its entirety. In particular, claim 1 recites that the “folding edge means comprises several folding rollers being arranged one after the other in said sheet running direction and each being supported rotatably about a rotation axis extending perpendicularly to said sheet running direction.” These folding rollers are sufficient to contact the sheet during transport and form a folding line in the sheet. See Spec. 5, para. [0021] (“The distance between the outer circumference of the folding rollers 30 and the upper strand 39 of the transport belt 38 is dimensioned such that through the folding rollers 30 during the passage of the sheets 22a, 22b a folding line having a desired depth is formed by the apex 51 of the folding rollers 30 in the sheet 22a, 22b.”) As such, 35 U.S.C. § 112, sixth paragraph, is not invoked by claim 1. In light of the language of claim 1, we construe claim 1 to call for a stationary folding knife to be comprised of a plurality of folding rollers Appeal 2009-012645 Application 11/643,367 5 being arranged one after the other in said sheet running direction and each being supported rotatably about a rotation axis extending perpendicularly to said sheet running direction, such that the rollers are capable of contacting the sheet and forming a folding line in the sheet. We also construe claim 1 to call for the folding edge means (i.e., the folding rollers) to be disposed “at a side facing said sheet support plane” and to call for the stationary folding knife, formed by the folding rollers, to be “arranged opposite said sheet support plane.” Ishii discloses a conventional bag-making apparatus for making a gusset bag. Ishii, col. 1, ll. 58-59; figs 12-14. This apparatus includes a forming plate 49, guide bars 50 disposed on both sides in the cross direction of the forming plate 49, pressing rollers 51 disposed on the forming plate 49 in the traveling direction of the bag material 48, and creasing rollers 52 disposed on both sides of the forming plate 49 perpendicular to the pressing rollers 51. Ishii, col. 1, ll. 59-67; figs. 12, 13. Ishii discloses that “[t]he guide bars 50 fold the bag material 48 so as to lap the forming plate 49,” “[t]he pressing rollers 51 press the bag material formed tubular on the forming plate 49,” and “[t]he creasing rollers 52 form a crease by pressing on the central portion of each side of the bag material 48 formed tubular by the forming plate 49 and the guide bars 50.” Ishii, col. 2, ll. 5-12. We find that Ishii’s creasing rollers 52 are arranged one after the other in the sheet running direction (i.e., the traveling direction of the bag material 48). Ishii, fig. 12 (showing the rollers 52 arranged in a line in the same direction as the traveling direction of bag material 48). We further find that Appeal 2009-012645 Application 11/643,367 6 Ishii’s creasing rollers 52 are each supported rotatably about a rotation axis extending perpendicularly to the sheet running direction. Ishii, fig. 12 (showing the rotation axis of rollers 52 disposed vertically and perpendicular to the horizontal traveling direction of the bag material 48). We further find that Ishii’s creasing rollers 52 are disposed such that they contact the sides of the formed bag to form a folding line in the side of the bag. Ishii, fig. 13 (showing creasing rollers 52 in contact with bag material 48 and forming a folding line or crease in the bag material). We do not find, however, any discussion in the Examiner’s rejection sufficient to support a finding that Ishii’s creasing rollers 52 are disposed “at a side facing said sheet support plane” such that the stationary folding knife is “arranged opposite said sheet support plane.” To the extent the Examiner relied on Ishii’s pressing rollers 51 as the claimed folding rollers, we find that Ishii’s pressing rollers 51 are not capable of forming a folding line in the sheet, as called for in claim 1. Rather, Ishii discloses that the guide bars 50 fold the bag material 48 and the pressing rollers 51 merely press the bag material formed tubular on the forming plate 49. Thus, neither Ishii’s pressing rollers 51 nor Ishii’s creasing rollers 52 satisfy the folding rollers limitation of claim 1. The rejection of claims 2-4 suffers from the same deficiency by virtue of the dependency of claims 2-4 from claim 1. CONCLUSION Ishii does not disclose the folding rollers as called for in claim 1. Appeal 2009-012645 Application 11/643,367 7 DECISION The decision of the Examiner to reject claims 1-4 is REVERSED. REVERSED nlk Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation