Ex Parte Rhodes et al

Patent Trial and Appeal Board

Jul 31, 2018

13917758 (P.T.A.B. Jul. 31, 2018)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE
13/917,758 06/14/2013
28395 7590 08/02/2018
BROOKS KUSHMAN P.C./FG1L
1000 TOWN CENTER
22NDFLOOR
SOUTHFIELD, MI 48075-1238
FIRST NAMED INVENTOR
Kevin James Rhodes
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
ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO.
83330027 9168
EXAMINER
LYLES-IRVING, CARMEN V
ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER
1724
NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE
08/02/2018 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@brookskushman.com
PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07)
UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE
BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD
Ex parte KEVIN JAMES RHODES, ANDREW ROBERT
DREWS, CHRISTOPHER MICHAEL SEUBERT, and
MARK EDWARD NICHOLS
Appeal2017-008379
Application 13/917,758
Technology Center 1700
Before TERRY J. OWENS, CHRISTOPHER C. KENNEDY, and
MONTE T. SQUIRE, 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 7, 8, 10-18, and 21. We have jurisdiction under
35 U.S.C. § 6(b).
The Invention
The Appellants claim a method for treating a current collector.
Claim 7 is illustrative:
7. A method of treating a current collector, comprising:
Appeal2017-008379
Application 13/917 ,758
unrolling a roll of a metal current collector and passing it
under a stationary electron beam source;
continuously treating a surface of the unrolled metal
current collector with an electron beam in air to increase its
surface energy;
applying a slurry including a binder to the treated
surface; and
Muggli
Weiss
Besling
Hosoe
Li
Eres
drying the slurry.
The References
US 2008/0248212 Al
US 2010/0261801 Al
US 2011/0272786 Al
US 2013/0008217 Al
US 2013/0108776 Al
US 2013/0115413 Al
The Rejections
Oct. 9, 2008
Oct 14, 2010
Nov. 10, 2011
Jan. 10,2013
May 2, 2013
May 9, 2013
The claims stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as follows: claims 7,
8, 11, and 15-18 over Li in view ofHosoe, claims 10 and 12 over Li in view
of Hosoe and Weiss, claim 13 over Li in view of Hosoe and Eres, claim 14
over Li in view of Hosoe and Muggli and claim 21 over Li in view of Hosoe
and Besling.
OPINION
We reverse the rejections. We need address only the sole independent
claim, i.e., claim 7. That claim requires continuously treating a surface of an
unrolled metal current collector with an electron beam to increase its surface
energy.
Li treats a current collector's surface to increase its surface energy
using a technique which can be electron beam treatment (i1i1 7, 21 ).
Hosoe adjusts porous aluminum current collector body thickness so
the desired amount of active material slurry can be filled into the pores of
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Appeal2017-008379
Application 13/917 ,758
different current collectors to give them the desired capacity without
changing the active material slurry composition, thereby reducing the cost of
the current collector component of electrodes (i1i16, 9, 10). The method
includes unwinding a porous aluminum body (3) from a roll, adjusting the
porous aluminum body (3)'s thickness by roller pressing, unwinding a
lead ( 4) from a roll, welding the lead ( 4) to the porous aluminum body (3) to
form a current collector, and filling active material slurry into the current
collector's pores (i-f 70; Fig. 2).
The Examiner states that "Hosoe is merely relied on as a teaching of
making known processes in the art continuous" (Ans. 13), "Hosoe is merely
relied on as a teaching that it is known in the art to adapt treatments in the art
to be continuous treatments for the purposes of production on a larger scale"
(Ans. 15) and "rather than perform a weld in isolation followed by
subsequent isolated welds, Hosoe performs a continuous welding treatment
thereby teaching the general notion of scaling up treatments was known in
the art at the time of filing" (Ans. 17).
Establishing a prima facie case of obviousness requires an apparent
reason to modify the prior art as proposed by the Examiner. See KSR Int 'l
Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398,418 (2007).
The Examiner does not establish that Hosoe' s disclosure of a
continuous process for filling a current collector's pores with active material
slurry would have provided one of ordinary skill in the art with an apparent
reason to make continuous current collector treatment processes generally or
Li's electron beam treatment process specifically. Thus, the record indicates
that the Examiner's rejections are based upon impermissible hindsight in
view of the Appellants' disclosure. See In re Warner, 379 F.2d 1011, 1017
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Appeal2017-008379
Application 13/917 ,758
(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
The rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 103 of claims 7, 8, 11, and 15-18
over Li in view of Hosoe, claims 10 and 12 over Li in view of Hosoe and
Weiss, claim 13 over Li in view of Hosoe and Eres, claim 14 over Li in view
of Hosoe and Muggli and claim 21 over Li in view of Hosoe and Besling are
reversed.
The Examiner's decision is reversed.
REVERSED
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