DETAILED ACTION
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Response to Amendment
The amendment of claims 1, 4 are supported by the specification.
Any rejections and/or objections made in the previous Office action and not repeated below are hereby withdrawn.
The text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
The new grounds of rejection set forth below are necessitated by applicant's amendment filed on 12/10/2025. Thus, the following action is properly made final.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
Claim 4 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor, or for pre-AIA the applicant regards as the invention.
Claim 4 should be rephrased. For purposes of expediting prosecution, the claim is interpreted as the composition comprises greater than 50 wt% millable polyurethane based on the total elastomer content of the composition.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
Claim(s) 1-2, 4, 6-12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Shindo et al (JP2020147443).
In setting forth this rejection a machine translation of JP2020147443 has been relied upon and all citations to paragraph numbers in the discussion below are with respect to the machine translation.
Shindo teaches a conveyor belt (i.e. a power transmission belt) comprising a main body portion made from a composition comprising one or more of rubber components, preferably contains 80wt% or more millable urethane rubber based on the total rubber component [0011-0012]. The millable urethane rubber can be a polyester based millable urethane [0014]. The composition is cured by peroxide [0013]. The composition comprises carbon black which is a particulate reinforcing filler (0038). The conveyor belt can be a toothed belt [Fig 6A-6B, 0034]. A core wire can be embedded the belt body [0032-0033, Fig 4B, 5B].
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments have been considered but are moot in view of the new ground(s) of rejection.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any extension fee pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the date of this final action.
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/WENWEN CAI/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1763
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