Ex Parte Tomita et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jan 27, 2014

12111432 (P.T.A.B. Jan. 27, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte HIDEO TOMITA and MICHIHIRO TOBITA
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Appeal 2011-012665
Application 12/111,432
Technology Center 2600
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Before JAMES R. HUGHES, MICHAEL J. STRAUSS, and
JUSTIN BUSCH, Administrative Patent Judges.

STRAUSS, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Appeal 2011-012665
Application 12/111,432

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STATEMENT OF CASE
Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from a rejection of claims
1-4. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
THE INVENTION
The claims are directed to a liquid crystal projector and a method of
controlling the same. Spec. 1. Claim 1, reproduced below, is illustrative of
the claimed subject matter with disputed limitations in italics:
1. A liquid crystal projector for projecting a three-dimensional
image based on an image signal for a left-hand eye and an
image signal for a right-hand eye, said liquid crystal projector
comprising:
a liquid crystal panel to which a normal voltage and an
inversion voltage are alternately applied; and
a drive circuit configured to drive said liquid crystal
panel in order of a first state corresponding to a first image
signal, the first state corresponding to a second image signal, a
second state corresponding to the first image signal, and the
second state corresponding to the second image signal, one of
the image signal for the left-hand eye and the image signal for
the right-hand eye being set as the first image signal, the other
thereof being set as the second image signal, one of a normal
state of the voltage applied to the liquid crystal panel, and an
inversion state of the voltage applied to the liquid crystal panel
being set as the first state, the other thereof being set as the
second state.

REFERENCES
The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on
appeal is:
Harada US 6,476,820 B1 Nov. 5, 2002
Applicant’s Admitted Prior Art (see Figs. 1-3 and the
corresponding specification, pages 3-8) (hereinafter “AAPA”).
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REJECTION1
The Examiner rejected claims 1-4 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being
unpatentable over AAPA and Harada. Ans. 3-6.

APPELLANTS’ CONTENTION
Harada fails to teach or suggest the claimed order of images “and in
fact does not teach or suggest inverting an image state at all” and therefore,
the combination of AAPA and Harada fails to teach or suggest the disputed
limitations of claim 1. App. Br. 5.

ISSUE ON APPEAL
Based on Appellants’ arguments in the Appeal Brief (App. Br. 3-5)
and Reply Brief (Reply Br. 2-3), the issue presented on appeal is whether
AAPA and Harada collectively teach or would have suggested a drive circuit
configured to drive a liquid crystal panel as recited in Appellants’ claim 1.

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 (1) the findings and reasons set forth by
the Examiner in the action from which this appeal is taken (Ans. 3-6) and (2)
the reasons set forth by the Examiner in the Examiner’s Answer in response

1 Appellants argue the rejection of claim 4 on the basis of claim 1. Separate
patentability is not argued for claims 2 and 3. Therefore, based on
Appellants’ arguments, we decide the appeal of claims 1-4 based on claim 1
alone. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.37(c)(1)(vii).
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Application 12/111,432

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to Appellants’ Appeal Brief (Ans. 6-7) and concur with the conclusions
reached by the Examiner. We highlight the following for emphasis.
Appellants contend that Harada only describes presenting frames in
the order A1, B1, A1, B1 at double speed but “does not describe any
inversions or changes to an order of frames, as only two types of frames are
described A 1 and B 1.” Reply Br. 2. According to Appellants, modifying
AAPA according to Harada “would result in providing the frames in the
order of A1, A2, B1, B2 at double speed, namely the order described by the
Related Art and the double speed modification provided by Harada.” Id.
Appellants argue Harada provides no suggestion or motivation to change the
order of frames or invert the polarity of the frames, only to double the speed
at which they are presented.
We disagree with Appellants. As an initial matter we note that claim 1
recites a liquid crystal projector including a liquid crystal pane and drive
circuit. While Appellants argue that claim 1 requires specific arrangements
of inversions and orderings of frames, no structure is recited to provide the
argued functionality. Instead claim 1 recites that the drive circuit is
“configured” to drive the liquid crystal panel in a particular order of states
and image signal sequences. Because the “configured” language of claim 1
does not recite structure to perform the argued sequence or require that the
argued sequence actually be performed, it is merely a statement of intended
use and, therefore, fails to patentably distinguish claim 1 over the applied
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combination of AAPA and Harada.2 Nevertheless, we find that the
combination of AAPA and Harada teaches or at least would have suggested
the disputed limitations. In particular, as explained by the Examiner:
[T]he combination of AAPA and Harada merely modifies the
driving step order of AAPA in view of the driving step order of
Harada while maintaining the polarities of the first and second
states of the first and second images of AAPA unchanged (i.e.,
maintaining the first state of the first image being a normal state
and the second state of the first image being an inversion state.)
Ans. 7 (emphasis omitted). We agree with the Examiner. In particular,
Harada describes presenting left-eye video, followed by right-eye video, and
repeating the sequence to effectively double the frame rate resulting in the
sequence A1, B1, A2, B2. Harada Fig. 8B, col. 9, ll. 1-10. That is, rather
than immediately repeating the left-eye video with itself and only then
following with right-eye and its repetition as suggested by Appellants’
proffered sequence A1, A2, B1, B2 (Reply Br. 2), Harada alternates between
left and right videos resulting in the sequence A1, B1, A2, B2. While we
agree that Harada’s A2 frame may be a time-delayed version of A1 and
likewise for B2 and B1, that arrangement is analogous to AAPA which
describes a first or left image signal and a second or right image signal, i.e.,

