Appeal No. 2003-0471 Page 4
Application No. 09/100,346
In rejecting claims under 35 U.S.C. § 103, the examiner bears the initial burden
of presenting a prima facie case of obviousness. See In re Rijckaert, 9 F.3d 1531,
1532, 28 USPQ2d 1955, 1956 (Fed. Cir. 1993). A prima facie case of obviousness is
established by presenting evidence that would have led one of ordinary skill in the art to
combine the relevant teachings of the references to arrive at the claimed invention.
See In re Fine, 837 F.2d 1071, 1074, 5 USPQ2d 1596, 1598 (Fed. Cir. 1988) and In re
Lintner, 458 F.2d 1013, 1016, 173 USPQ 560, 562 (CCPA 1972).
In the rejection before us in this appeal, the examiner (answer, p. 4) found that
Kikuchi discloses a connector mounting structure having a base board 9, a housing 5
with a plurality of terminal accommodating chambers 6 for receiving wires 4, a plurality
of terminals 1 (shaped the same) disposed in the chambers with the terminals disposed
from one end of the housing to the other end and the terminals including fastening
means which include fixing portions 3 for indirectly fastening the housing to the base
board. The examiner next declared that although Kikuchi has terminals and chambers
that appear not to be used, Kikuchi does not disclose the terminals as being dummy
terminals disposed at opposite ends of the housing. The examiner also found that it is
well known in the art to use dummy terminals as evidenced by Anderson's disclosure of
the use of dummy terminals 67c, 67e and 67f for added capacity. Lastly, the examiner
concluded that it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use as
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