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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 09/25/2025 was filed after the mailing date of the Non-Final Office Action on 06/24/2025. The submission is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Status
This Office Action is in response to the remarks and amendments filed on 09/24/2025. The previous objections to the specification and claims have been withdrawn. Furthermore, the previous 35 USC 112 rejections have also been withdrawn. Claims 1-10 and 12-19 remain pending for consideration.
This Office Action contains a New Grounds of Rejection. Since these new grounds of rejection did not result from an amendment to the claims, this Office Action is being made non-final to afford the Applicant the opportunity to respond to the new grounds of rejection.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
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.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or nonobviousness.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1-6 and 12-15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park (US 20100024463 A1), in view of Kwon (KR20100029979A), and in further view of Moriya (JP2020098066A).
Regarding claim 1, Park teaches a refrigerator (refrigerator 10 Fig. 1) comprising: an outer case (main body 11 Fig. 1) forming an exterior of the refrigerator (Figs. 1-2); an inner case (corresponds to the interior walls of refrigerator 10 Figs. 1-2) provided in the outer case (Figs. 1-2) and defining a storage compartment (refrigerating chamber 12 and freezing chamber 13 Fig. 1), the inner case comprising a first inner wall (right wall of freezing chamber 13 Fig. 2) and a second inner wall (left wall of freezing chamber 13 Fig. 2) opposing the first inner wall (Fig. 2); and an ice maker (ice-making device 90 Fig. 2) mounted in the inner case (Figs. 1-2) and configured to make ice (paragraph [0043]), the ice maker comprising an ice maker case (storage box 60 Fig. 2), wherein the ice maker case comprises: a first ice maker case wall (right wall of storage box 60 Fig. 2) supported by the first inner wall (Fig. 2); a second ice maker case wall (left wall of storage box 60 Fig. 2) supported by the second inner wall (Fig. 2); and a protrusion (junction 70 Fig. 2) provided on the first ice maker case wall (Fig. 2), the protrusion being configured to interfere with the first inner wall (Figs. 2-3 where it is understood that junction 70 is interfering with the inner sidewalls of freezing chamber 13 via connection elements 50).
Park teaches the invention as described above but fails to explicitly teach “the protrusion is an elastic protrusion; the elastic protrusion being configured to be elastically deformable in a direction in which the elastic protrusion is pressed by the first inner wall”.
However, Kwon teaches a protrusion (the combination of top right reinforcing member 80 and top right fixing member 70 Fig. 2 corresponds to the protrusion of Park) that is an elastic protrusion (paragraph [0029]); the elastic protrusion being configured to be elastically deformable in a direction (referring to paragraphs [0046] and Fig. 3, a person skilled in the art would recognize that the direction of deformation is a direction that is perpendicular to the sidewalls of inner case 111) in which the elastic protrusion is pressed by a first inner wall (paragraph [0046] and Fig. 3 where the right sidewall of inner case 111 corresponds to the first inner wall of Park) to reduce the possibility of damaging the protrusion during assembly/disassembly of the ice maker (paragraph [0014]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person skilled in the art before the effectively filed date to modify the apparatus of Park to include “the protrusion is an elastic protrusion; the elastic protrusion being configured to be elastically deformable in a direction in which the elastic protrusion is pressed by the first inner wall” in view of the teachings of Kwon to reduce the possibility of damaging the protrusion during assembly/disassembly of the ice maker.
The combined teachings teach the invention as described above but fail to explicitly teach “wherein the first inner wall comprises a holder configured to support the first ice maker case wall, and wherein the elastic protrusion is provided under the holder”.
However, Moriya teaches wherein a first inner wall (left side portion 122 Figs. 2-3 corresponds to the first inner wall of Park) comprises a holder (first shelf support portion 124A Figs. 2-3) configured to support a first ice maker case wall (paragraph [0016] with Figs. 2-3 and 14 where left side portion 410c corresponds to the first ice maker case wall of Park, it is understood that the combination of shelf 400 and holder main body 510 Figs. 11-12 corresponds to the ice maker case of Park), and wherein an elastic protrusion (second portion 422 Figs. 3 and 7 corresponds to the elastic protrusion of Kwon) is provided under the holder (Fig. 3) to support the case from below (paragraph [0016]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person skilled in the art before the effectively filed date to modify the apparatus of the combined teachings to include “wherein the first inner wall comprises a holder configured to support the first ice maker case wall, and wherein the elastic protrusion is provided under the holder” in view of the teachings of Moriya to support the case from below.
