Appeal No. 2002-0109
Application No. 09/110,221
In responding to the examiner’s reliance on In re Aller,
appellants note that the art of golf ball manufacture contains an
almost limitless array of variables, and that the different
compositions that may be used in golf ball manufacture and their
concentration ranges are nearly infinite. Appellants also again
point out that Matsuki neither teaches nor suggests increasing
the whitening agent concentration above the 3.0 parts by weight
mentioned therein and contends that it is impractical, if not
impossible, to discover optimum concentrations of even known
ingredients by routine experimentation without some incentive or
suggestion to try a specific range.
Appellants conclude by arguing that the examiner’s position
is not based upon established principles under 35 U.S.C. § 103,
but instead is based upon hindsight reconstruction and obvious to
try reasoning to arrive at the claimed invention.
We fully agree with appellants’ arguments as presented in
the brief and reply brief, and with their position that there is
nothing in Matsuki which would have provided any suggestion or
motivation for one of ordinary skill in the art to contemplate an
amount of whitening agent in the cover of a golf ball like that
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