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 .
Claim Objections
Claim 1 is objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 1 recites in line 7, “the binder resin contains at least on kind of…” This appears to be a typographical error Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claim(s) 1, 2, 4, 7 and 8, is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by WO 2009/035059 A1 to Kitano et al. (hereinafter Kitano).
Regarding claims 1, 2, 4, 7 and 8, Kitano teaches a transparent electroconductive film comprising a transparent electroconductive layer with metallic nanowires coated onto a base material (See abstract) with a protective layer on top above the conductive layer (para 10 and Fig. 1).
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(See Fig. 1). Specifically, the base material is a polyethylene terephthalate (PET) film (Example 10, para 54), the transparent conductive layer contains specifically poly-N-vinylacetamide (PNVA) and silver nanowires (para 54, Example 10), and the protective layer is specifically a polyester resin such as PET (See examples, para 57) or a cellulose resin (para 29). The above PET meets the claimed transparent thermoplastic resin at 100% mass as the substrate and protection film, and the above transparent conductive layer meets the claimed PNVA binder resin and silver nanowire. Kitano further teaches the transparent substrate includes polycarbonate resins (para 18).
Claim(s) 1-8 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by WO 2018/101334 A1 in which US 2019/0388933 A1 to Toba et al. is used as an English equivalent below. (hereinafter Toba).
Regarding claims 1-8, Toba a teaches a transparent conductive substrate comprising a substrate, a transparent conductive film formed on the principal surface of the substrate, wherein the transparent conductive film contains a binder film and conductive fibers, and a protective film formed on the transparent conductive film (See abstract). Specifically, the substrate is a cyclic olefin polymer (COP) film (para 138), the transparent conductive film contains silver nanowires and poly-N-vinylacetamide (silver nanowire ink 1), (para 132), and the protective film contains 1.8 g of carboxyl-group containing polyurethane obtain by reacting a polycarbonate diol, 1,9-nonanediol,2-methyl-1,8-octanediol, 2,2-dimethylolbutanoic acid, and bis(4-isocyanatocylohexyl)methane) with an acid value of 39.4 mgKOH/g (para 139-141) with 0.06 g of an epoxy compound (pentaerythritol tetraglycidyl ether, EEW 97 g/eq), (See para 141, 144, 146, Table 1 and Examples 1, 3 and 5). The above COP film meets the claimed transparent thermoplastic substrate of claim 1, the above transparent conductive film meets the claimed binder resin of poly-N-vinylacetamide with silver nanowire of claims 1, 2, 4, and 7, and the above carboxyl-group containing polyurethane of the protective film meets the claimed thermoplastic resin of claims 1, 5, and 6. The above also correlates to about 96.8 mass% of carboxyl-group containing polyurethane, 3.2 mass% of epoxy compound, 0.00062 Ep/70.92 COOH = 0.0000087, which meets the amounts of claims 1 and 6. Toba further teaches that a suitable substrate example includes polycarbonate (para 38), which meets claims 3 and 8.
Conclusion
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/HA S NGUYEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1766