Ex Parte Boll

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Oct 31, 2014

10557597 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 31, 2014)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte PETER BOLL
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Appeal 2012-008873
Application 10/557,597
Technology Center 2600
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Before JOSEPH L. DIXON, JAMES R. HUGHES, and ERIC S. FRAHM,
Administrative Patent Judges.

FRAHM, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL
Appellant appeals under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
rejections of claims 1–19. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
We reverse.

Appeal 2012-008873
Application 10/557,597

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REJECTIONS
(1) The Examiner rejected claims 1, 3, 4, 8, 12, 13, and 19 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as unpatentable over Chakrabarti (US 6,646,623 B1;
issued Nov. 11, 2003) and Eichenlaub (US 5,311,220; issued May 10, 1994).
Ans. 6–9.
(2) The Examiner rejected claims 2 and 5–7 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a)
as unpatentable over Chakrabarti, Eichenlaub, and Kim (EP 1 302 812 A2;
published Apr. 16, 2003). Ans. 9–11.
(3) The Examiner rejected claims 9–11 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Chakrabarti, Eichenlaub, and Centofante (US 5,833,903;
issued Nov. 10, 1998). Ans. 11–13.
(4) The Examiner rejected claims 14, 15, 17, and 18 under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as unpatentable over Chakrabarti, Eichenlaub, and Tsao (US
6,302,542 B1; issued Oct. 16, 2001). Ans. 13–14.
(5) The Examiner rejected claim 16 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as
unpatentable over Chakrabarti, Eichenlaub, Tsao, and Salley (US 6,901,185
B2). Ans. 14–15; also see Ans. 4 and 6 (Examiner stating that Salley, US
6,901,185, is relied upon for the rejection). We note that U.S. Patent No.
6,901,185 B2 is a patent issued to Sasaki, and not Salley, and that the issue
date is May 31, 2005, and not October 2004 as asserted by the Examiner at
page 6 of the Answer). Notably, Figure 19 and column 16 of U.S. Patent
No. 6,901,185 B2 do not exist (these portions of the reference are cited at
page 15 of the Answer), as there are only 10 Figures and 10 columns present
in U.S. Patent No. 6,901,185 B2. Because we reverse the Examiner’s
rejections based on the base combination of Chakrabarti and Eichenlaub for
reasons stated infra with respect to independent claim 1 and remaining
Appeal 2012-008873
Application 10/557,597

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independent claim 4 (from which claim 16 ultimately depends), we consider
this to be harmless error for purposes of appeal.

ANALYSIS
We have reviewed Appellant’s arguments in the Appeal Brief (Br. 9–
21), the Examiner’s rejections (Ans. 6–15), and the Examiner’s response to
the arguments (Ans. 16–26).
Appellant presents the following argument pertaining to the base
combination of Chakrabarti and Eichenlaub:
The referenced portion of Eichenlaub states that "[t]he
third time the region turned on it would emit blue light, and the
display would show blue component of some image, such [sic]
multicolored regions could be generated if the emitting
surface, such as 1 in FIGS. 1 and 2, were a CRT display or a
back lighted LCD."
Assuming that the skilled person would backlight an
LCD using LEDs at the time of the invention, the skilled person
would modify Eichenlaub by using LEDs for panel 1 which is
described as "light emitting panel" (3:15-19) and "LIGHT
GENERATING/TRANSMITTING SURFACE" in the Figs. 1-
6. The light valve display (2) is "a transmissive display such as
a liquid crystal display (LCD)" (3:19-21). Thus, the skilled
person would understand that the light emitting panel (1) serves
as the light source to backlight the LCD light valve display (2).
Therefore, based on the Examiner's assertion, the skilled person
would be led to modify the light emitting panel to use LEDs to
backlight the image displayed on the light valve display (2).
The proposed combination of Chakrabarti and
Eichenlaub based on the Examiner's findings would result in
the skilled person placing the LED backlight behind the
AMLCD panel of Chakrabarti. However, the images in both
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Chakrabarti and Eichenlaub are produced using the LCD
panels, and the LED backlight would serve as the light source
of the image producing panels of Chakrabarti and Eichenlaub.
Chakrabarti teaches that image information of a conventional
3-D frame is generated on the AMLCD unit (14:64-67), and
Eichenlaub describes light valve (2) displaying a scene (3:60-
63). Thus, the proposed combination would not focus light
emanating from the LEDs of the array which produce a
sequence of two-dimensional output images onto an imaging
device as required by the claims.
(Br. 16) (underlining added for emphasis).
We agree with Appellant’s argument (Br. 16) that the combination of
Chakrabarti and Eichenlaub fails to teach or suggest focusing light
emanating from the LEDs of the array onto an imaging device as required by
the claims. We are constrained by the record before us to find that the
Examiner erred in concluding, for each rejection, that the base combination
of Chakrabarti and Eichenlaub teaches or suggests focusing light emitted
from the light emitting diodes (LEDs) of an array onto an imaging device, as
recited in each of independent claims 1 and 4, as well as remaining claims 2,
3, and 5–19 depending respectively therefrom.

DECISION
For the foregoing reasons, the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1–
19 is reversed.

REVERSED
lv