Appeal No. 2004-0785 Page 11
Application No. 09/252,635
Since all the limitations of claims 1, 8 and 22 are not disclosed in Hopkins for the
reasons set forth above, the decision of the examiner to reject claims 1, 8 and 22, and
claims 2 to 7, 9 to 12 and 23 to 27 dependent thereon, under 35 U.S.C. § 102(b) is
reversed.
The obviousness rejection
We will not sustain the rejection of claims 13 to 21 under 35 U.S.C. § 103 as
being unpatentable over Hopkins.
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
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).
Claim 13, the independent claim subject to this ground of rejection, reads as
follows:
A multiunit modular building, comprising:
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