Appeal NO. 2005-0577
Application No. 09/741,237
Id. The examiner admits that the photonic via of Allman does not
extend through the substrate. Id.
To remedy this deficiency, the examiner relies on Austin to
teach this limitation and concludes that it would have been
obvious to form a photonic via through the substrate (Answer, pp.
6 and 7).
The examiner’s position is not well taken. Allman discloses
(col. 5, ll. 15-21) removing the light reflecting structure and
the second horizontal waveguide to prevent deflecting the light to
the horizontal direction after deflecting the light into the
vertical direction in a single chip. However, Allman does not
disclose forming a via through the layers (63), (40a), (26a), and
(26) or just the layer 26. The examiner has not demonstrated that
one of ordinary skill in the art would have been led to form a
photonic via through the above layers since Allman’s chip is not
shown to be useful for the same purpose as Austin’s chip. In this
regard, we note that the chip of Austin has a different structure
than that of Allman’s chip.
To the extent that the via can be formed in the layer (26) of
Allman as suggested by the examiner, the resulting waveguide still
would not meet the claimed limitation “wherein the angled surface
is an optical alignment with a photonic via extend[ing] . . .
through the substrate.” To meet the claim limitation in
question, the examiner must point to some suggestion or motivation
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