Appeal No. 2004-1231
Application 09/481,224
fabrication yield of the machine. Appellants’ specification, page
9, line 16 through page 10, line 3. Appellants further state on
page 10 of the Appellants’ specification:
It is another object of the present invention to provide
an apparatus for carrying out a pre-conditioning process on a
conditioning disc in an off-line manner without sacrificing
machine time.
It is a further object of the present invention to
provide an off-line pre-conditioning a conditioning disc that
can be carried out without affecting the fabrication yield of
the chemical mechanical polishing apparatus.
Appellants describe the details of Appellants’ apparatus and
method on pages 18-22 of Appellants’ specification as shown in
Figs. 3, 3A-3C and 4.
We note that the claimed apparatus shown in Figs. 3, 3A-3C and
4 is different and separate from the CMP apparatus shown in Figs.
1(A)-1(C). In addition, the original disclosure clearly describes
that Appellants’ apparatus and method is for carrying out a
preconditioning process on a conditioning disc in an off-line
manner to save the production time of the CMP apparatus of the
prior art. In other words, the term “off-line” here is meant to be
“off” or “at the outside” of the production line that has the CMP
apparatus. Therefore, we find that Appellants had possession of the
8
Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 Next
Last modified: November 3, 2007