Appeal No. 2004-0731 Page 7
Application No. 09/957,059
brief, page 11) that the modification would not have been obvious
because in Norimatsu, one only needs to keep track of the elapsed
rental period, not the remaining amount of calling minutes.
Appellants maintain (reply brief, page 12) that "there would be
no need, and no motivation, to keep track of the remaining amount
of calling time left in the phone to manage the remaining calling
time since that remaining calling time cannot be managed in the
first place."
From our review of the references, it would appear at first
blush that appellants are correct that it would not have been
obvious to permanently disable the rental cellular telephone of
Norimatsu because the purpose of a rental phone is to be used by
subsequent renters. However, we find from our review of Crossley
(page 9) that "[a]lthough the telephone 10 has been described as
disposable after use, alternatively it may be returned to a
supplier to have the power source replenished and/or reconnected
and, if necessary, new telephone numbers programmed into the
memory." We observe that this disclosure of Crossley has not
been brought to out attention by either the examiner or
appellants. From Crossley's disclosure that as an alternative to
being disposable, the phone can be replenished by the supplier,
we find that Crossley teaches that the phone can either be
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