Appeal No. 2001-1090
Application No. 09/477,821
skill in the art to reverse the order of the process steps disclosed by Nogami to meet the claimed
order of process steps. Appellants argue (reply brief, page 4) that the only evidence of record of
such a switch of process steps is their disclosed and claimed invention, and that such teachings are
not available to the examiner in an obviousness determination. We agree. Thus, the obviousness
rejection of claims 1 through 20 is reversed because “the combination of references as postulated by
the Examiner does not and cannot remedy the inherent deficiency of the primary reference and yield
the claimed invention in that they do not disclose or even remotely suggest performing planarization
of the blanket metallization layer prior rather than subsequent to deposition (selective) of the
alloying element layer(s)” (brief, page 16).
DECISION
The decision of the examiner rejecting claims 1 through 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103(a) is
reversed.
REVERSED
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