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and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114.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 2/5/2026 has been entered.
Response to Amendment
The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior office action.
All outstanding rejections, except for those maintained below, are withdrawn in light of applicant’s amendment filed on 2/5/2026.
Election/Restrictions
The restriction requirement between Group I (claims 1-7) over Group V (claims 21 and 22) has been withdrawn because claims 21 and 22 have been amended to a coating composition which is directly dependent on the coating composition of claim 1.
Claim Objections
Claims 1 and 21 are objected to because of the following reasons:
With respect to claim 1, language “flop index= 2.69 (L1-L3)1.11/(L2)o_86” is inconsistent with originally recited formula “flop index = 2.69 (L1-L3)1.11/(L2)0.86” and should be changed back Also, referring to L1, L2, and L3 should have subscripts like so: L1, L2, and L3.
With respect to claim 21, the recitation in lines 3-6, i.e. “the film-forming resin; …composition; and” is redundant and should be deleted. Also, in the last two lines, the term “the pigment composition” is inconsistent with previous recitation “flake pigment composition” and should be replaced with “the flake pigment composition.”
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
Claim 2 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
With respect to claim 2, line 22, the term “the coating layer” (used twice) lacks antecedent basis.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
Claims 1, 2, 4-7, 21, and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Maruoka (US 8,846,194).
With respect to claims 1, 2, and 4-7, Maruoka discloses am wave-permeable brilliant coating composition (abstract) comprising an aluminum planar brightening material and 1-20 mass % of a planar (flake) non-conductive material such as pearl mica (col. 10, lines 23-33). Example 11 in Table comprises acrylic urethane paint (col. 9, line 20), 5 mass % ground aluminum flake having particle size of 15 µm (col. 9, lines 22-23), and 8 mass % pearl mica having particle size of 18 µm (col. 9, lines 27-28), which converts to a flake pigment composition comprising 38 wt % aluminum flake and 62 wt % mica flake.
Regarding the amount of flake pigment composition in the coating composition, Maruoka only discloses the amount of pigment composition in the final coating and not the amount before drying the coating composition.
Even so, the exemplified amount of 13 mass % in the formed coating is considered to be the maximum amount of flake pigment composition in the coating composition. For illustrative purposes, a coating composition containing 50 wt % solids provides an amount of flake coating composition of about 9 wt %, and a coating composition containing 95 wt % solids provides an amount of flake coating composition of about 7 wt %. Therefore, even when a solids content is very low with a high volatile component, the amount of flake pigment composition exemplified by Maruoka is within the claimed range of 1-25 wt %. Should the amount of solids be reduced significantly further, the viscosity of the coating composition would become too low to form a uniform coating.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to utilize an amount of flake pigment composition in a range of 1-25 wt % of the coating composition.
Regarding the claimed transmittance property at 1-100 GHz, Example 11 is a polycarbonate substrate coated with a 20 µm coating (Table 2, col. 9, line 19) and measures mm wave permeability at 76.575 GHz (col. 7, lines 23-24).
Maruoka discloses that the wave permeability is “pass” (Table 2) but fails to disclose transmittance.
Even so, given that Maruoka discloses that the coating having thickness of 20 µm is mm wave permeable, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to obtain a transmittance of at least 70%.
Regarding claimed flop index, Maruoka teaches that coating has a brilliant luster finish (abstract) and that the mica is a pearl mica. The flop index is representative of reflectance or metallic variation, wherein a pearlescent composition has a higher flop index.
Given that Maruoka teaches brilliant luster coating comprising pearl mica, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to obtain a flop index of at least 2 in order to provide desired pearlescence from the pearl mica.
Regarding claimed ΔE, because the “color-matched coating system” is not defined other than one comprising a flake pigment composition consisting of aluminum flake, it appears that the value is intrinsically met by Maruoka’s composition because when an amount is low enough and no significant color differences can be observed. Also, because Maruoka discloses a pigment composition comprises both aluminum flake and pearl mica, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to prepare a composition whose ΔE would be 4 or less.
With respect to claim 21, Maruoka teaches that the amount of aluminum pigment in the coating film is 2.5-10 mass % (col. 4, lines 47-51), and the amount of non-conductive pigment (pearl mica) is 1-20 mass % in the coating film (col. 4, lines 9-12). The ranges provide for an amount of aluminum flake pigment of at least 11 mass % which overlaps with claimed 0.065-11 wt %.
With respect to claim 22, Maruoa teaches that the brightening material (aluminum flake) is oriented in a state that such a plane is based toward a direction of the surface to allow for the brilliant coating film (col. 2, lines 11-14). Maruoka discloses that the content of the brightening material (aluminum flake) is sufficient to provide “good luster” and “good electromagnetic wave permeability” (col. 3, lines 47-58). Also, the amounts of conductive flake pigment and planar non-conductive pigment of 2.5-10 mass % and 1-20 mass % in the coating film, respectively, are at least the total amounts claimed because the claimed amounts are based on a diluted liquid coating composition. Therefore, at least 50% of total area coverage of a coating film would be expected to be covered by flake in order to provide the luster and permeability.
Claims 1, 3-7, and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hasegawa (JP 2004-244516, cited on IDS filed 12/5/22 and machine translation provided by examiner and cited on PTO-892).
