Appeal 2007-2240
Application 09/818,016
1 special service request. The Examiner further finds that Bergeron and Lesaint both
2 disclose assigning field service workers to sites, based on priority, using remote
3 communications. Bergeron further discloses allowing the field service worker to
4 accept or reject the assignment. (Answer 5-6.)
5 Thus, the Examiner concludes that it would have been obvious to one of
6 ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention to include allowing the field
7 mechanic of Lesaint to accept or reject a communicated task in order to more
8 efficiently produce schedules that benefit the service company by assigning the
9 most suitable and available field mechanic to the task. The Examiner supports this
10 conclusion with the rationale that allowing the technician to directly input his/her
11 ability to perform a task would increase the efficiency of this process. (Answer 6.)
12 To overcome the elevator mechanic deficiency, the Examiner finds that Lesaint
13 discloses a system that allocates tasks to field mechanics using remote
14 communications. The Examiner points out that the term “elevator” only appears in
15 the preamble of the claim and has no functional effect on the body of the claim
16 (i.e., the mechanic being an elevator mechanic is the intended field use and the
17 elements in the body of claim are structurally the same regardless of the industry in
18 which they are applied). Thus, the Examiner concludes that it would have been
19 obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention to utilize the
20 system of Lesaint to assign mechanics to tasks concerning elevators in order to
21 more efficiently allocate a plurality of field mechanics to a plurality of tasks in an
22 industry with dynamic conditions. (Answer 6.)
23 The Appellants contend that none of the claims are obvious because the
24 motivation required under 35 U.S.C. §103 for modifying the Lesaint reference as
25 proposed by the Examiner does not exist. The Appellants argue that it is important
5
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