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 .
DETAILED ACTION
The action is in response to the Applicant’s communication filed on 01/22/2024.
Claims 1-12 are pending, where claim 1 is independent.
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 01/ 22/2024 has been filed on the filing date of the application. The submission is in-compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Specification objections (Title)
The title of the invention is not descriptive. A new title is required that is clearly indicative of the invention to which the claims are directed.
The following title is suggested: INFORMATION COLLECTION DEVICE FOR SUBSTRATE PROCESSING APPARATUS. MPEP 606.01
Claim Objections
Claim 6 is objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 6 recites the terminology "and/or", what is actually being performed by the alternatively claimed language. However, it will be assumed "or” for the purposes of examination.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 7 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112, second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which applicant regards as the invention.
Claims 7 and 10 recite the limitation “wired or wireless manner”. The term “manner” represents the term “type” which renders the claim indefinite because the claim(s) include(s) elements not actually disclosed or clearly defined in the specification and it is a broad term, thereby rendering the scope of the claim(s) unascertainable. See MPEP § 2173.05.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-12 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to a judicial exception an abstract idea without significantly more.
Independent claim(s) recite(s) a judicial exception: The claim(s) recite(s) “power supply to operate information collection device; sensor detects state of substrate processing apparatus, relay transmits sensor data; and controller collects sensor data through the relay”, as explained in detail below.
Claim 1: Ineligible
Step 1: The claim recites a series of steps and, therefore, is a process. Thus, the claim is directed to the same as a process, which is a statutory category of invention (Step 1: Yes).
Next, the claims are analyzed to determine directed to a judicial exception.
Under MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2), whether the claim recites:
any judicial exceptions, including certain groupings of abstract ideas (i.e., mathematical concepts, certain methods of organizing human activity such as a fundamental economic practice, or mental processes) ("Step 2A, Prong One"); and
additional elements that integrate the judicial exception into a practical application ("Step 2A, Prong Two").
Step 2A, Prong One: Claim 1 recites a judicial exception with the step of “power supply to operate information collection device; sensor detects state of substrate processing apparatus, relay transmits sensor data; and controller collects sensor data through the relay”, as explained in detail below.
The limitations “power supply to operate information collection device; sensor detects state of substrate processing apparatus, relay transmits sensor data; and controller collects sensor data through the relay” are observations, and therefore recite a mental process, such as an evaluation and judgement. See MPEP § 2106.04(a)(2), subsection III.
This steps, as drafted, is a process that under its broadest reasonable interpretation, covers (structure and Mental processes: the concept performed in human such as observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion, etc.). Thus, the claim recites in a group of mental processes.
Therefore, claim 1 is directed to an abstract idea of a judicial exception (Step 2A Prong one: Yes).
Step 2A Prong two:
The claim(s) does/do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the claim recites the additional elements of “sensor detects state of substrate processing apparatus, relay transmits sensor data; and controller collects sensor data through the relay” based on data/information collection and controller receives the collected data that do not add meaningful limitations sufficient amount to significantly more (“inventive concept”) than the judicial exception, that merely further limiting the scope of abstract ideas or stating merely technical environment of these abstract ideas and the claim is directed to the judicial exception.
This exception is not significant into a practical application of the exception and based on the recited additional elements of the claims (Step 2A Prong two: No).
Next, the claim as a whole is analyzed to determine whether any element, or combination of elements, is sufficient to ensure the claim amounts to significantly more than the abstract idea.
Step 2B: In addition to the steps that describe the abstract idea of “power supply; sensor, relay and controller”, the claim recites the additional limitation of obtaining and transfer the data to the controller. This additional element taken individually represents a general purpose data collection and transfer to the controller of substrate processing apparatus, [as evidence discussed in the background [paragraph 0003-04] “status reporting device collects process data detected by sensors provided in processing units when a process related to substrate processing is executed for each of a plurality of the processing units included in a substrate processing apparatus, and transmits the data to a management device”. This is analogous to such concepts identified by the courts as abstract, such as collection, analysis and display information in Electric Power Group, LLC, v. Alstom, (671 F.3d 1317, 101 U.S.P.Q.2d 1785 (Fed. Cir. 2012)) and the “manipulation of data to generate additional datasets”. The additional elements power supply; sensor, relay and controller and data transfer to management device are mainly based on data/information collection that are not sufficient amount to significantly more (“inventive concept”) than the judicial exception. The claim recites generic computer data collection and transfer to management device. As such, the claim is directed to a judicial exception. Accordingly, the claim is ineligible for patenting. (Step 2B: No)
As to the dependent claims 2-12, reciting the similar elements in the substrate processing and management device, which does not rise to a level of significantly more than the abstract idea, and are accordingly not eligible under 35 USC 101. See MPEP 2106.
