Appeal 2007-2069
Application 10/723,000
art can implement a predictable variation, and would likely see the benefits
of doing so, § 103 likely bars its patentability.” Id at 1740, 82 USPQ2d at
1396. In KSR, the Supreme Court rejected a rigid application of the
teaching, suggestion, or motivation test in an obviousness inquiry.
Id. at 1739, 82 USPQ2d at 1395. The Court noted the importance of
identifying “a reason that would have prompted a person of ordinary skill in
the relevant field to combine the elements in the way the claimed new
invention does” to avoid hindsight reconstruction of the claimed invention.
Id. at 1731, 82 USPQ2d at 1396. The Court emphasized, “[W]hen a patent
claims a structure already known in the prior art that is altered by the mere
substitution of one element for another known in the field, the combination
must do more than yield a predictable result.” KSR Int’l Co., 127 S.Ct. at
1740, 82 USPQ2d at 1395.
In this case, Appellant claims a structure described and depicted by
Seal that has been altered to reposition the auxiliary mounting stirrup behind
the primary or normal riding stirrup of the saddle. The record indicates that
saddles are relatively simple mechanical devices that have numerous points
of attachment for auxiliary equipment, such as the pommel of the Western
saddle, the stirrup strap 7, or the D-ring 9, which Seal describes as "normally
a part of any English riding saddle" (Seal, col. 3, ll. 7–8) Thus adding
additional points of attachment appears to have been within the level of
ordinary skill in the art. Hence, we have no trouble finding that Seal's
teaching that the auxiliary mounting stirrup may be used “on any saddle
having . . . any other device by which the invention may be attached to the
saddle thereby providing the equestrian with a safe convenient method of
mounting said saddle” (Seal, col. 3, ll. 31-35), would have taught persons
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