Appeal 2007-3412
Application 10/832,450
statement that a prima facie obviousness rejection is not supported if no
reference shows or suggests the newly-discovered properties and results of a
claimed structure is not the law." In re Dillon, 919 F.2d 688, 693,
16 USPQ2d 1897, 1901 (Fed. Cir. 1990) (en banc). As we have found, the
record supports the conclusion that the Examiner carried his burden of
demonstrating both a reason to combine the teachings of the references, and
a reasonable expectation of obtaining useful laminates by doing so.
The inquiry set forth by the Court in Graham v. John Deere, 383 U.S.
at 17, 148 USPQ at 467 is broad, and invites courts and examiners, "where
appropriate, to look at any secondary considerations that would prove
instructive." KSR, 127 S.Ct. at 1739, 82 USPQ2d at 1395. Although
D'Errico's arguments have no merit as arguments that a prima facie case of
obviousness has not been established, they do touch on the issue of
unexpected results. As the Federal Circuit has observed, "[t]here is always
at least a possibility of unexpected results, that would then provide an
objective basis for showing that the invention, although apparently obvious,
was in law nonobvious." In re O'Farrell, 853 F.2d 894, 903, 7 USPQ2d
1673, 1681 (Fed. Cir. 1988).
D'Errico contends that long term stability of a laminate comprising a
glass layer with an IR coating and an adjacent PVB layer is improved if a
low Tg PVB is used instead of a standard Tg PVB. (Br. at 4). Here, although
the data in Specification Example 1 are limited to the comparison of a glass
laminate having a PVB Tg of 18°C to a glass laminate having a PVB of
30°C, the evidence of improvement must be addressed and weighed against
the evidence favoring obviousness.
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