Ex Parte Decuir et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jun 19, 2013

11058453 (P.T.A.B. Jun. 19, 2013)

UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
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BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
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Ex parte JOHN DAVID DeCUIR, TODD GEN KOZUKI,
OTIS JAMES GATES and SATOSHI ORII
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Appeal 2011-004024
Application 11/058,453
Technology Center 3600
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Before STEVEN D.A. McCARTHY, RICHARD E. RICE and
MITCHELL G. WEATHERLY, Administrative Patent Judges.

McCARTHY, Administrative Patent Judge.

DECISION ON APPEAL

STATEMENT OF THE CASE 1
The Appellants1 appeal under 35 U.S.C. § 134 from the Examiner’s 2
final decision rejecting claims 1, 4-7, 9-11, 15 and 16. Claims 8 and 13 are 3
pending but not subject to rejection; instead, the Examiner objects to claims 4
8 and 13 as depending from rejected base claims. (Ans. 3). Claims 2, 3, 125

1 The Appellants identify the real party in interest as Sony Corp. and
Sony Electronics, Inc.
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14 and 17-22 are cancelled. 1
We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. § 6(b). Only issues and 2
findings of fact contested by the Appellants have been considered. See Ex 3
parte Frye, 94 USPQ2d 1072, 1075-76 (BPAI 2010) (precedential). 4
5
First Issue—Claims 1, 4-7, 9 and 10 6
We sustain the rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) of: 7
claims 1 and 4 as being unpatentable over Ishii (US 8
6,278,904 B1, issued Aug. 21, 2001), Dietz (US 6,385,586 B1, 9
issued May 7, 2002) and Anders (US 2004/0203644 A1, publ. 10
Oct. 14, 2004); 11
claim 5 as being unpatentable over Ishii, Dietz, Anders 12
and Park (US 2003/0236590 A1, publ. Dec. 25, 2003); 13
claims 6 and 7 as being unpatentable over Ishii, Dietz, 14
Anders and Inoue (US 6,381,515 B1, issued Apr. 30, 2002); 15
claim 9 as being unpatentable over Ishii, Dietz, Anders, 16
Inoue and Slocum (US 6,430,306 B2, issued Aug. 6, 2002); and 17
claim 10 as being unpatentable over Ishii, Dietz, Anders, 18
Inoue and Sato (US 2002/0111988 A1, publ. Aug. 15, 2002). 19
The Appellants do not argue the patentability of dependent claim 4 20
separately from the patentability of independent claim 1. Claim 1 is 21
representative of both claims. Claim 1 recites, with italics added for 22
emphasis: 23
1. A mechanical robot, comprising: 24
a body; 25
at least one processor mounted on the body; 26
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at least one electro-mechanical mechanism 1
controlled by the at least one processor to cause 2
the body to ambulate; and 3
at least one localization beacon receiver 4
mounted on the body and electrically connected to 5
the at least one processor to communicate 6
localization data thereto, the localization data 7
indicating the position of the body on the globe 8
and/or in a dwelling, 9
wherein the at least one processor executes 10
logic comprising: 11
receiving the localization data 12
from the at least one beacon receiver; 13
and 14
based on the localization data, 15
selecting a location-appropriate 16
language, using the location 17
appropriate language, and establishing 18
an audio volume, 19
the robot including at least one speaker 20
through which the robot communicates in 21
accordance with the audio volume established 22
from the localization data. 23
The Appellants’ arguments regarding the patentability of 24
representative claim 1 as set forth on pages 4-5 of the Appeal Brief raise a 25
pure issue of fact. The Examiner finds that “Anders discloses a system for 26
adjusting audio output in which location (107) is determined and the volume 27
of audio output is automatically adjusted in response to the determined 28
location (107) (Fig. 1; paragraph 0021, 0048).” (Ans. 6). The Appellants’ 29
sole argument regarding the rejection of representative claim 1 is that, 30
as plainly taught in Anders, paragraph 48, a ringer 31
is caused to ring at a particular location but not at a 32
volume which is “automatically adjusted in 33
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response” to the location as claimed. Instead, the 1
ringer rings at a set volume, line 13 of paragraph 2
48. For being based on a clearly erroneous finding 3
of fact, the rejection merits reversal. 4
(App. Br. 4-5). 5
We find by a preponderance of the evidence that Anders describes 6
determining a current location of a personal communication device (“PCD”) 7
and automatically setting a ring volume of the PCD according to a 8
predetermined preference setting for a location type of the current location. 9
(Anders, para. 0007). In addition, we find that Anders teaches creating 10
location descriptions associating addresses or other locations 107 with 11
“location types.” Each location type is associated with a notification profile 12
102. Anders additionally teaches that “[n]otification, such as a ring volume, 13
can be automatically set according to a predetermined preference for a 14
particular location type thereby enabling a PCD 103 to automatically ring at 15
a set ring volume, or provide other notification according to location type for 16
a current location.” (Anders, para. 0048).2 17
The Examiner correctly finds that paragraph 0048 of Anders teaches 18
ringing at a ring volume automatically set according to a predetermined 19
preference for a particular location type. In other words, the PCD 20
automatically establishes (that is, resets or adjusts) the ring volume based on 21
localization data, that is, the location and the associated location type. 22

