Appeal No. 2003-0471 Page 6
Application No. 09/100,346
the differences include: (1) the connector mounting structure including a pair of dummy
terminals (claims 15 and 17); (2) the pair of dummy terminals being respectively
disposed at opposite ends of the housing relative to at least one electrical terminal with
an electrical wire only being connected to the at least one electrical terminal (claims 15
and 17); (3) fixing portions provided on the pair of dummy terminals and passing
through the base board to fix the dummy terminals, and attendantly, the housing to the
base board (claims 15 and 17); and (4) all of the electrical terminals and the pair of
dummy terminals have the same shape (claim 17).
The third and final difficulty we have with the rejection is that the examiner did
not determine that all of the above-noted differences between Kikuchi and the
independent claims at issue would have been obvious at the time the invention was
made to a person of ordinary skill in the art. In our view, Anderson provides no
teaching, suggestion or motivation for an artisan to have modified Kikuchi to place
terminals 1 in the terminal accommodating chambers 6 at opposite ends of the housing
5 and not connect an electrical wire to those terminals (i.e., to create "dummy terminals"
at opposite ends of the housing 5). In our view, the only possible suggestion for
modifying Kikuchi to meet the above-noted limitations would be hindsight knowledge
derived from the appellant's own disclosure. The use of such hindsight knowledge to
support an obviousness rejection under 35 U.S.C. § 103 is, of course, impermissible.
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