Appeal No. 96-2860 Page 5
Application No. 08/049,408
35 U.S.C. § 103, the examiner bears the initial burden of
presenting a prima facie case of obviousness. See In re
Rijckaert, 9 F.3d 1531, 1532, 28 USPQ2d 1955, 1956 (Fed. Cir.
1993). A prima facie case of obviousness is established by
presenting evidence that the reference teachings would appear to
be sufficient for one of ordinary skill in the relevant art to
make the modifications necessary to arrive at the claimed
invention. See In re Fine, 837 F.2d 1071, 1074, 5 USPQ2d 1596,
1598 (Fed. Cir. 1988) and In re Lintner, 9 F.2d 1013, 1016, 173
USPQ 560, 562 (CCPA 1972).
With this as background, we turn to the examiner's rejection
of claim 41, the only independent claim on appeal.
Claim 41 recites a hand-held implement comprising, inter
alia, a first curved body panel, a second curved body panel and
an elongated snap-fit cartridge housing. Claim 41 further
recites (1) that the first curved body panel has an elongated
snap-fit post extending from an inner surface of the first panel,
(2) that the elongated snap-fit cartridge housing has a first
coaxial recessed groove, (3) that the elongated snap-fit post
resiliently extends into the first coaxial recessed groove, and
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