Ex Parte Dawley et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Sep 5, 2017

12950889 (P.T.A.B. Sep. 5, 2017)

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.
12/950,889 11/19/2010 Robert Dawley GRIR-034-101 8645
27896 7590 09/07/2017
EDELL, SHAPIRO & FINNAN, LLC
9801 Washingtonian Blvd.
Suite 750
Gaithersburg, MD 20878
EXAMINER
PARK, HYUN D
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
2865
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
09/07/2017 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):
epatent@usiplaw.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte ROBERT DAWLEY and DAVE PERROTTA
Appeal 2016-008478
Application 12/950,889
Technology Center 2800
Before CHUNG K. PAK, TERRY J. OWENS, and WESLEY B. DERRICK,
Administrative Patent Judges.
OWENS, Administrative Patent Judge.
DECISION ON APPEAL
STATEMENT OF THE CASE
The Appellants appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134(a) from the Examiner’s
rejection of claims 1—8. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
The Invention
The Appellants claim an in-line power management
system for protecting connected equipment. Claim 1 is
illustrative:
1. An in-line power management system for protecting
connected equipment, having:
in-line power cord, coupled to a housing, for electrically
connecting to a wall socket to carry an incoming electrical
power signal,
Appeal 2016-008478
Application 12/950,889
a power outlet and a telephone jack connector having six
connector pins on the housing for providing filtered electrical
power signal to equipment connected to the power outlet,
the housing enclosing:
a voltage sensor for detecting power events occurring on
the incoming electrical power signal,
an event logger capable of logging an occurrence of a
power event to record a type of power event, and
a communication interface capable of transferring
recorded events to a remote processor, the communication
interface having
a connection to two of the connector pins in the
telephone jack connector, wherein the two connector pins are
unused by telephone equipment, and
a processor for generating the recorded data as two-
line serial communication signals for transferring the recorded
events on the two connector pins in the telephone jack
connector.
The References
O’Sullivan US 5,127,041 June 30, 1992
Brocco US 2002/0196805 A1 Dec. 26, 2002
Brown US 2006/0271214 A1 Nov. 30, 2006
Galsim WO 2010/057343 A2 May 27, 2010
The Rejections
The claims stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as follows:
claims 1—4, 6 and 7 over Galsim in view of Brown and O’Sullivan and
claims 5 and 8 over Galsim in view of Brown, O’Sullivan and Brocco.
OPINION
We reverse the rejections. We need address only the independent
claims (1 and 8). Those claims require two telephone jack connector pins
that are unused by telephone equipment. To meet that claim requirement the
Examiner relies upon O’Sullivan (Final Act. 4; Ans. 3).
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Appeal 2016-008478
Application 12/950,889
O’Sullivan discloses a modem (102) having a standard 6-position
RJ-11 jack (140) for connecting either to a landline telephone jack (138) or a
cellular bus (112) via a signal processing cable (col. 6,1. 67 — col. 7,1. 2).
The RJ-11 jack’s six terminals carry signals as follows: pin 1, “common
ground”; pin 2, “serial data from signal processing cable”; pin 3, “signal
processing cable analog transmit”; pin 4, “signal processing cable analog
receive”; pin 5, “serial data to signal processing cable”; and pin 6, “signal
processing cable provided DC voltage” (col. 7,11. 2—3, 33—45).
The Examiner finds that the Appellants’ claim requirement of two
connector pins unused by telephone equipment is “nothing more than
recitation of well-known telephone jack configuration ([O’Sullivan]
Abstract, Fig. 2C; Col. 6, lines 56-68; Col. 7, lines 1-20) that are commonly
used to transfer data, as taught by O’Sullivan” (Ans. 3).
The Examiner does not point out, and it is not apparent, where the
relied-upon portions of O’Sullivan disclose a telephone jack having two
connector pins unused by telephone equipment. Thus, the Examiner has not
set forth a factual basis which is sufficient to support a conclusion of
obviousness of the Appellants’ claimed invention. See In re Warner, 379
F.2d 1011, 1017 (CCPA 1967) (“A rejection based on section 103 clearly
must rest on a factual basis, and these facts must be interpreted without
hindsight reconstruction of the invention from the prior art”). Accordingly,
we reverse the rejections.
DECISION/ORDER
The rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 103 of claims 1—4, 6 and 7 over
Galsim in view of Brown and O’Sullivan and claims 5 and 8 over Galsim in
view of Brown, O’Sullivan and Brocco are reversed.
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Appeal 2016-008478
Application 12/950,889
It is ordered that the Examiner’s decision is reversed.
REVERSED
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