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 of this title, 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 set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied 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.
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 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.
Claims 1-12 are rejected under AIA 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Huang, et al. USPGPub No. 20220206996 A1in view of Inoue, (USPGPub No. 20200183375 A1).
As to claim 1, Huang discloses An information collection device comprising:
a power supply configured to supply power to operate the information collection device (Huang [abstract] “data collection system for semiconductor manufacturing - processing chamber controller to receive a plurality of different types of data during operating - receive and store the formatted data as categories in a common file - generate an output file including a subset of the data from the common file” see Fig. 1-9, controller obviously includes power supply to operate the system/device);
However, Inoue discloses an input port connected to a sensor capable of detecting a state of a substrate processing apparatus and configured to input sensor data indicating the state of the substrate processing apparatus detected by the sensor, a relay configured to relay transmission of the sensor data; and a controller configured to collect the sensor data input by the input unit through the relay (Inoue [0026-58] “sensor 23 directly installed in the machine tool 22 or installed in the vicinity thereof, and measures various types of state quantities in the machine tool 22 - used as the operation state information - CCLD-type vibration sensor or a charge-type vibration sensor - of the machine tool 22 itself or in the vicinity of the machine tool 22; a temperature sensor which detects a temperature - illumination sensor; and an image sensor - sensors installed in the optimum positions - state monitoring device 24 - uses one or a plurality of sensors - data transferred from the manufacturing device 20 to the data collection device 10” [0003-11] “data collection device - collects data from the manufacturing device - state data of the corresponding machine tool acquired - controller transmits - stored in the temporary storage device - from various sensors - transmitted to a data collection device” [abstract] see Fig. 1-6).
Huang and Inoue are analogous arts from the same field of endeavor and contain overlapping structural and functional similarities and both contain data collection device.
Therefore, at the time the invention was made, it would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art to modify the above functionalities semiconductor manufacturing, as taught by Huang, and incorporating manufacturing device including numerical controller of industrial machine for data collection device, as taught by Inoue.
As to claim 2, the combination of Huang and Inoue disclose all the limitations of the base claims as outlined above.
The combination further discloses The information collection device according to claim 1, wherein the information collection device is detachably disposed on the substrate processing apparatus (Inoue [0026-58] “sensor 23 directly installed in the machine tool 22 or installed in the vicinity thereof, and measures various types of state quantities in the machine tool 22 - used as the operation state information - CCLD-type vibration sensor or a charge-type vibration sensor - of the machine tool 22 itself or in the vicinity of the machine tool 22; a temperature sensor which detects a temperature - illumination sensor; and an image sensor - sensors installed in the optimum positions - state monitoring device 24 - uses one or a plurality of sensors - data transferred from the manufacturing device 20 to the data collection device 10” [0003-11] “data collection device - collects data from the manufacturing device - state data of the corresponding machine tool acquired - controller transmits - stored in the temporary storage device - from various sensors - transmitted to a data collection device” [abstract] see Fig. 1-6, sensor directly installed or installed in the vicinity and measures various types of state quantities obviously provides detachably disposed on the processing apparatus).
As to claim 3, the combination of Huang and Inoue disclose all the limitations of the base claims as outlined above.
