Appeal No. 2001-1550
Application 09/105,830
In regard to the rejection by the Examiner that claims 1 and
8 are obvious in view of Summerfelt under 35 U.S.C. § 103, we
fail to find that Summerfelt suggests a conductive adhesion-
promoting layer. Therefore, we will not sustain this rejection
as well.
We now turn to the rejection of claims 1 through 14, 16
through 18 and 20 as being unpatentable over Summerfelt in view
of Kashihara and Meikle under 35 U.S.C. § 103. Appellants argue
that Summerfelt fails to teach a conductive adhesion-promoting
layer as required by all of the claims. Appellants further argue
that Kashihara’s adhesion layer 353 also will be converted to a
dielectric during processing and therefore does not teach or
suggest a conductive adhesion-promoting layer. Appellants
finally argue that Meikle has a Ti-Al-N layer, but one of
ordinary skill in the art would not look to such a layer which is
used as a diffusion barrier to substitute for the adhesion layers
taught in Summerfelt or Kashihara.
In rejecting claims under 35 U.S.C. § 103, the Examiner
bears the initial burden of establishing a prima facie case of
obviousness. In re Oetiker, 977 F.2d 1443, 1445, 24 USPQ 1443,
1444 (Fed. Cir. 1992). See also In re Piasecki, 745 F.2d 1468,
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