Appeal No. 2007-1188
Application 10/621,131
USPQ2d at 1397 (2007): “Under the correct [obviousness] analysis, any need or
problem known in the field of endeavor at the time of invention and addressed by
the [applicant] can provide a reason for combining the elements in the manner
claimed.”
Applicant’s argument is similarly misplaced with regard to the Examiner
applying the mirror frame and support structure disclosed in Foster and Bateman to
a crossover mirror. The Applicant argues that Englander is not concerned about
the particular configuration or the support structure of the mirror being tested
(Br. 6: 26-27), and thus any modification properly combinable “should be directed
to the [testing] method, not to improvements to the mirror structure itself.
(Br. 7: 21-23). The argument is erroneous.
The Applicant mistakenly limits the pertinence of a prior art reference to the
particular invention and objectives disclosed in the reference. A prior art reference
must be considered for everything it teaches by way of technology and is not
limited to the particular invention it is describing and attempting to protect. It is
true that Englander does not provide the details of the crossover mirror and its
supporting structure. But one with ordinary skill in the art would have known that
the mirror had to have a certain structure as well as a supporting structure that
attaches the mirror to the vehicular surface, and would have known to consider
other vehicle mirror frames and supporting structure as disclosed in Foster and
Bateman for a rearview mirror.
The Applicant advances no argument that Foster and Bateman constitute
nonanalogous art or that the frame and supporting structure disclosed in Foster and
Bateman for rearview mirrors cannot or would not work for crossover mirrors.
Note also that in KSR International Co., 127 S. Ct. at 1742-43, 82 USPQ2d at
1397, with regard to motivation to combine teachings, the Supreme Court stated:
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