Appeal No. 97-0391
Application 08/443,044
Appellants do not give any specific arguments against the
above combination to reject claims 3 and 5. Instead, they
rely on the above arguments relating to claim 1 and Malik.
Thus, Appellants urge that claim 1 is not in any way obvious
in view of the alleged combination . . . [brief, page 14]. In
the absence of any rebuttal to the combination for the
purposes of rejecting claims 3 and 5, we will sustain the
obviousness rejection of claims 3 and 5 over Malik and Durst.
Rejection of claims 11 and 12 over Malik, Durst and Doyle
We have reviewed Appellants’ arguments [brief, pages 15
and 16] and the Examiner’s position [final rejection, pages 2
to 3 and answer, pages 8 and 9]. In our view, the Examiner
has failed to present a prima facie case to reject claim 11
and hence its dependent claim 12. Claim 11 calls for, among
other things, “transmitting an output signal including said
error code from said transmitter means to said receiving
means” (claim 11, lines 12 to 13). The Examiner has not
addressed this limitation. Even though Appellants too have
not argued for this limitation, the initial burden is on the
Examiner to present a prima facie case to reject a claim. In
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