Appeal No. 97-4155
Application No. 08/309,403
(2) Claims 5, 6, 9 and 10 on the basis of Filipoff,
Tarrant and Jones.
The rejections are explained in the Examiner's Answer.
The opposing viewpoints of the appellant are set forth in
the Brief.
OPINION
In a rejection under 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)), which is established when the
teachings of the prior art itself would appear to have
suggested the claimed subject matter to one of ordinary skill
in the art (see In re Bell, 991 F.2d 781, 783, 26 USPQ2d 1529,
1531 (Fed. Cir. 1993)). It is our opinion that the examiner
has not met this burden, and we therefore will not sustain the
rejections. Our reasons for arriving at this conclusion
follow.
With regard to claim 12, it is the examiner’s opinion
that Filipoff discloses all of the claimed subject matter,
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