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 .
Continued Examination Under 37 CFR 1.114
A request for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, including the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e), was filed in this application after final rejection. Since this application is eligible for continued examination under 37 CFR 1.114, and the fee set forth in 37 CFR 1.17(e) has been timely paid, the finality of the previous Office action has been withdrawn pursuant to 37 CFR 1.114. Applicant's submission filed on 6/17/2025 has been entered.
Claim Interpretation
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(f):
(f) Element in Claim for a Combination. – An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The following is a quotation of pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
An element in a claim for a combination may be expressed as a means or step for performing a specified function without the recital of structure, material, or acts in support thereof, and such claim shall be construed to cover the corresponding structure, material, or acts described in the specification and equivalents thereof.
The claims in this application are given their broadest reasonable interpretation using the plain meaning of the claim language in light of the specification as it would be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art. The broadest reasonable interpretation of a claim element (also commonly referred to as a claim limitation) is limited by the description in the specification when 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is invoked.
As explained in MPEP § 2181, subsection I, claim limitations that meet the following three-prong test will be interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph:
(A) the claim limitation uses the term “means” or “step” or a term used as a substitute for “means” that is a generic placeholder (also called a nonce term or a non-structural term having no specific structural meaning) for performing the claimed function;
(B) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is modified by functional language, typically, but not always linked by the transition word “for” (e.g., “means for”) or another linking word or phrase, such as “configured to” or “so that”; and
(C) the term “means” or “step” or the generic placeholder is not modified by sufficient structure, material, or acts for performing the claimed function.
Use of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim with functional language creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites sufficient structure, material, or acts to entirely perform the recited function.
Absence of the word “means” (or “step”) in a claim creates a rebuttable presumption that the claim limitation is not to be treated in accordance with 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. The presumption that the claim limitation is not interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, is rebutted when the claim limitation recites function without reciting sufficient structure, material or acts to entirely perform the recited function.
Claim limitations in this application that use the word “means” (or “step”) are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action. Conversely, claim limitations in this application that do not use the word “means” (or “step”) are not being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, except as otherwise indicated in an Office action.
This application includes one or more claim limitations that do not use the word “means,” but are nonetheless being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, because the claim limitation(s) uses a generic placeholder that is coupled with functional language without reciting sufficient structure to perform the recited function and the generic placeholder is not preceded by a structural modifier. Such claim limitation(s) is/are: supplying device (24) e.g. in claim 15, line 9 and claim 23, line 9.
Because this/these claim limitation(s) is/are being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, it/they is/are being interpreted to cover the corresponding structure described in the specification as performing the claimed function, and equivalents thereof.
If applicant does not intend to have this/these limitation(s) interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph, applicant may: (1) amend the claim limitation(s) to avoid it/them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph (e.g., by reciting sufficient structure to perform the claimed function); or (2) present a sufficient showing that the claim limitation(s) recite(s) sufficient structure to perform the claimed function so as to avoid it/them being interpreted under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph.
Claim Objections
Claim 17 objected to because of the following informalities:
Claim 17 recites “related” in line 3, where it appears it should have instead recited --repeated--.
The examiner notes that the claim numbering skips from claim 20 to claim 22 (missing claim 21).
Claim 22 recites “wherein fourth” in line 1, but should be amended to recite --wherein the fourth--.
Appropriate correction is required.
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 7-8, 10, 13, 15-20, and 22-25 are 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 applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claim 7 recites the limitation "loading stations" (plural) in line 3. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim. For examination purposes, this will be interpreted as --loading station-- (singular).
Claim 13 recites “the respective current station” in line 9. There is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim limitation “supplying device” in claims 15 and 23 invokes 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph. However, the written description fails to disclose the corresponding structure, material, or acts for performing the entire claimed function and to clearly link the structure, material, or acts to the function. Therefore, the claim is indefinite and is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, second paragraph.
Applicant may:
(a) Amend the claim so that the claim limitation will no longer be interpreted as a limitation under 35 U.S.C. 112(f) or pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, sixth paragraph;
(b) Amend the written description of the specification such that it expressly recites what structure, material, or acts perform the entire claimed function, without introducing any new matter (35 U.S.C. 132(a)); or
(c) Amend the written description of the specification such that it clearly links the structure, material, or acts disclosed therein to the function recited in the claim, without introducing any new matter (35 U.S.C. 132(a)).
If applicant is of the opinion that the written description of the specification already implicitly or inherently discloses the corresponding structure, material, or acts and clearly links them to the function so that one of ordinary skill in the art would recognize what structure, material, or acts perform the claimed function, applicant should clarify the record by either:
(a) Amending the written description of the specification such that it expressly recites the corresponding structure, material, or acts for performing the claimed function and clearly links or associates the structure, material, or acts to the claimed function, without introducing any new matter (35 U.S.C. 132(a)); or
(b) Stating on the record what the corresponding structure, material, or acts, which are implicitly or inherently set forth in the written description of the specification, perform the claimed function. For more information, see 37 CFR 1.75(d) and MPEP §§ 608.01(o) and 2181.