2 Our reviewing Court has held that a statement of intended use in an
apparatus claim cannot distinguish over a prior art apparatus that discloses
all the recited limitations and is capable of performing the recited function.
See In re Schreiber, 128 F.3d 1473, 1477 (Fed. Cir. 1997). We also note
that “[a]n intended use or purpose usually will not limit the scope of the
claim because such statements usually do no more than define a context in
which the invention operates.” Boehringer Ingelheim Vetmedica, Inc. v.
Schering-Plough Corp., 320 F.3d 1339, 1345 (Fed. Cir. 2003). Although
“[s]uch statements often . . . appear in the claim’s preamble,” In re Stencel,
828 F.2d 751, 754 (Fed. Cir. 1987), a statement of intended use or purpose
can appear elsewhere in a claim. Id.
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two not four distinct images. Furthermore, because the invention is directed
to an LCD display, AAPA teaches that image signals are first driven by a
normal state and then an inversion state of voltage (or vice versa).
Therefore, using the Examiner’s notation, given the sequence (a), (b), (c),
(d) (Spec. Fig. 2B) and the desirability of alternating drive polarity at some
predetermined timing (Spec. 4-5) according to AAPA combined with
Harada’s teaching of alternating left and right images when increasing frame
rate, the combination would result in either the sequence (a), (c), (b), (d) as
found by the Examiner (Ans. 4) or (a), (d), (c), (b). We note that the
sequence (a), (c), (b), (d) includes a first state ((a) and (c)), followed by a
second state ((b) and (d)), each state including the first (or left) and second
(or right) image signals as depicted in Fig. 5A thereby satisfying the
language of claim 1. Alternatively, the combination of AAPA and Harada
might result in the sequence (a), (d), (c), (b) in which case the first “normal”
and second “inversion” states alternate with the image signals. While this
second possible arrangement fails to meet the limitations of claim 1, this
does not detract from the alternative (a), (c), (b), (d) sequence also resulting
from the combination which does teach or suggest the disputed limitations.
When there is a design need or market pressure to solve a
problem and there are a finite number of identified, predictable
solutions, a person of ordinary skill [in the art] has good reason
to pursue the known options within his or her technical grasp.
If this leads to the anticipated success, it is likely the product
not of innovation but of ordinary skill and common sense.
KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 421 (2007).
While, being directed to CRT rather than LCD technology, Harada
does not describe inverting an image state as asserted by Appellants (App.
Br. 5), because the Examiner relies on AAPA, not Harada, for teaching or
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suggesting first and second states including normal and inversion states of
voltage applied to the LCD (Ans. 4), Appellants’ contention based on this
omission of Harada is not persuasive of error.
On the record before us and for the reasons supra, we sustain the
rejections of independent claim 1 and, for the same reasons, independent
claim 4 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) over AAPA and Harada together with the
rejections of dependent claims 2 and 3 not separately argued.

CONCLUSIONS
We find AAPA and Harada collectively teach or suggest a drive circuit
configured to drive a liquid crystal panel as recited in claim 1 and, therefore,
the Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 1-4 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a).

DECISION
The Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1-4 is affirmed.
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv).

AFFIRMED

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