Appeal No. 1999-1055 Page 3
Application No. 08/571,342
The test for obviousness is what the combined teachings of the prior art would have
suggested to one of ordinary skill in the art. See, for example, In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413,
425, 208 USPQ 871, 881 (CCPA 1981). In establishing a prima facie case of
obviousness, it is incumbent upon the examiner to provide a reason why one of ordinary
skill in the art would have been led to modify a prior art reference or to combine reference
teachings to arrive at the claimed invention. See Ex parte Clapp, 227 USPQ 972, 973
(Bd. Pat. App. & Int. 1985). To this end, the requisite motivation must stem from some
teaching, suggestion or inference in the prior art as a whole or from the knowledge
generally available to one of ordinary skill in the art and not from the appellant's disclosure.
See, for example, Uniroyal, Inc. v. Rudkin-Wiley Corp., 837 F.2d 1044, 1052, 5 USPQ2d
1434, 1439 (Fed. Cir.), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 825 (1988).
We understand the appellant’s invention to be an interactive system in which the
operator of a vehicle is provided with real time information from forward-looking and
rearward-looking cameras, from pre-recorded information available on CD-ROM discs
and EE-PROM cards, and from GPS sources, which is analyzed by a computer and then
provided to the operator as needed to expedite the “navigation” of the vehicle, which
includes its safety with regard to vehicles in close proximity as well as its path from one
point to another. The operator can interact with the system by entering voice or keyed
commands, and the system provides information and verbal response. Claim 1 sets forth
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