Appeal No. 2003-1953 Page 3
Application 09/244,742
The Rejection Under Section 102
The appellants’ invention relates generally to cutting machines for cutting window
coverings, and more particularly to a cutting blade having a pocketed cutting portion.
The examiner has taken the position that independent claims 8, 10 and 13 are
anticipated2 by Walker. The rejection is based not upon specific description in the
reference, but upon the examiner’s finding that the subject matter claimed is “reliably”
shown in the drawings (Answer, pages 5-8). The appellants argue that such is not the
case, in that it cannot be discerned therefrom that the Walker blade comprises a
pocketed cutting portion, much less such a construction defined in the manner recited
in all of the independent claims. We agree with the appellants, and we therefore will
not sustain this rejection.
Walker provides no description of the cutting portion of the cutting blade. As we
understand the examiner’s position, it is that Figure 2 shows a cutting portion A tapered
to an edge, that the lines on the lowermost portion of blade C in Figure 1 should be
interpreted as defining a pocket in the blade, and that the pocket necessarily would
comprise a plurality of interior side walls spaced inwardly of the exterior side walls of the
blade. While we would concede that Figure 2 provides evidence that at least a portion
of the lower edge of blade C tapers to a cutting edge, we cannot agree that the drawing,
2Anticipation is established only when a single prior art reference discloses, expressly or under the
principles of inherency, each and every element of the claimed invention. See, for example, RCA Corp. v.
Applied Digital Data Systems, Inc., 730 F.2d 1440, 1444, 221 USPQ 385, 388 (Fed. Cir. 1984).
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