The combination further discloses The information collection device according to claim 1, wherein the information collection device collects the sensor data, independently of or in conjunction with a control device built into the substrate processing apparatus (Inoue [0026-58] “data collection device 10 connected to one manufacturing device 20 - sensor 23 and one state monitoring device 24 - data collection device 10 - connected to an arbitrary number of manufacturing devices 20 - arbitrary number of sensors 23 and an arbitrary number of state monitoring devices 24 - to communicate therewith - sensor 23 directly installed in the machine tool 22 or installed in the vicinity thereof, and measures various types of state quantities in the machine tool 22 - used as the operation state information - CCLD-type vibration sensor or a charge-type vibration sensor - of the machine tool 22 itself or in the vicinity of the machine tool 22; a temperature sensor which detects a temperature - illumination sensor; and an image sensor - sensors installed in the optimum positions - state monitoring device 24 - uses one or a plurality of sensors - data transferred from the manufacturing device 20 to the data collection device 10” [0003-11] “data collection device - collects data from the manufacturing device - state data of the corresponding machine tool acquired - controller transmits - stored in the temporary storage device - from various sensors - transmitted to a data collection device” [abstract] see Fig. 1-6, data collection device connected to manufacturing device 20 includes state monitoring plurality of sensors, sensor directly installed or installed in the vicinity and measures various types of state quantities obviously provides collection device collects the sensor data, independently of or in conjunction with a control device built into the substrate processing apparatus ).
As to claim 4, the combination of Huang and Inoue disclose all the limitations of the base claims as outlined above.
The combination further discloses The information collection device according to claim 3, wherein the sensor connected to the input port is one or more second sensors that are additionally installed on the substrate processing apparatus and that are different from first sensors previously attached to the substrate processing apparatus and connected to the control device (Inoue [0026-58] “sensor 23 directly installed in the machine tool 22 or installed in the vicinity thereof, and measures various types of state quantities in the machine tool 22 - used as the operation state information - CCLD-type vibration sensor or a charge-type vibration sensor - of the machine tool 22 itself or in the vicinity of the machine tool 22; a temperature sensor which detects a temperature - illumination sensor; and an image sensor - sensors installed in the optimum positions - state monitoring device 24 - uses one or a plurality of sensors - data transferred from the manufacturing device 20 to the data collection device 10” [0003-11] “data collection device - collects data from the manufacturing device - state data of the corresponding machine tool acquired - controller transmits - stored in the temporary storage device - from various sensors - transmitted to a data collection device” [abstract] see Fig. 1-6, plurality of sensors, sensor directly installed or installed in the vicinity and measures various types of state quantities obviously provides sensor connected to the input port is one or more second sensors that are additionally installed on the substrate processing apparatus and that are different from first sensors previously attached to the substrate processing apparatus and connected to the control device).
As to claim 5, the combination of Huang and Inoue disclose all the limitations of the base claims as outlined above.
The combination further discloses The information collection device according to claim 4, wherein the second sensors are attached to locations in the substrate processing apparatus that are different from locations where the first sensors are disposed (Inoue [0026-58] “sensor 23 directly installed in the machine tool 22 or installed in the vicinity thereof, and measures various types of state quantities in the machine tool 22 - used as the operation state information - CCLD-type vibration sensor or a charge-type vibration sensor - of the machine tool 22 itself or in the vicinity of the machine tool 22; a temperature sensor which detects a temperature - illumination sensor; and an image sensor - sensors installed in the optimum positions - state monitoring device 24 - uses one or a plurality of sensors - data transferred from the manufacturing device 20 to the data collection device 10” [0003-11] “data collection device - collects data from the manufacturing device - state data of the corresponding machine tool acquired - controller transmits - stored in the temporary storage device - from various sensors - transmitted to a data collection device” [abstract] see Fig. 1-6, plurality of sensors, sensor directly installed or installed in the vicinity and measures various types of state quantities obviously provides second sensors are attached to locations in the substrate processing apparatus that are different from locations where the first sensors are disposed).
As to claim 6, the combination of Huang and Inoue disclose all the limitations of the base claims as outlined above.
The combination further discloses The information collection device according to claim 4, wherein the control unit transmits at least one of the collected sensor data of the second sensors and/or a result analyzed from the collected sensor data of the second sensors, to the control device (Inoue [0026-58] “sensor 23 directly installed in the machine tool 22 or installed in the vicinity thereof, and measures various types of state quantities in the machine tool 22 - used as the operation state information - CCLD-type vibration sensor or a charge-type vibration sensor - of the machine tool 22 itself or in the vicinity of the machine tool 22; a temperature sensor which detects a temperature - illumination sensor; and an image sensor - sensors installed in the optimum positions - state monitoring device 24 - uses one or a plurality of sensors - data transferred from the manufacturing device 20 to the data collection device 10” [0003-11] “data collection device - collects data from the manufacturing device - state data of the corresponding machine tool acquired - controller transmits - stored in the temporary storage device - from various sensors - transmitted to a data collection device” [abstract] see Fig. 1-6, plurality of sensors, sensor directly installed or installed in the vicinity and measures various types of state quantities obviously provides control unit transmits at least one of the collected sensor data of the second sensors and/or a result analyzed from the collected sensor data of the second sensors, to the control device).
