Harrison, Michael J.

Patent Trials and Appeals Board

Dec 13, 2019

15001582 - (D) (P.T.A.B. Dec. 13, 2019)

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.
15/001,582 01/20/2016 Michael J. Harrison EE175 3712
54698 7590 12/13/2019
MOSER TABOADA
1030 BROAD STREET
SUITE 203
SHREWSBURY, NJ 07702
EXAMINER
RETEBO, METASEBIA T
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2842
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
12/13/2019 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):
docketing@mtiplaw.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
____________

BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
____________

Ex parte MICHAEL J. HARRISON

Appeal 2019-002182
Application 15/001,582
Technology Center 2800
____________

Before JEFFREY T. SMITH, JEFFREY W. ABRAHAM, and
MICHAEL G. McMANUS, Administrative Patent Judges.

McMANUS, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. § 134(a), Appellant1 seeks review of the
Examiner’s decision to reject claims 1–7, 9–15, and 17–20. We have
jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We REVERSE.

1 We use the word “Appellant” to refer to “applicant” as defined in 37
C.F.R. § 1.42. Appellant identifies the real party in interest as Enphase
Energy, Inc. Appeal Br. 3.
Appeal 2019-002182
Application 15/001,582

2
CLAIMED SUBJECT MATTER

The present application generally relates to an apparatus and system
for powering an isolated gate driver. Spec. ¶ 6.
Claim 1 is illustrative of the subject matter on appeal and is
reproduced below:
1. An apparatus for powering a power converter isolated gate
driver, comprising:
a gate driver power supply unit (PSU), coupled to a
transistor and to an isolated gate driver that couples control
signals to the transistor, for (i) harnessing energy from
commutation action across the transistor, and (ii) using the
harnessed energy to power the isolated gate driver.
Appeal Br. 12 (Claims App’x).
REFERENCES
The Examiner relies upon the following prior art:
Name Reference Date
Sankman et al.
(“Sankman”)
US 2004/0125623 Al July 1, 2004
Jahkonen US 2004/0207359 Al Oct. 21, 2004
Yeh US 2009/0315393 Al Dec. 24, 2009
Fang et al. (“Fang”) US 2014/0049175 Al Feb. 20, 2014
Zolnhofer US 2015/0253792 Al Sept. 10, 2015
Richardson et al.
(“Richardson”)
US 2016/0142049 Al May 19, 2016

Appeal 2019-002182
Application 15/001,582

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REJECTIONS
The Examiner maintains the following rejections:
1. Claims 1–3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13, 15, and 19 are rejected under 35
U.S.C. § 103 as being unpatentable over Richardson in view of
Fang and further in view of Jahkonen. Final Act. 2–4.
2. Claims 4 and 12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Richardson in view of Fang and further in
view of Jahkonen and Sankman. Id. at 4.
3. Claims 6 and 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Richardson in view of Fang and further in
view of Jahkonen and Zolnhofer. Id. at 4–5.
4. Claims 17, 18, and 20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as being
unpatentable over Richardson in view of Fang and further in
view of Jahkonen and Yeh. Id. at 5.
DISCUSSION
Rejection 1. The Examiner rejects claims 1–3, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 13, 15,
and 19 as obvious over Richardson in view of Fang and Jahkonen. Final
Act. 2–4. Claims 2, 3, 5, and 7 depend from independent claim 1 while
claims 10, 11, 13, 15, and 19 depend from independent claim 9. Appellant
presents argument limited to independent claims 1 and 9. Appeal Br. 6–7.
Accordingly, the rejection of dependent claims 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, 11, 13, 15, and
19 will stand or fall with underlying independent claims 1 and 9.
In support of the rejection, the Examiner finds that Richardson
discloses an apparatus for powering an isolated gate driver comprising a gate
Appeal 2019-002182
Application 15/001,582

4
driver power supply unit and an isolated gate driver but does not teach the
details of the power supply unit. Final Act. 2.
The Examiner additionally finds that Fang teaches a power supply
circuit that includes a charge pump and a linear voltage regulator coupled to
bridge diodes. Id. Fang teaches that “[t]he invention relates to a PFC
converter and more particularly to an internal power supply circuit for buck-
boost power factor correction (PFC) converter.” Fang ¶ 2. The Examiner
determines that a person of ordinary skill in the art would have had reason to
modify the power supply of Richardson by incorporating the charge pump
and linear voltage regulator of Fang “for the purpose of reducing the ripple
voltage to allow the voltage after the linear voltage rectifier to be linear to
DC bus voltage at steady state.” Final Act. 2–3.
The Examiner additionally finds that Jahkonen discloses that it would
have been known to implement a rectifier using diode bridges. Id. at 3; see
also Jahkonen ¶ 4. Jahkonen teaches that “[b]oth the rectifier 21 and the
inverter 22 are generally implemented using semiconductor switches.”
Jahkonen ¶ 5. The Examiner determines that it would have been obvious to
one of ordinary skill “to have provided a rectifier with transistors in place of
bridge diode (21-24), because such an obvious modification would have
been the mere substitution of known art recognized alternative rectifier
chosen as necessary by those of ordinary skill in the art as suggested by the
exemplary teaching of Jahkonen.” Final Act. 3.
Accordingly, the Examiner determines that the apparatus of claim 1
would have been obvious. Appellant argues that the rejection is in error on
several bases.
Appeal 2019-002182
Application 15/001,582