Regarding claim 2, the combined teachings teach wherein the elastic protrusion is pressed in a direction (the direction that is perpendicular to the sidewalls of inner case 111 Fig. 3 of Kwon) from the first inner wall toward the second inner wall by the first inner wall (paragraph [0046] and Fig. 3 of Kwon where the left sidewall of inner case 111 corresponds to the second inner wall of Park).
Regarding claim 3, the combined teachings teach wherein the elastic protrusion comprises an interference portion (fixing member 70 Fig. 2 of Kwon) protruding in a first direction (the direction that is perpendicular to the sidewalls of inner case 111 Fig. 3 of Kwon) from the first ice maker case wall toward the first inner wall (Fig. 3 of Kwon where the right sidewall of grille pan cover 60 corresponds to the first ice maker case wall of Park) and to interfere with the first inner wall (Fig. 3 of Kwon), and wherein the interference portion extends in a second direction (the direction that is perpendicular to the rear wall of inner case 111 in Fig. 3 of Kwon) parallel to the first inner wall (Fig. 3 of Kwon).
Regarding claim 4, the combined teachings teach wherein the interference portion comprises: a contact surface (see below annotated Fig. 2 of Kwon) provided at one end of the interference portion (see below annotated Fig. 2 of Kwon) and configured to come in contact with the first inner wall (Fig. 3 of Kwon); and a corner surface (see below annotated Fig. 7 of Park) provided at an end of the contact surface (see below annotated Fig. 7 of Park) in the second direction, and wherein the corner surface is inclined relative to the second direction (see below annotated Fig. 7 of Park) and extends from the contact surface in a direction (see below annotated Fig. 2 of Park) moving away from the first inner wall (see below annotated Fig. 7 of Park).
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Regarding claim 5, the combined teachings teach wherein the second direction is parallel to a forward-backward direction of the inner case (Fig. 3 of Kwon where the direction that is perpendicular to the rear wall of inner case 111 is the forward-backward direction of inner case 111 where inner case 111 corresponds to the inner case of Park).
Regarding claim 6, the combined teachings teach wherein the interference portion is configured to be movable in a direction (the direction that is perpendicular to both sidewalls of inner case 111 Fig. 3 of Kwon) parallel to the first direction by being elastically deformed (paragraph [0046] and Fig. 3 of Kwon).
Regarding claim 12, the combined teachings teach wherein the holder extends in a direction parallel (Fig. 2 of Park) to a forward-backward direction of the inner case (Fig. 2 of Park), and wherein the ice maker case is mounted by sliding from a front of the inner case (Fig. 3 of Park) toward a rear thereof along the holder (Fig. 3 of Park).
Regarding claim 13, the combined teachings teach wherein the ice maker case (grille pan cover 61 Fig. 2 of Kwon corresponds to the ice maker case of Park) further comprises a plurality of elastic protrusions (Fig. 2 of Kwon) arranged in an up-down direction (Fig. 2 of Kwon) and including the elastic protrusion (Fig. 2 of Kwon).
Regarding claim 14, the combined teachings teach wherein the elastic protrusion is a first elastic protrusion (the combination of top right reinforcing member 80 and top right fixing member 70 Fig. 2 of Kwon), wherein the ice maker case further comprises a second elastic protrusion (the combination of top left reinforcing member 80 and top left fixing member 70 Figs. 2-3 of Kwon) provided on the second ice maker case wall (the left sidewall of grill pan cover 61 Figs. 2-3 of Kwon corresponds to the second ice maker case wall of Park), and wherein the second elastic protrusion is configured to interfere with the second inner wall (Fig. 3 of Kwon where the left sidewall of inner case 111 corresponds to the second inner wall of Park) and to be elastically deformable in a direction (the direction that is perpendicular to both sidewalls of inner case 111 Fig. 3 of Kwon) in which the second elastic protrusion is pressed by the second inner wall (paragraph [0046] and Fig. 3 of Kwon).