2 We also adopt and incorporate by reference the Examiner’s findings at
page 5, line 10 (starting with “As per Claim 1 . . .”) through page 6, line 12
(ending with “. . . Dietz is concerned with performing a function in response
to GPS signals.”); and at page 15, lines 1-16 (ending with “. . . Dietz is
concerned with performing a function in response to GPS signals.”). The
Appellants do not appear to contest these findings. (See generally App. Br.
4-5).
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Since the Appellants have not identified an error in the Examiner’s 1
findings, we sustain the rejection of representative claim 1 as well as of 2
dependent claim 4. Since the Appellants argue the patentability of claim 5 3
over Ishii, Dietz, Anders and Park; claims 6 and 7 over Ishii, Dietz, Anders 4
and Inoue; claim 9 over Ishii, Dietz, Anders, Inoue and Slocum; and claim 5
10 over Ishii, Dietz, Anders, Inoue and Sato, solely on the basis of the 6
patentability of claims 1 and 4 over Ishii, Dietz and Anders (App. Br. 5-6), 7
we sustain the rejections of claims 5-7, 9 and 10 as well. 8
9
Second Issue—Claims 11, 15 and 16 10
We do not sustain the rejection under § 103(a) of claims 11 and 16 as 11
being unpatentable over Inoue, Slocum and Tumey (US 7,062,073 B1, 12
issued Jun. 13, 2006); or of claim 15 as being unpatentable over Inoue, 13
Slocum, Tumey and Sato. Dependent claims 15 and 16 depend from 14
independent claim 11. Claim 11 recites a mechanical robot including at least 15
one processor executing logic comprising: 16
imaging at least one person using [a] camera 17
to render a visual and/or aural image; 18
determining whether the image matches data 19
already stored in [a] data storage, and 20
if the image does not match 21
data in the storage, storing the image 22
in the data storage, and 23
otherwise not storing the image 24
in the data storage, 25
wherein the image is determined not to 26
match data in the storage at least in response to the 27
image being determined to include a new 28
combination of previously-imaged individuals. 29
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Inoue describes an entertainment robot 1 including a processor-based 1
controller 20; an external storage memory 24; and a camera 13. (Inoue, col. 2
2, ll. 36-42 and 46-59). The robot 1 stores a template image representative 3
of the face of a user in the external storage memory 24. The robot 1 may 4
compare an image of the user captured by the camera 13 with the template 5
image stored in the external storage memory 24 to determine whether the 6
user is the robot’s “master.” (Inoue, col. 7, ll. 13-19). The Examiner finds 7
that Inoue fails to disclose “wherein the image is determined not to match 8
data in the storage at least in response to the image being determined to 9
include a new combination of previously-imaged individuals.” (Ans. 12 and 10
18). 11
Slocum describes a system 10 for manufacturing identification cards. 12
(Slocum, col. 5, ll. 12-17). The system includes a data processor 34; an 13
image acquisition element 30, such as a camera; and a database memory 24. 14
(Slocum, col. 5, ll. 34-37; col. 6, ll. 35-39; and col. 6, ll. 50-55). Slocum’s 15
system 10 detects attempts by an applicant to obtain multiple identification 16
cards under different identities by acquiring an image of the applicant’s face 17
using the image acquisition element 30 and then searching the database 24 18
for an image of a similar face. (Slocum, col. 8, ll. 11-15 and col. 9, ll. 50-19
61). If there is no image stored in the database 24 representing a face similar 20
to the applicant’s face, the system 10 stores the image of the applicant’s face 21
in the database 24. (Slocum, col. 9, ll. 62-67). If an operator verifies that 22
there is an image stored in the database 24 representing a face similar to the 23
applicant’s face, the operator may store the image of the applicant’s face in 24
an enforcement buffer within the data processor 34. (Slocum, col. 10, ll. 62-25
67). 26
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1
Tumey summarizes Turk (US 5,164,992, issued ) as follows: 2
U.S. Pat. No. 5,164,992 wherein Turk and 3
Pontland teach the use of an Eigenface 4
methodology for recognizing and identifying 5
members of a television viewing audience. The 6
Turk et al. system is designed to observe a group 7
of people and identify each of the persons in the 8
group to enable demographics to be incorporated 9
in television ratings determinations. 10
(Tumey, col. 2, lines 49-55). The Examiner characterizes this summary by 11
finding that “Tumey quantifies information about groups of people using 12
facial recognition techniques.” (Ans. 20). 13
The Appellants correctly point out that neither Inoue nor Slocum nor 14
Tumey describes distinguishing between images based on whether the 15
images depict different groupings of the same set of individuals. In 16
particular, while the summary of Turk appearing in column 2 of Tumey at 17
least arguably suggests identifying individuals in an image depicting an 18
audience for a television show in order to extract demographic data 19
regarding those individuals (See Tumey, col. 2, ll. 49-55), Tumey does not 20
suggest distinguishing between different combinations of those individuals. 21
Therefore, the combined teachings of Inoue, Slocum and Tumey would not 22
have provided one of ordinary skill in the art reason to determine that two 23
images fail to match in response to the later image being determined to 24
include a new combination of previously-imaged individuals. 25
We do not sustain the rejection of claims 11 and 16 over Inoue, 26
Slocum and Tumey. Since the teachings for which the Examiner cites Sato, 27
as detailed on page 14 of the Answer, fail to remedy the deficiency in the 28
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combined teachings of Inoue, Slocum and Tumey, we do not sustain the 1
rejection of claim 15 over Inoue, Slocum, Tumey and Sato, either. 2
3
DECISION 4
We AFFIRM the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 1, 4-7, 9 and 5
10. 6
We REVERSE the Examiner’s decision rejecting claims 11, 15 and 7
16. 8
No time period for taking any subsequent action in connection with 9
this appeal may be extended under 37 C.F.R. § 1.136(a)(1)(iv) (2010). 10
11
AFFIRMED-IN-PART 12
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msc 18