Appeal No. 2003-1475
Application No. 09/352,250
spring plates. Nevertheless, the examiner concludes on the basis
of the Brenner teaching alone that the claimed book clamp would
have been obvious. We disagree. It is very clear to this panel
of the Board that only impermissible hindsight and reliance upon
appellants’ own teaching would have enabled one having ordinary
skill in the art to derive the claimed invention from the Brenner
teaching by itself. Brenner would not have provided any
suggestion whatsoever for the modifications thereof proposed by
the examiner. Thus, the specified obviousness rejection cannot
be sustained.
We do not sustain the rejection of claims 11 and 12 under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over Brenner in view of
Rathert.
Like appellants (brief, page 22), we readily perceive that
the teaching of Rathert does not overcome the noted deficiency of
the Brenner disclosure. Thus, we cannot sustain this obviousness
rejection of claims 11 and 12.
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