5
First, Appellant argues that the Final Action was improperly issued
because the Examiner did not respond to the substance of Appellant’s
arguments presented in the response filed to the December 2017 final
rejection. Appeal Br. 5–6. That is, Appellant argues that the Examiner has
not followed proper procedure. Id. If an Examiner has procedurally erred,
the remedy lies exclusively in petitioning the Director for supervisory
review. 37 C.F.R. § 1.181; cf. 35 U.S.C. § 6(b) (giving substantive review
powers directly to the Board). The Director of the United States Patent and
Trademark Office, not the Board, supervises examination and Examiners.
35 U.S.C. §§ 3(a)(2)(A), 132(a).
Second, Appellant argues that the Examiner has not shown an
adequate reason why a person of ordinary skill in the art would have
combined the teachings of Richardson and Fang. Appeal Br. 6–7. Appellant
argues as follows:
Appellants respectfully submit that there is no reason why
one skilled in the art would be motivated to make such a
modification. Fang discloses that a major limitation of buck-
boost PFC converter internal power supply circuits consisting of
an auxiliary winding of the PFC inductor, a charge pump circuit
and a linear voltage regulator is that the voltage after the charge
pump includes a high ripple voltage with a frequency of double
main input frequency. (Fang, paragraph [0007]) A consequence
of this high ripple voltage is that it causes the linear voltage
regulator to have a high power loss and thus to be less cost
effective. (Id.) Fang further discloses that to avoid such PFC
circuit limitation, an internal power supply circuit for the buck-
boost PFC converter is needed that eliminates or reduces the
ripple voltage to allow the voltage after the linear voltage
rectifier to be linear to DC bus voltage (output of the buck-boost
PFC converter) at steady state, and that a smaller or eliminated
voltage ripple will improve the power loss factor in linear voltage
Appeal 2019-002182
Application 15/001,582

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regulator and allow the buck-boost PFC converter to be more
cost effective. (Fang, paragraph [0008]). None of these issues
disclosed by Fang are applicable to Richardson.

Appeal Br. 7 (emphasis added). Appellant further argues that Fang teaches
an internal power supply that includes an auxiliary winding of a PFC
inductor, a charge pump circuit and a linear voltage regulator and that
“Richardson fails to disclose any of these components or circuits, or any AC
input resulting in a ripple voltage.” Id. Similarly, in its Reply Brief,
Appellant argues as follows:
Fang discloses a high ripple voltage that results from a particular
circuit configuration which does not apply to Richardson.
Further, Richardson is silent with respect to any ripple voltage
even being present. If the circuit configuration that generates
ripple voltage is missing from Richardson, and if Richardson is
silent with respect to any ripple voltage, there is simply no reason
one skilled in the art would seek to modify Richardson to reduce
ripple voltage.

Reply Br. 2.
Richardson teaches that “a need exists for an improved power supply
circuit to deliver isolated and/or electrically floating supply voltages to load
driving circuits.” Richardson ¶ 4.
An Examiner must provide more than conclusory statements to
support an obviousness argument: “there must be some articulated reasoning
with some rational underpinning to support the legal conclusion of
obviousness.” KSR Int’l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398, 418 (quoting In
re Kahn, 441 F.3d 977, 988 (Fed. Cir. 2006)). Here, the Examiner posits
that one of skill in the art would incorporate the charge pump and linear
regulator of Fang into the power supply of Richardson “for the purpose of
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Application 15/001,582

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reducing the ripple voltage.” Final Act. 2. The Examiner, however, has not
shown that the power supply of Richardson gives rise to a ripple voltage.
Nor has the Examiner shown that the components proposed to be
incorporated by Fang would have been compatible with Richardson’s stated
need “for an improved power supply circuit to deliver isolated and/or
electrically floating supply voltages to load driving circuits.” Richardson
¶ 4. Absent such a showing, the Examiner has not provided sufficient
“articulated reasoning with some rational underpinning” to support the
proposed reason to combine the teachings of Richardson and Fang.
Accordingly, we determine that Appellant has shown error in the
rejection of independent claims 1 and 9. As the Examiner relies upon the
same reasoning in rejecting dependent claims 2, 3, 5, 7, 10, 11, 13, 15, and
19 (Final Act. 3–4), we similarly determine that Appellant has shown error
in the rejection of those claims.

Rejections 2–4. The Examiner rejects claims 4, 6, 12, 14, 17, 18, and
20 as obvious over Richardson, Fang, and certain other references. Final
Act. 4–5. Each of these rejections relies upon the same rationale in support
of the determination that one of ordinary skill in the art would have had
reason to combine the teachings of Richardson and Fang. Id. As we have
determined such finding to be unsupported, we reverse these rejections.

Appeal 2019-002182
Application 15/001,582

8
CONCLUSION

The Examiner’s rejections are reversed.
In summary:
Claims
Rejected
35 U.S.C. § Reference(s)/Basis Affirmed Reversed
1–3, 5, 7,
9, 10, 11,
13, 15, 19
103 Richardson, Fang,
Jahkonen
1–3, 5, 7, 9,
10, 11, 13,
15, 19
4, 12 103 Richardson, Fang,
Jahkonen,
Sankman
4, 12
6, 14 103 Richardson, Fang,
Jahkonen,
Zolnhofer
6, 14
17, 18, 20 103 Richardson, Fang,
Jahkonen, Yeh
17, 18, 20
Overall
Outcome
1–7, 9–15,
17–20

REVERSED