Appeal No. 1999-0848
Application No. 08/634,310
Nakano is formed by etching is immaterial in a claim drawn to a
product. The patentability of a product does not depend on its
method of production. In re Pilkington, 411 F.2d 1345, 1348,
162 USPQ 145, 147 (CCPA 1969).
With regard to Appellant’s argument related to the claimed
enhancing of the breakdown voltage of a p-n junction, we note
that the Examiner has made an unrebutted showing that the
modified structure of Nakano is identical to that as set forth
in appealed claim 8. We find nothing in Appellant’s response
that would convince us of any error in the Examiner’s position
(Answer, page 10) that “... similar structures behave similarly
and therefore the structure of the prior art also behaves
similar to the claimed invention by virtue of the fact that it
is a similar structure to the claimed invention.”
In view of the above discussion, it is our opinion that
since the Examiner’s prima facie case of obviousness has not
been rebutted by any convincing arguments from Appellant, the
Examiner’s 35 U.S.C. § 103 rejection based on Nakano of
representative claim 8 is sustained.
The Jang Reference
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