Appeal No. 95-4806
Application No. 08/155,730
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)).
The appellant’s invention is directed to solving a
problem that, according to the evidence presented, remained
unsolved in the packaging art for at least twenty-five years
(see affidavits of Bernard Lerner, Dana Liebhart and Vincent
Lattur). The invention applies to the type of packaging in
which an elongated web of preopened bags in interconnected 3
end-to-end relationship is conveyed past stations in which an
article is placed into each bag, the bag is closed or sealed,
and the bags are separated from the web along lateral lines of
weakness defining the top and bottom of the bag. In such a
system, if the web is conveyed in the direction of the open
end of the bags, they would be blown open, which severely
3A “preopened bag” is one in which an opening has been
created by making a slit in one of the two layers of plastic
that have been attached together at their edges to form the
bag, as is best illustrated in Figures 3 and 4 of the Lerner
reference.
4
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