Appeal No. 1997-1925
Application No. 08/465,315
OPINION
In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to the
appellant's specification and claims, to the applied prior art references, and to the
respective positions articulated by the appellant and the examiner. As a consequence of
our review, we make the determinations which follow.
Nickel and Culley
As pointed out by our reviewing court, we must first determine the scope of the
claim. "[T]he name of the game is the claim." In re Hiniker Co., 150 F.3d 1362, 1369, 47
USPQ2d 1523, 1529 (Fed. Cir. 1998). We find that the examiner has not provided a
teaching or convincing line of reasoning why one skilled in the art would have desired to
“enabl[e] the operation of said digital signal processor according to the signal procedures
transferred from said ROM and stored in said RAM” and to have the “control processor
connected in interprocessor communication with said digital signal processor for reading
from said ROM” as set forth in the language of claim 1.
“To reject claims in an application under section 103, an examiner must show an
unrebutted prima facie case of obviousness. See In re Deuel, 51 F.3d 1552, 1557, 34
USPQ2d 1210, 1214 (Fed. Cir. 1995). In the absence of a proper prima facie case
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