With respect to claims 1 and 3-6, Hasegawa discloses a glossy coating composition providing excellent electromagnetic radar permeability comprising a urethane resin and mica (abstract; paragraph 0009). The mica pigment is scaly, i.e., a flake. No other pigment is necessarily present and therefore the radar transmissive mica pigment is present in weight of 100 wt % of the flake pigment composition. Hasegawa teaches that amount of mica is 3-8 wt % based on the base coating material (paragraph 0014) and exemplifies an acrylic urethane paint comprising 5 wt % pearl mica (paragraph 0020). Hasegawa teaches that the coating composition provides a film having thickness of 5-30 µm on a substrate such as a polypropylene (i.e., polyolefin) substrate (paragraph 0016-0017).
Regarding the claimed transmittance property at 1-100 GHz, Hasegawa teaches that the composition has high electromagnetic wave transmittance (paragraphs 0009 and 0026).
Given that Hasegawa discloses a coating composition comprising the claimed flake pigment composition and further given that Hasegawa teaches that high transmittance is obtained, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to obtain a coating composition having claimed transmittance at 1-100 GHz.
Regarding claimed flop index, Hasegawa teaches that coating is glittery (paragraph 00-12) and that the mica is coated with titanium oxide to provide pearl mica (paragraph 0013). The flop index is representative of reflectance or metallic variation, wherein a pearlescent composition has a higher flop index.
Given that Hasegawa teaches glittery coating comprising pearl mica, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to obtain a flop index of at least 2 in order to provide desired pearlescence from the pearl mica.
Regarding claimed ΔE, because the “color-matched coating system” is not defined other than one comprising a flake pigment composition consisting of aluminum flake, it appears that the value is intrinsically met by Hasegawa’s composition because when an amount is low enough and no significant color differences can be observed. Also, Hasegawa discloses that the coating composition is a substitute for metallic paint comprising aluminum (paragraph 0021). Therefore, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to match the color to the substitute coating composition taught by Hasegawa.
With respect to claim 7, Hasegawa teaches that mica has particle size of 2-60 µm (paragraph 0013).
With respect to claim 22, Hasegawa discloses that the coating is glittery. Because the glittery appearance is due to the presence of mica pigment, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to utilize a sufficient amount of the mica pigment to obtain a uniform glittery appearance.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 2/5/2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. Specifically, applicant argues that neither Maruoka nor Hasegawa teaches a “pigment composition” other than to identify flake pigments contains in the coating composition.
The claimed “flake pigment composition” is clearly defined as one comprising 50 wt % or greater non-conductive radar transmissive pigment and no greater than 50 wt % electrically conductive metal flake pigment. Based on broadest reasonable interpretation, a flake pigment composition is one containing at least one flake pigment. While this “flake pigment composition” is clearly open to other ingredients due to open transitional language “comprising,” it minimally requires at least one flake pigment. The brightening material of Maruoka (aluminum flake) is clearly the claimed metal flake pigment, and the non-conductive pigment is a pigment. Hasegawa names the mica as a “pigment.”
Applicant argues that neither Maruoka nor Hasegawa discloses “exact percentages” of aluminum and/or mica/pearl in the flake pigment composition.
The examiner agrees with this statement. However, both references clearly suggest the amount of flake pigment composition in the coating composition.
Applicant argues that Maruoka does not disclose a mixture of pigments with one being radar transmissive and one being conductive but having poor radar permeability.
Although Maruoka uses pearl mica in a different capacity than applicant, case law holds that it “does not alter the conclusion that its use in a prior art composition would have been prima facie obvious from the purpose disclosed in the reference.” In re Linter, 458 F.2d 1013, 173 USPQ 560 (CCPA 1972). While this motivation may not be the same motivation as in the present invention, it is noted that obviousness under 103 is not negated because the motivation to arrive at the claimed invention as disclosed by the prior art does not agree with appellant’s motivation. In re Dillon, 16 USPQ2d 1897 (Fed. Cir. 1990), In re Tomlinson, 150 USPQ 623 (CCPA 1996).
Applicant argues that Hasegawa does not suggest using both conductive and non-conductive flake pigments.
The examiner agrees, however, the instant claims do not require the presence of electrically conductive metal flake pigment given the amount “no greater than 50% by weight” includes 0% by weight.
Applicant argues that the amendment to electromagnetic radiation transmission distinguishes over Maruoka and Hasegawa because neither one of them teaches the transmission of electromagnetic radiation through the coating system at 20µm thickness.
The limitations regarding the coating system are functional limitations of the coating composition. In other words, the prior art is only required to disclose a coating composition that when added to a coating system behaves with claimed transmission properties. Maruoka includes an example of the coating compositions applied to a polycarbonate substrate coated with a 20 µm coating (Table 2, col. 9, line 19) and measures mm wave permeability at 76.575 GHz (col. 7, lines 23-24) which is a “pass” for wave permeability (Table 2). While Maruoka does not specifically discloses the transmittance value, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to obtain a transmittance of at least 70% because Marupoka teaches “pass” mm wave permeability. Also, Hasegawa teaches that the composition has high electromagnetic wave transmittance (paragraphs 0009 and 0026) and therefore properly relied upon to teach that it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to obtain a coating material.
Conclusion
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/VICKEY NERANGIS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1763
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