Appeal No. 95-3538
Application 08/108,356
A reading of the examiner’s answer reveals that the term
"quasi-complementary BICMOS" was not given weight and a BICMOS
circuit was deemed sufficient to satisfy the appellant’s claims.
Throughout the examiner’s answer, in discussing the prior art
reference Ando, the examiner identified and referred to a BICMOS
circuit and not a quasi-complementary BiCMOS circuit.
The appellant is correct in arguing that Ando’s Figure 3
embodiment does not disclose or illustrate a quasi-complementary
BiCMOS circuit having a pull down bipolar transistor.
Specifically, note that the pull down n-p-n transistor Q2 is
driven by an nMOS device. We disagree with the appellant’s
position that Ando’s inverter 4 is connected in a feedback
arrangement with respect to the output. It is not. However, the
lack of a single claim element in a purportedly antipatory
reference is sufficient to undermine the rejection as a whole.
Here, the missing element is a quasi-complementary circuit which
includes a pull down bipolar transistor.
For the foregoing reasons, the rejection of claims 1-20
cannot be sustained.
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