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 .
Priority
Receipt is acknowledged of certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statements (IDS) submitted on 10/31/2023 and 07/16/2024 are in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statements are being considered by the examiner.
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.
Claim(s) 1-2 and 10-15 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Bae et al. [US 2019/0362922] in view of Kaita et al. [US 2015/0229154].
With respect to claims 1 and 14, Bae discloses a battery pack [abstract], comprising: a battery module [11]; a first switch and a second switch configured to control an electrical connection between the battery module and a load [12/13]; a driver configured to control, turn on, and turn off the first switch and the second switch [15]; a switch control device, comprising: a first retention circuit configured to output a first retention signal to a first driver of a first switch to maintain an on state of the first switch based on a safety signal and a first control signal [204, i.e. SS1]; a second retention circuit configured to output a second retention signal to a second driver of a second switch to maintain an on state of the second switch based on the safety signal and a control signal [204; i.e. SS2]; a retention control circuit configured to enable the first and second retention circuits according to the first and second control signals [203]; a first controller configured to output the first control signals [CS]; and a second controller configured to output the safety signal according to an operation state of the first controller [SBC], wherein the first driver controls the first switch based on the first control signal and the first retention signal, and the second driver controls the second switch based on the second control signal and the second retention signal [par. 0035-0060], however, fails to explicitly disclose a second driver/second control signal.
Kaita relates to a battery system and teaches utilizing multiple/second drivers and second control signals for the switches [Fig. 10]. Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to modify Bae to utilize independent drivers/signals for each switch as taught by Kaita for the benefit of isolation and fault containment as well as enabling scalability/modularity for the battery pack.
With respect to claims 2 and 15, Bae further discloses wherein the retention control circuit is further configured to enable the first retention circuit and the second retention circuit if the first control signal and the second control signal simultaneously indicate an on state of the first switch and the second switch [203/205; i.e. has retention control circuit that controls the output controlling the switch].
With respect to claims 10-13, Kaita further discloses a first latch circuit configured to receive the first control signal and the safety signal, and to start outputting the first retention signal according to the first control signal if the safety signal indicates an abnormal state of the first controller [Figs 5 and 17]. Further, incorporating a timer and delay are routine operations with latch circuits that are well-known in the art. Therefore, it would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art to modify Kaita to further include timing/delay circuits for the benefit of controlling the on/off operations of the switches.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 3-9 and 16-20 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if canceled and incorporated into their respective independent claim including all of the limitations of the base claim and the intervening claims.
With respect to claims 3 and 16, wherein the retention control circuit includes: a latch on circuit configured to output a latch on signal if the first control signal and the second control signal simultaneously indicate the on state of the first switch and the second switch; a latch circuit configured to output a latch signal if the latch on signal is output from the latch on circuit; and an output circuit configured to output a disable signal for disabling the first retention circuit and the second retention circuit, and to block output of the disable signal if the latch signal is output from the latch circuit, and wherein the first retention circuit and the second retention circuit are further configured to block the output of the first retention signal and the second retention signal while the disable signal is being received.
Claims 4-9 and 17-20 depend from the claims above and are objected to for the same reasons.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to NATHANIEL R PELTON whose telephone number is (571)270-1761. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 9am to 5pm.
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/NATHANIEL R PELTON/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2859
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