Appeal No. 1999-1894
Application 08/847,804
"In order to render a claimed apparatus or method
obvious, the prior art must enable one skilled in the art to
make and use the apparatus or method." Motorola, Inc. v.
Interdigital Tech. Corp., 121 F.3d 1461, 1471, 43 USPQ2d 1481,
1489 (Fed. Cir. 1997). The fact that some antennas may happen
to have a length less than an exact quarter wavelength due to
manufacturing tolerances does not teach one of ordinary skill
in the art to make the claimed invention of less than a
quarter wavelength and does not render such limitation
obvious. There must be something that would teach one of
ordinary skill to make the length less than a quarter
wavelength. We agree with Appellants that "less than a
quarter wavelength" requires the length to be outside a
typical tolerance range for a quarter wavelength design.
As to limitation (2), Appellants argue that the radiation
pattern is a direct result of the length of the first
radiating element being less than a quarter wavelength at the
selected resonant frequency and is not disclosed by the
combination of Fenwick and Dörrie (Br11). The Examiner states
(EA4): "The specific (power) gain range in the vertical plane
and elevation angle range are not features but merely the
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