DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 1/15/2026 has been entered.
The previous prior art rejection under Tohi (US 20160280819) in view of Ichino (WO 2016152711) maintained.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claims 1, 3-8 and 17-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Tohi (US 20160280819) in view of Ichino (WO 2016152711), both cited in previous Office Action.
New claim 19 is noted. Syndiotactic polypropylene (7 AA) possesses MFR values within the range of 0.1 to 100 g/10 min (see Fig. 6).
The rejection can be found in the NON-FINAL office action mailed 4/24/2025 and is herein incorporated by reference.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 1/15/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Applicant submits that Tohi does not teach that the propylene- ethylene copolymer (7B-2) can be a propylene/ethylene/nonconjugated polyene copolymer and the propylene a- olefin copolymer (B3) can be a propylene/a-olefin/nonconjugated polyene copolymer.
This is incorrect. Tohi teaches that a propylene-based copolymer (B1) contains a propylene component in an amount of 95 to 51 mol %, contains an α-olefin component, which is at least one selected from ethylene, 1-butene, 4-methylpentene-1,1-hexene, 1-octene and 1-decene, in an amount of 5 to 49 mol %, and contains a polyene component, which is at least one selected from conjugated or non-conjugated dienes (see 0098).
Applicant argues that an artisan would not be motivated to apply the molar ratio of an ethylene-derived structural unit (e) and an a-olefin-derived structural unit (o) of the ethylene-a-olefin random copolymer (CO) and the ethylene-a-olefin random copolymer (7C).
Examiner disagrees. Tohi clearly teaches that constituent units derived from ethylene are contained in an amount of 60 to 95 mol %, and constituent units derived from an α-olefin having 3 to 20 carbon atoms other than ethylene are contained in an amount of 5 to 40 mol % (provided that the sum of amounts of the constituent units derived from ethylene and the constituent units derived from the α-olefin having 3 to 20 carbon atoms is 100 mol %) (see 0182).
Applicant argues that the ethylene/a-olefin/nonconjugated polyene copolymer (A) of claim 1 is not equivalent to Tohi’s non-crosslinked or partially crosslinked olefin-based thermoplastic elastomer (C2), because they have a significant difference in tensile modulus values.
Examiner disagrees. Applicant does not provide any tensile modulus values in order to compare it to Tohi’s data, which discloses tensile modulus values within the range of 1 MPa to 400 MPa (see 0149).
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to GREGORY LISTVOYB whose telephone number is (571)272-6105. The examiner can normally be reached 9am-5pm EST M-F.
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GL
/GREGORY LISTVOYB/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1765