Appeal No. 2005-0826
Application No. 09/989,563
We refer to the Final Rejection (mailed May 31, 2002) and the Examiner’s
Answer (mailed Mar. 31, 2003) for a statement of the examiner’s position and to the
Brief (filed Jan. 10, 2003) and the Reply Brief (filed Jun. 5, 2003) for appellants’ position
with respect to the claims which stand rejected.
OPINION
Rejection over the prior art
Consistent with appellants’ Brief and the rules effective at the time of its filing, we
select claims 1 and 10 as representative for the purposes of this appeal. See 37 CFR
§ 1.192(c)(7) (2002).
The examiner finds that Javanifard shows in Figure 14 a voltage control circuit
within the meaning of instant claim 1, except that voltage reference 316 does not
contain a plurality of voltage regulation devices and at least one bypass device
connected to at least one of the plurality of voltage regulation devices. The examiner
turns to Furumochi (Fig. 5) and its teaching of a plurality of voltage regulation devices
(T1-T4) with at least one bypass device (SW0(TN4)) connected to at least one of the
plurality of voltage regulation devices. The examiner finds that the prior art suggested
combination of the references for the purpose of providing an adjustable (i.e., finely
adjustable) reference voltage in the device of Javanifard. The examiner concludes that
the subject matter as a whole of instant claim 1 would have been prima facie obvious to
the artisan. (Answer at 3-4.)
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