Ex Parte San Andres et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

May 17, 2016

13293746 (P.T.A.B. May. 17, 2016)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO.
13/293,746
13077 7590
Sutherland GE
Suite 2300
999 Peachtree Street
Atlanta, GA 30309
FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
11/10/2011 Ramon Juan San Andres
05/19/2016
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.
19441-1050 1198
EXAMINER
SHERWIN,RYANW
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2686
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
05/19/2016 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):
patent. docket@sutherland.com
pair_sutherland@firsttofile.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte RAMON JUAN SAN ANDRES,
MARC KARL LOSEE, and ATUL NIGAM
Appeal2015-001097 1
Application 13/293,746
Technology Center 2600
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, CATHERINE SHIANG, and
MATTHEW J. McNEILL, Administrative Patent Judges.
SHIANG, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's final
rejection of claims 1-20, which are all the claims pending in the application.
We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). We reverse.
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
The present invention relates to detecting and responding to power
events such as power outages. See generally Spec. 1. Claim 1 is exemplary:
1 Appellants identify the General Electrical Company as the real party in
interest. See App. Br. 2.
Appeal2015-001097
Application 13/293,746
1. A power grid event detection apparatus, comprising:
an event detection unit to detect at least a location of an
event in a power grid;
a customer location unit to receive an input from an
interested party identifying a location of interest to the
interested party, to associate the location of interest with a
location in the power grid, and to determine, based on detecting
the location of the event in the power grid, whether the location
of the event corresponds to the location of interest to the
interested party; and
a rule application unit to determine whether to perform
an action designated by the interested party at least when the
location of the event corresponds to the location of interest to
the interested party.
References and Rejections
Claims 1-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over Fischer et al. (U.S. Patent No. 6,963,285 B2, Nov. 8,
2005) ("Fischer") and Beeco et al. (U.S. PG Pub. No. 2011/0116387 Al,
May 19, 2011) ("Beeco").
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed Appellants' arguments in the Briefs, the
Examiner's rejection, the Examiner's response to Appellants' arguments,
and the evidence of record. We concur with Appellants' conclusion that the
Examiner erred in finding Fischer teaches "a customer location unit to
receive an input from an interested party identifYing a location of interest to
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Application 13/293,746
the interested party, to associate the location of interest with a location in the
power grid," as recited in independent claim 1 (emphasis added). 2
The Examiner finds:
a customer location unit to receive an input from an interested
party identifying a location of interest to the interested party
[Fischer's] Figure 5 - Pet Store in Bedford and Column 14,
Line 52 - Column 15, Line 56 teach a customer submitting
information via a website with one or more webpages to the
electric utility or other service provider[.]
Final Act. 3.
Appellants argue:
Nothing in Fischer discloses that the customer enters any
information regarding a "location-of-interest." At best, the
system of Fischer assumes that a location of the customer is a
location where the customer would be interested in knowing of
outages. However, Fischer does not allow for the customer to
indicate which location the customer considers to be of interest.
Thus, while Fischer limits notifications to a customer location,
the language of Applicant's claim allows any interested party to
indicate any desired location as being of-interest.
App. Br. 5; see also Reply Br. 2.
The Examiner responds:
Due to the broad nature of the claim language, it is within the
broadest reasonable interpretation of the claimed limitation that
when the system of Fischer receives the submitted webpage
from a customer, that the customer is providing an input to the
system which indicates that a location for which the webpage is
being submitted is a location of interest to the customer. Based
on this interpretation, a customer is indicating that a location is
a location of interest by submitting the webpage.
Ans. 3 (emphasis added).
2 Appellants raise additional arguments. Because the identified issue is
dispositive of the appeal, we do not reach the additional arguments.
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Application 13/293,746
We disagree with the Examiner. The Examiner maps the claimed
"location in the power grid" to Fischer's "Device ID and Device Type" of
Figure 5. See Final Act. 3. The Examiner initially maps the claimed
"location of interest" to Fischer's "Pet Store in Bedford" of Figure 5. See
Final Act. 3.
Fischer describes the following in connection with Figure 5:
FIG. 5 [is] an exemplary interface or webpage 100 provided by
an electric utility or other service provider ... the customer
may provide information relevant to the outage notification,
such as contact information for the appropriate individual( s) to
be contacted, where the contact information may include, for
example, fax numbers, telephone numbers, pager numbers, or
email addresses to contact in the event of an outage.
Fischer 14:52-64.
Consistent with the description above, Fischer's Figure 5 indicates the
"Pet Store in Bedford" is associated with the account prior to submission of
the cited information-not by "a customer submitting information via a
website" in connection with Figure 5, as asserted by the Examiner (Final
Act. 3). Therefore, the Examiner has not adequately explained how the cited
Fischer portions teach "a customer location unit to receive an input from an
interested party identifying a location of interest to the interested party," as
required by the claim.
The Examiner's response in the Answer is also inadequate. The
Examiner newly maps the claimed "location of interest" to the "location for
which the webpage is being submitted." Ans. 3. But under that new
mapping, the Examiner has not explained how the cited portions of Fischer
teach "a customer location unit to receive an input ... identifying a location
of interest to the interested party" or "associate[ing] the location of interest
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Application 13/293,746
with a location in the power grid," as required by the claim. For example,
the cited Fisher portions do not describe where the "location for which the
webpage is being submitted" is, and do not describe associating such
location "with a location in the power grid," as required by the claim. See
Fischer, Fig. 5; 14:52-15:56.
Because the Examiner fails to provide sufficient evidence or
explanation to support the rejection, we are constrained by the record to
reverse the Examiner's rejection of claim 1, and corresponding dependent
claims 2-13 for similar reasons.
For similar reasons discussed above with respect to claim 1, we are
constrained by the record to reverse the Examiner's rejection of independent
claims 14 and 17, which recite features similar to the disputed limitation,
and corresponding dependent claims 15, 16, and 18-20.
DECISION
We reverse the Examiner's decision rejecting claims 1-20.
REVERSED
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