Appeal 2006-3236
Inter Partes Reexamination Control No. 95/000,006
diamond>." Webster's Third New International Dictionary (Unabridged)
(G.&C. Merriam Co. 1971). One relevant definition of a "face" is
"[6] f: any one of the plane surfaces that bound a polyhedron (as a crystal) or
other geometrical solid." Id. Examiner and the Requester define an "edge"
as "a line where something begins or ends" or as "the boundary line of a
surface or a region, a border; the region adjacent to this, a margin," and
Patent Owners do not provide a counter-definition. According to these
definitions, a "surface" can be one of the distinct planar faces on the tray
defined by interruptions (such as a discontinuity where the surface stops or
the line of intersection where two distinct surface areas meet), or the entire
exterior of the tray (which is a collection of the individual faces), but this
does not help answer the question of whether the single surface 68 in
Brahmbhatt can have both a first wall surface and a second wall surface.
Regardless of what definitions are used, there must be some objective
way to identify a "surface" and an "edge" if the terms are to have any
meaning. There are two interpretation clues in claim 1.
First, claim 1 defines the first and second wall surfaces in terms of
their function. The function of the "first wall surface" is "to support an edge
of the package of the semiconductor integrated circuit device," and the
function of the "second wall surface" is "to limit horizontal movement of the
semiconductor integrated circuit device." It is reasonable to interpret the
extent of a wall surface to be defined by a physical interruption indicating
the extent of the surface or, on a single surface, by where the surface ceases
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