Appeal No. 2004-1596
Application No. 09/544,858
In addition, the examiner relied upon Appellant’s Admitted
Prior Art (specification, pages 5, 11 and 12) relating to a
method for performing transactions over a bus. Appellant’s
Admitted Prior Art (AAPA).
Claims 1-16, 23-25, 27-34 and 37-39 stand rejected under
35 U.S.C. § 103(a) as being unpatentable over AAPA and Kowalski.
Claims 18, 19, 35 and 36 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C.
§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over AAPA and Kowalski and further
in view of Hewitt.
We make reference to the answer (Paper No. 19, mailed
January 29, 2004) for the Examiner’s reasoning, and to the appeal
brief (Paper No. 18, filed December 19, 2003) for Appellant’s
arguments thereagainst.
OPINION
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). The conclusion that the claimed
subject matter is obvious must be supported by evidence, as shown
by some objective teaching in the prior art or by knowledge
generally available to one of ordinary skill in the art that
would have led that individual to combine the relevant teachings
of the references to arrive at the claimed invention. See In re
3
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