Appeal No. 1999-2006
Application No. 08/561,960
ANALYSIS
We consider the two groups of rejections separately below.
Rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 102
A prior art reference anticipates the subject of a claim
when the reference discloses every feature of the claimed
invention, either explicitly or inherently, See Hazani v. Int'l
Trade Comm'n, 126 F.3d 1473, 1477, 44 USPQ2d 1358, 1361 (Fed.
Cir. 1997) and RCA Corp. v. Applied Digital Data Sys., Inc.,
730 F.2d 1440, 1444, 221 USPQ 385, 388 (Fed. Cir. 1984).
We consider claim 1. On pages 4 and 5 of the Examiner's
answer, the Examiner lays out his explanation of how claim 1
reads on Matsushita. The Examiner specifically points to
figures 19 and 20 of Matsushita. Appellant argues, brief at
page 5, that "(i) in Matsushita the floating gate and the major
surface of the semiconductor body are not separated by a
substantially constant distance over substantially the entire
length of the floating gate and (ii) Matsushita does not have a
corner adjacent the end of its drain region along side the
channel." The Examiner responds, answer page 8, that "the term
'substantially' is a relative term and is not defined by the
claim, the specification does not provide a standard for
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