Appeal No. 1998-2215
Application 08/700,578
layer as a support layer and increasing its disclosed
thickness by a factor of 25 to arrive at the claimed invention
comes from the appellants’ disclosure rather than the applied
reference and that, therefore, the examiner used impermissible
hindsight when rejecting the claims. See W.L. Gore &
Associates v. Garlock, Inc., 721 F.2d 1540, 1553, 220 USPQ
303, 312-13 (Fed. Cir. 1983), cert. denied, 469 U.S. 851
(1984); In re Rothermel, 276 F.2d 393, 396, 125 USPQ 328, 331
(CCPA 1960). Accordingly, we reverse the examiner’s
rejection.
DECISION
The rejection of claims 1-8, 10-15 and 19-24 under 35
U.S.C. § 103 over Akutsu is reversed.
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