Appeal 2006-3092
Application 10/601,738
From our review of the Examiner’s rejection, we conclude that the
Examiner has set forth a prima facie case of obviousness of the invention as
recited in independent claim 1. Therefore, we look to Appellants’ Briefs to
show error in the proffered prima facie case.
Appellants’ main contention is that it would not have been obvious to
one skilled in the art at the time of the invention to have combined the
teachings of Kurita and King to achieve the invention as recited in
independent claim 1 (Br. 10-11). Specifically, Appellants argue that (i)
Kurita and King, when considered as a whole, do not suggest the desirability
and thus the obviousness of modifying Kurita in the manner taught by King,
and (ii) modifying Kurita in the manner taught by King renders Kurita
unsatisfactory for the intended purpose and consequently, there is no
suggestion or motivation to make the proposed combination (Br. 11 and
Reply Br. 2). Appellants' additionally contend that it would not have been
obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention to
combine the plural interfaces of King in the control system of Kurita since
Kurita discloses a problem using a single control to control multiple devices
in that an operator's control efficiency is low as a result of having to navigate
the switches/buttons which are respectively associated with the devices
(Reply Brief 2). Therefore, Appellants’ argue that it would not have been
obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time the invention was made
to use plural controls to control plural devices at the same time due to this
problem of low operator efficiency associated with using a single control to
control devices at a single time.
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