Ex Parte Baldursson

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 20, 2018

10879528 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 20, 2018)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
10/879,528 06/30/2004
11764 7590
Ditthavong & Steiner, P.C.
44 Canal Center Plaza
Suite 305
Alexandria, VA 22314
09/24/2018
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Sveinn Baldursson
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.
P5152USOO 7313
EXAMINER
BARRY, LANCE LEONARD
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2448
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/24/2018 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):
docket@dcpatent.com
Nokia.IPR@nokia.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte SVEINN BALDURSSON
Appeal2018-000729
Application 10/879,528
Technology Center 2400
Before MAHSHID D. SAADAT, JOYCE CRAIG, and
JOHN P. PINKERTON, Administrative Patent Judges.
SAADAT, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant1 appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner's
Final Rejection of claims 20 and 22-39, which are all the claims pending in
this application. 2 We have jurisdiction over the pending claims under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We affirm.
1 According to Appellant, the real party in interest is HERE GLOBAL B.V.
App. Br. 1.
2 Claims 1-19 and 21 have been cancelled previously.
Appeal2018-000729
Application 10/879,528
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
Introduction
Appellant's Specification describes "systems for publishing content
using mobile networks." Spec. 1. Exemplary claim 20 under appeal reads
as follows:
20. A method comprising:
receiving content from a mobile device for publishing to
a blog file;
determining, using at least one computing device, a
location of the mobile device at a time the content was received
in response to receiving the content;
associating of the location with the content as location
information; and
transmitting the content and the location information for
publishing to the blog file.
The Examiner's Rejection
Claims 20 and 22-39 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § I03(a) as
unpatentable over Mayraz (US 2003/0105826 Al; published June 5, 2003),
Movable Type (Movable Type User Manual,
http://web.archive.org/web/20030403014227/www.movabletype.org/docs/m
tmanual-full.html, accessed Dec. 2, 2010), Brown (US 2002/0165910 Al;
published Nov. 7, 2002), and Yamamoto (US 2003/0037110 Al; published
Feb. 20, 2003). See Final Act. 4--8.
ANALYSIS
We have reviewed the Examiner's rejection in light of Appellant's
arguments in Appellant's Briefs that the Examiner has erred. We are
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Application 10/879,528
unpersuaded by Appellant's contentions and concur with the findings and
conclusions reached by the Examiner as explained below.
In rejecting claim 20, the Examiner finds Mayraz discloses all the
recited method steps, except for the publishing content to a blog file and
determining the mobile device location in response to receiving the content.
Final Act. 4. The Examiner relies on Movable Type (publishing to a blog
file (citing pp. 2, 3, 6)), on Brown (determining a location of the user's
mobile device ( citing Abstract, ,r,r 3 8-39) ), and Yamamoto ( a location was
received in response to receiving the content (citing ,r,r 54--55)) for the
limitation missing in Mayraz. Final Act. 4--6.
Appellant contends the combination of Mayraz with Movable Type,
Brown, and Yamamoto fails to teach or suggest the recited step of
"determining, using at least one computing device, a location of the mobile
device at a time the content was received in response to receiving the
content" recited in independent claims 20 and 30. App. Br. 5. Appellant
argues Mayraz provides the user location that is included in the user profile
when a user wants to include a location or location information in the
message, which does not take into account the location of the user or the
device at the time the message is generated. App. Br. 6 ( citing Mayraz
,r,r 126-128). Additionally, Appellant contends the cited portions of Brown
teach that "a location of a user can be the location of the user's mobile
device," but do not teach or suggest "determining a location of a mobile
device at a time content is received in response to receiving the content."
App. Br. 7.
The Examiner responds that the rejection is based on the combination
of the reference teachings, specifically, on determining a location related to a
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user taught in Mayraz, which could include the location of the mobile device
taught by Brown, in combination with Movable Type and Yamamoto
disclosing a blog file and determining location of the device in response to
receiving content. Ans. 2-3. The Examiner further explains how the
teachings of Mayraz with respect to location information of the sender of a
message, which identifies the location included in the sender profile as a
source of such information, would be modified with Brown's teaching of
using the location of the mobile device as the location of the sender. See
Ans. 4--8.
We agree with the Examiner that one of ordinary skill in the art would
have found it obvious to substitute the user location of Brown, which is
determined by the position coordinates of a wireless device associated with a
user, for the location in the user profile ofMayraz in determining the
location information when content is received. Contrary to Appellant's
argument that determining the location of a user or a location of the mobile
device is not the focus of Mayraz, we agree with the Examiner that the
proposed combination reasonably suggests obtaining the real time location
information from the device location instead of the location information of
Mayraz that is obtained from the already stored user profile. See App. Br. 9;
Reply Br. 2--4; Ans. 3. "The test for obviousness is not whether the features
of a secondary reference may be bodily incorporated into the structure of the
primary reference .... Rather, the test is what the combined teachings of the
references would have suggested to those of ordinary skill in the art." In re
Keller, 642 F.2d 413,425 (CCPA 1981). Here, the rejection is based on
combining the specific elements taught by Movable Type, Brown, and
Yamamoto with Mayraz, specifically, rather than the location information
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contained in the user profile, using the location information of the mobile
device taught by Brown as the location information of the user.
Additionally, we are not persuaded by Appellant's contention that the
Examiner failed to establish a prima facie case of obviousness because the
rejection lacks an articulated reason for the proposed combination. See App.
Br. 9; Reply Br. 3--4. The Supreme Court has rejected the rigid requirement
of demonstrating a teaching, suggestion, or motivation to combine
references in order to show obviousness. See KSR Int 'l Co., v. Teleflex Co.,
550 U.S. 398, 419 (2007). Instead, a rejection based on obviousness only
needs to be supported by "some articulated reasoning with some rational
underpinning" to combine known elements in the manner required by the
claim. Id. at 418. As found by the Examiner, one of ordinary skill in the art
would have been motivated to modify the process of Mayraz by using
Brown's location information based on the location of the wireless device.
See Final Act. 5. We conclude that the Examiner's articulated reasoning is
sufficient to support the rejection of claim 20 because "[t]he combination of
familiar elements according to known methods is likely to be obvious when
it does no more than yield predictable results." KSR, 550 U.S. at 416.
CONCLUSION
As discussed herein, Appellant's arguments have not persuaded us
that the Examiner erred in finding the combination of Mayraz with Movable
Type, Brown, and Yamamoto teaches or suggests the disputed limitations of
claims 20 and 30. Accordingly, we sustain the 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) rejection
of independent claims 20 and 30, as well as the remaining dependent claims,
which are not argued separately.
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Application 10/879,528
DECISION
We affirm the Examiner's rejection of claims 20 and 22-39 under
35 U.S.C. § I03(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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