Ex Parte Antosz - Page 3




              Appeal No. 2004-2261                                                                 Page 3                
              Application No. 09/494,690                                                                                 



                                                       OPINION                                                           
                     In reaching our decision in this appeal, we have given careful consideration to                     
              the appellant's specification and claims, to the applied prior art references, and to the                  
              respective positions articulated by the appellant and the examiner.  Upon evaluation of                    
              all the evidence before us, it is our conclusion that the evidence adduced by the                          
              examiner is insufficient to establish a prima facie case of obviousness with respect to                    
              the claims under appeal.  Accordingly, we will not sustain the examiner's rejection of                     
              claims 2 to 6, 8 to 12 and 20 under 35 U.S.C. § 103.  Our reasoning for this                               
              determination follows.                                                                                     


                     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                 
              combine the relevant teachings of the references 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).                                               


                     With this as background, we first analyze the teachings of the prior art applied by                 
              the examiner in the rejection of the claims on appeal.                                                     







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