Regarding claim 15, the combined teachings teach wherein the inner case further comprises an opening (opening illustrated in Fig. 3 of Park) formed at a front of the storage compartment (Fig. 3 of Park) and a rear wall (rear wall of the inner case of Park illustrated in Fig. 3) formed at a rear of the storage compartment (Fig. 3 of Park) and configured to face the opening of the inner case (Fig. 3 of Park), and wherein the elastic protrusion is disposed to be closer to the opening of the inner case than to the rear wall of the inner case (Fig. 3 of Park).
Claims 7-10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park, Kwon, and Moriya as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Kim et al. (US 20220357096 A1, herein after referred to as Kim).
Regarding claim 7, the combined teachings teach the invention as described above but fail to explicitly teach “wherein the elastic protrusion comprises a connecting portion connected to the first ice maker case wall, and wherein the connecting portion is configured to be elastically deformable about a fixed end thereof fixed to the first ice maker case wall”.
However, Kim teaches wherein an elastic protrusion (elastic piece 713 Fig. 38 corresponds to the elastic protrusion of Kwon) comprises a connecting portion (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) connected to a first ice maker case wall (front wall of upper housing 710 Fig. 38 corresponds to the first ice maker case wall of Park), and wherein the connecting portion is configured to be elastically deformable (a person skilled in the art would recognize that part 713 of Kim is deformable since it is described as an elastic piece) about a fixed end thereof (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) fixed to the first ice maker case wall (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) to simplify the attachment of the ice maker to the inner case.
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Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person skilled in the art before the effectively filed date to modify the apparatus of the combined teachings to include “wherein the elastic protrusion comprises a connecting portion connected to the first ice maker case wall, and wherein the connecting portion is configured to be elastically deformable about a fixed end thereof fixed to the first ice maker case wall” in view of the teachings of Kim to simplify the attachment of the ice maker to the inner case.
Regarding claim 8, the combined teachings teach wherein the elastic protrusion is pressed in a first direction (top to bottom direction in Fig. 38 of Kim) by the first inner wall (Fig. 24 and paragraph [0433] of Kim where upper installation plate 641 corresponds to the first inner wall of Park), and wherein the connecting portion extends from the fixed end in a direction (the direction parallel to the length of upper housing 710 Fig. 38 of Kim) different from the first direction (Fig. 38 of Kim).
Regarding claim 9, the combined teachings teach wherein the first ice maker case wall comprises a cut-open portion (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) formed in the direction in which the connecting portion extends (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim), and wherein the connecting portion is provided at the cut-open portion (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim).
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Regarding claim 10, the combined teachings teach wherein the elastic protrusion further comprises an interference portion (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) configured to protrude in the first direction (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) and to interfere with the first inner wall (paragraph [0433] and Figs. 24 and 38), and wherein the interference portion is bent from a free end of the connecting portion (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) opposing the fixed end thereof and extends in the first direction (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim).
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Claims 16-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Park, in view of Kim, and in further view of Moriya.
Regarding claim 16, Park teaches an ice maker (ice-making device 90 Fig. 2) comprising: at least one ice making tray (ice-making tray 92 Fig. 2) configured to receive and hold an amount of water (paragraph [0043]); and an ice maker case (storage box 60 Fig. 2) configured to support the at least one ice making tray (Fig. 2), wherein the ice maker case comprises: a first ice maker case wall (right wall of storage box 60 Fig. 2) configured to be supported by a first inner wall (right wall of freezing chamber 13 Fig. 2) of a refrigerator (refrigerator 10 Fig. 1); a second ice maker case wall (left wall of storage box 60 Fig. 2) configured to be supported by a second inner wall of the refrigerator (left wall of freezing chamber 13 Fig. 2); and a protrusion (junction 70 Fig. 2) provided on the first ice maker case wall (Fig. 2), the protrusion being configured to interfere with the first inner wall when the ice maker is mounted in the refrigerator (Figs. 2-3 where it is understood that junction 70 is interfering with the inner sidewalls of freezing chamber 13 via connection elements 50 when the ice maker is mounted).