As to claims 7 and 10, the combination of Huang and Inoue disclose all the limitations of the base claims as outlined above.
The combination further discloses The information collection device according to claim 6, wherein the information collection device is capable of communicating with the substrate processing apparatus in a wired or wireless manner (Inoue [0003-11] “data collection device - collects data from the manufacturing device at specific periods - plurality of machine tools, - the state data of the corresponding machine tool acquired - grasp the operation conditions of a machine tool, a numerical controller acquires -chronological data - controller transmits - stored in the temporary storage device - from various sensors - transmitted to a data collection device” [0056-86] “supply programs to a computer through a wired communication path such as an electric wire or an optical fiber or a wireless communication path” [abstract] see Fig. 1-6, wired communication path such as an electric wire or an optical fiber or a wireless communication path obviously provides communicating with the processing apparatus in a wired or wireless manner).
As to claims 8 and 11, the combination of Huang and Inoue disclose all the limitations of the base claims as outlined above.
The combination further discloses The information collection device according to claim 6, further comprising: an environmental power generator configured to supply power that is used when wirelessly transmitting the sensor data from the input port to the relay (Huang [0043-87] “transport controller 134 control robots 112 and 124 - controllers 130 monitor sensors 135 - temperature, pressure, RF power, etc. - RF generating system 220 generates and outputs an RF voltage - plasma generated inductively or remotely” [abstract] “processing chamber controller to receive a plurality of different types of data during operating” see Fig. 1-9, it’s obvious that any remote electronic device operated by battery as wirelessly, RF generating system also generates outputs RF voltage generated inductively or remotely obviously provides the limitations).
As to claims 9 and 12, the combination of Huang and Inoue disclose all the limitations of the base claims as outlined above.
The combination further discloses The information collection device according to claim 6, wherein the controller collects, as the sensor data, image data obtained by capturing an image of the substrate processing apparatus by an image capturing device, through the relay or not through the relay, in addition to the sensor data input by the input port (Inoue [0003-11] “data collection device - collects data from the manufacturing device at specific periods - plurality of machine tools, - the state data of the corresponding machine tool acquired - grasp the operation conditions of a machine tool, a numerical controller acquires -chronological data - controller transmits - stored in the temporary storage device - from various sensors - temperature sensor, a voltage sensor, an illumination sensor, an image sensor and a vibration sensor - transmitted to a data collection device” [abstract] see Fig. 1-6, image sensor as image capturing device).
Citation of Pertinent Prior Art
It is noted that any citations to specific, pages, columns, lines, or figures in the prior art references and any interpretation of the reference should not be considered to be limiting in any way. A reference is relevant for all it contains and may be relied upon for all that it would have reasonably suggested to one having ordinary skill in the art. See MPEP 2141.02 VI. PRIOR ART MUST BE CONSIDERED IN ITS ENTIRETY, i.e., as a whole and 2123.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. The prior art made of record:
Oshima, et al. USPGPub No. 2019/0188999 A1 discloses a sensor relays and transfers sensor data detected by plurality of sensor terminals.
McCann, et al. USPGPub No. 2019/001800 A1 discloses a system for receiving sensor data for an operating manufacturing machine using sensors.
Kazmierski, et al. USPGPub No. 20230195071 A1 discloses a mechanism for generating data collection plan for semiconductor manufacturing system.
Nagata, et al. USPGPub No. 20210157301 A1 discloses an information collection system for industrial equipment until a product manufactured.
Yamanaka, et al. USPGPub No. 2022/0201532 A1 discloses a technique for collecting data obtained by a device as a sensor.
Kotaoka, et al. USPGPub No. 2011/0301739 A1 discloses a control system includes collecting unit for collecting data from component sof substrate processing apparatus and storing collected data.
Koyama, USPGPub No. 2010/0132611 A1 discloses a substrate processing apparatus in a group control connected to substrate processing.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to Md Azad whose telephone @(571)272-0553 or email: md.azad@uspto.gov. The examiner can normally be reached on Mon-Thu 9AM-5PM.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Mohammad Ali can be reached on (571)272-4105. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Md Azad/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2119