Appeal No. 1996-3591
Application No. 08/251,053
arrive at the claimed subject matter. We can find no
motivation for the skilled artisan to apply Iyengar’s output
voltage to the reference input of Masaki’s voltage divider.
The only basis for applying Iyengar’s teachings to Masaki
comes from an improper attempt to reconstruct Appellants’
invention in hindsight. Accordingly, we cannot sustain the
Examiner’s obviousness rejection of independent claims 1 and
15, each of which requires a voltage divider coupled to a
stabilizing feedback circuit of a multiplier. Since all of
the limitations of independent claim 1 are not suggested by
the prior art, we also can not sustain the Examiner’s
rejection of appealed claims 2-7 which depend therefrom.
Turning now to a consideration of independent claim 8, we
note that, while we found Appellants’ arguments to be
persuasive with respect to the obviousness rejection of claims
1-7 and 15, we reach the opposite conclusion with respect to
claims 8-14. Contrary to the recitations in independent
claims 1 and 15 which require a voltage divider “. . . coupled
to the feedback circuit . . .”, the recitation in claim 8
places no limitation on the location of the voltage divider
within the multiplier circuit. Initially, in view of the
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