Appeal No. 2002-1023 Page 3
Application No. 09/387,399
respective positions articulated by the appellants and the examiner. As a consequence
of our review, we make the determinations which follow.
The appellants’ invention is a cushioning conversion machine that produces
protective packaging material for use in shipping cases, boxes and the like. The
machine includes a forming device for converting a continuous web of stock material
into a cushioning dunnage product by folding or rolling the material and a feeding
device for advancing the stock material through the forming device. As manifested in
the appellants’ claim 7, for example, the machine comprises a housing through which
the stock material passes along a path and upstream and downstream feeding
components, wherein
(1) the upstream feeding component advances the stock material toward
the downstream component “at a rate faster than the stock material can
pass from the downstream component to effect crumpling of the stock
material therebetween;”
(2) an adjustable speed control mechanism varies “the ratio of the feeding
speeds of the upstream and downstream feeding components, whereby a characteristic of the
(3) the adjustable speed control “comprises a control member outside said
housing for enabling selective operator adjustment of the speed ratio,
whereby the density of the strip of cushioning may be varied.”
It is the examiner’s position that all of the subject matter recited in independent claims
7, 39 and 56 would have been obvious2 to one of ordinary skill in the art in view of the
2The test for obviousness is what the combined teachings of the prior art would have suggested to
one of ordinary skill in the art. See, for example, In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 425, 208 USPQ 871, 881
(CCPA 1981). In establishing a prima facie case of obviousness, it is incumbent upon the examiner to
provide a reason why one of ordinary skill in the art would have been led to modify a prior art reference or
to combine reference teachings to arrive at the claimed invention. See Ex parte Clapp, 227 USPQ 972,
(continued...)
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007