Park teaches the invention as described above but fails to explicitly teach “the protrusion is an elastic protrusion being configured to be elastically deformable in a direction in which the elastic protrusion is pressed by the first inner wall when the ice maker is mounted in the refrigerator”.
However, Kim teaches a protrusion (elastic piece 713 Fig. 38 corresponds to the protrusion of Kwon) that is an elastic protrusion (piece 713 Fig. 38 is described as being elastic) being configured to be elastically deformable (a person skilled in the art would recognize that part 713 is deformable since it is described as an elastic piece) in a direction (top to bottom direction in Fig. 38) in which the elastic protrusion is pressed by a first inner wall (Fig. 24 and paragraph [0433] where upper installation plate 641 corresponds to the first inner wall of Park) when an ice maker (ice maker 700 Fig. 37 corresponds to the ice maker of Park) is mounted in a refrigerator (Fig. 1 where the illustrated refrigerator corresponds to the refrigerator of Park) to reduce the possibility of damaging the protrusion during assembly/disassembly of the ice maker.
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person skilled in the art before the effectively filed date to modify the apparatus of Park to include “the protrusion is an elastic protrusion being configured to be elastically deformable in a direction in which the elastic protrusion is pressed by the first inner wall when the ice maker is mounted in the refrigerator” in view of the teachings of Kim to reduce the possibility of damaging the protrusion during assembly/disassembly of the ice maker.
The combined teachings teach the invention as described above but fail to explicitly teach “wherein the first inner wall comprises a holder configured to support the first ice maker case wall, and wherein the elastic protrusion is provided under the holder”.
However, Moriya teaches wherein a first inner wall (left side portion 122 Figs. 2-3 corresponds to the first inner wall of Park) comprises a holder (first shelf support portion 124A Figs. 2-3) configured to support a first ice maker case wall (paragraph [0016] with Figs. 2-3 and 14 where left side portion 410c corresponds to the first ice maker case wall of Park, it is understood that the combination of shelf 400 and holder main body 510 Figs. 11-12 corresponds to the ice maker case of Park), and wherein an elastic protrusion (second portion 422 Figs. 3 and 7 corresponds to the elastic protrusion of Kim) is provided under the holder (Fig. 3) to support the case from below (paragraph [0016]).
Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person skilled in the art before the effectively filed date to modify the apparatus of the combined teachings to include “wherein the first inner wall comprises a holder configured to support the first ice maker case wall, and wherein the elastic protrusion is provided under the holder” in view of the teachings of Moriya to support the case from below.
Regarding claim 17, the combined teachings teach wherein the elastic protrusion comprises a connecting portion (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) configured to be connected to the first ice maker case wall (Fig. 38 of Kim where the front wall of upper housing 710 corresponds to the first ice maker case wall of Park), and wherein the connecting portion is configured to be elastically deformable (a person skilled in the art would recognize that part 713 of Kim is deformable since it is described as an elastic piece) about a fixed end thereof (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) fixed to the first ice maker case wall (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim).
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Regarding claim 18, the combined teachings teach wherein the elastic protrusion is configured to deflect in a first direction (top to bottom direction in Fig. 38 of Kim) when the ice maker is mounted in the refrigerator (Fig. 2 and paragraph [0433] of Kim), and wherein the connecting portion extends from the fixed end in a direction (the direction parallel to the length of upper housing 710 Fig. 38 of Kim) different from the first direction (Fig. 38 of Kim).
Regarding claim 19, the combined teachings teach wherein the first ice maker case wall comprises a cut-open portion (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim) formed in the direction in which the connecting portion extends (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim), and wherein the connecting portion is provided at the cut-open portion (see below annotated Fig. 38 of Kim).
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Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1 and 16 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Conclusion
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/SAMBA NMN GAYE/Examiner, Art Unit 3763
/JERRY-DARYL FLETCHER/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3763