Ex Parte Valdez et alDownload PDFPatent Trial and Appeal BoardDec 20, 201311091158 (P.T.A.B. Dec. 20, 2013) Copy Citation UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE ____________ BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD ____________ Ex parte JOHN VALDEZ, AMIT PATADIA, VAMSHI GILLIPALLI, LAN PHAM, VIVEK PACHAIYAPPAN, PETER SWAMIDAS, and JOHN LESLIE ____________ Appeal 2011-002805 Application 11/091,158 Technology Center 2400 ____________ Before ELENI MANTIS MERCADER, DENISE M. POTHIER, and PATRICK M. BOUCHER, Administrative Patent Judges. POTHIER, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON REQUEST FOR REHEARING Pursuant to 37 C.F.R. § 41.52, Appellants have submitted a timely Request for Rehearing dated February 24, 2013 (hereafter the “Request”), requesting rehearing of the December 24, 2013 opinion (hereafter the “Opinion”) affirming the Examiner’s rejection of claims 1-20 under § 103. Opinion (Op.) 1. Appeal 2011-002805 Application 11/091,158 2 We have reconsidered the Opinion in light of Appellants’ comments in the Request and find no errors. We, therefore, decline to change our prior decision for the following reasons. As stated in the Opinion, the Examiner took Official Notice of certain findings of facts. Op. 3-4 (citing Ans. 5). Appellants argue that “certain portions of the Official Notice remain unsupported by documentary evidence.” Request 3. Yet, as noted in the Opinion, Appellants did not traverse these factual findings adequately. See Op. 7. Specifically, Appellants have made general allegations that the features the Examiner took Official Notice of are not well known. See id. (citing App. Br. 12-13; Reply Br. 2-3). Such bald assertions are insufficient to challenge the Examiner’s taking of Official Notice. See In re Boon, 439 F.2d 724, 728 (CCPA 1971) (indicating an applicant has the right to challenge the official notice and demand evidence in support thereof, provided such a challenge is accompanied by adequate information or argument that creates a reasonable doubt regarding the circumstances justifying the official notice); cf. In re Perkins, 346 F.2d 981 (CCPA 1965). By failing to provide adequate information or argument to create reasonable doubt (see Op. 7), Appellants have not sufficiently challenged the Examiner’s taking of certain facts in the rejection as well known. We, therefore, disagree that we “misapplied the standard for assessing the propriety and content of facts under Official Notice.” Request 2. Even so, the Examiner provides some support for the findings that are stated to be well-known and for concluding claims 1-20 are obvious. See Op. 6 (citing Ans. 20, which discusses Chen and Rajala); see also Appeal 2011-002805 Application 11/091,158 3 Ans. 19-20. These references discuss protocol conversion in the data link and application layers. Op. 5-6. Conspicuously absent from Chen and Rajala, as well as from McZeal and Gbaguidi, are discussions of protocol conversions in layers of the network stack (e.g., the network or transport layer) other than those discussed (e.g., data link and application layers). Absent some evidence to the contrary, we find the Examiner’s findings reasonable that protocol conversions on data link and application layers occur without protocol conversions on other layers of the network stack. Beyond discussing the Examiner’s taking of Official Notice and contrary to Appellants’ contentions (see Request 3-4), the Opinion states what the evidence of record suggests to an ordinarily skilled artisan in the context of the obviousness rejection. Op. 6. Specifically, given the teachings of the cited references, we indicate what ordinarily skilled artisans would have recognized when accounting for the inferences that they would have employed. See Op. 6. That is, “[a] person of ordinary skill is also a person of ordinary creativity, not an automaton.” KSR, 550 U.S. at 421. As stated above, having no express teaching in the cited references that the protocol conversions taught on the data link and application layers also occur on other layers of the network stack suggests to an ordinarily skilled artisan that the data link and application layer protocol conversions occur without converting on at least one of the network or transport layer protocols as recited. Lastly, Appellants assert that we presented a new ground of rejection in the Opinion. Request 5. Specifically, Appellants argue that McZeal’s Figure 3 was relied upon to teach providing a user interface and not to teach Appeal 2011-002805 Application 11/091,158 4 making protocol conversions. Id. Ultimately, “whether a rejection is considered ‘new’ in a decision by the [B]oard” hinges on “whether [applicants] have had fair opportunity to react to the thrust of the rejection.” In re Leithem, 661 F.3d 1316, 1319 (Fed. Cir. 2011) (internal quotation marks omitted). Pointing to McZeal’s Figure 3 in the Opinion illustrates visually the example of a data link protocol conversion between Ethernet and wireless protocols discussed by Examiner in the rejection. See Op. 6 (citing Ans. 5, 19). At most, this discussion in the Opinion merely elaborates on the Examiner’s position. See In re Oetiker, 977 F.2d 1443, 1445-46 (Fed. Cir.1992). The basic thrust of the rejection has not changed, and Appellants have had a fair opportunity to react to the thrust of the rejection, which discusses examples of data link protocol conversions. We have considered the arguments raised by Appellants in the Request, but the arguments are not persuasive to find that the original Opinion was in error. Based on the record before us now and in the original appeal, we are still of the view that the Examiner did not err in rejecting claims 1-20. We have granted the Request to the extent that we have reconsidered our Opinion of December 24, 2013, but we deny the request with respect to making any changes therein. REHEARING DENIED rwk Copy with citationCopy as parenthetical citation