Claim 15 recites “after each repeated second operating cycle” in line 23. The second operating cycle is only repeated if the associated condition is met, and yet this limitation presumes there was at least one repeat prior to this step, which is not recited.
Claim 23 recites an analogous limitation in line 24.
The remaining claims are rejected by virtue of their dependency on claim 15 or 23.
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.
Claims 7, 13, 15-17, 19-20, and 23-24 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Guenther, JR. et al. (U.S. PGPub 2019/0183181, equivalent to CN107846978 cited in IDS) in view of Huff et al. (U.S. Patent 6,606,784).
Claim 15: Guenther discloses a method for addressing a loading failure in the production of an article (e.g. an electronic cigarette) in an automatic machine (e.g. 400, or subsystem 402 thereof) that is configured to operate in a succession of operating cycles (implied in paragraphs 151-152, 158, 160 - i.e. several carriages 604 cycle through the track, stopping at each station along the way, and the stations operate simultaneously), the method comprising: a first operating cycle in which a loading failure occurs, comprising: moving a carriage (604) by a conveyor (602) along a processing path (Fig. 4) to a first loading station (e.g. a first one of 502, 504, 506, etc.), the carriage comprising at least one seat (608a/608b - see Fig. 5) configured to accommodate a first component (e.g. base 204 - paragraph 154), holding the carriage at the first loading station for loading of the at least one seat with a first component by a supplying device (generally described in paragraph 162) configured to supply and insert the first component into the at least one seat (e.g. 754a of 502 - paragraphs 161, 178-179), attempting to supply and insert the first component into the at least one seat while the carriage is held at the first loading station (paragraphs 180-181), and checking the at least one seat for insertion of the first component into the at least one seat and determining that the at least one seat is empty (the machine checks for the presence or improper engagement of the component in the carriage as in paragraphs 182, 187, 232).
Guenther thus checks for improperly seated and/or missing components, but does not disclose a second operating cycle, comprising: holding the carriage at the first loading station after the first operating cycle; attempting, using the supplying device, to supply and insert the first component into the at least one seat while the carriage is held at the first loading station; checking the at least one seat for insertion of the first component into the at least one seat and determining if the at least one seat is empty. Guenther instead opts to mark the carriage as lacking the component and avoids subsequent operations thereto (e.g. paragraphs 182, 187, 183). However, Huff et al. teaches an assembly line using a carriage (pallet 14) moving along a conveyor (20), including a second operating cycle (i.e. the arbitrary period of time following a preliminary placement step and during a time period that presumably would otherwise have been a subsequent step) comprising holding the carriage at a first station after the first operating cycle following a failed component placement (column 4, lines 12-50); attempting to supply and insert the missing component into the seat while the carriage is held at the first loading station (i.e. correcting placement of the improperly placed component; and checking the at least one seat for insertion of the component into the at least one seat and determining if the at least one seat is empty (the carriage does not proceed until the sensors confirm proper placement of the component, Id.). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have provided for keeping the carriage and re-inserting the component as claimed as taught by Huff et al. in order to have ensured a proper component placement prior to proceeding with the remaining process rather than avoiding further assembly thereof and potentially wasting components or carriage space.
Regarding the above, it is noted that Huff corrects a component which is “not properly situated upon pallet”, such as to “detect gaps between portions of the pallet 14 and the underbody 12 which would exist if the underbody 12 was not properly situated upon pallet 14” in a non-limiting example (column 3, lines 48-50). The examiner submits that there is a fine line between a misalignment of a component and the seat of the carriage such that there is a gap therebetween, such as in Huff, and a situation where “the first component is actually not present in the seat” and the seat is “empty”, depending on the nature of the seating arrangement. If the component is improperly seated to a sufficient extent, then the seat could be considered effectively empty, or the first component “not present in the seat”, and such would presumably be detected by the respective sensors as a fault in the same way as an entirely missing component. Consequently, correcting the issue by fully seating the component could also be considered a form of “supply[ing] the missing first component” (it is supplied by being present) and “insert[ing] the missing first component…into the seat” (i.e. by fully inserting it). Additionally or alternatively, given that Guenther detects both misaligned and entirely missing components, and Huff generally teaches the concept of correcting a faulty seating prior to moving to subsequent stations, then it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have corrected for either issue as appropriate, i.e. by re-aligning the component or providing it again. In other words, if motivated to correct a faulty component placement prior to proceeding as taught by Huff, and if the faulty placement happened to be a missing part as contemplated by Guenther, then common sense would dictate the missing part simply be re-supplied by some means to correct the issue.
Huff uses the sensors for “notifying an operator and allowing the placement to be corrected”, though it is not explicitly described how the correction is made, and so does not necessarily teach using the supplying device to attempt re-insertion of the component. However, whether the correction is manual or automated in Huff, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have used the supplying device of Guenther to re-insert the component since it has been held that broadly providing an automatic or mechanical means to replace a manual activity which accomplishes the same result is not sufficient to distinguish over the prior art. In re Venner, 262 F.2d 91, 95, 120 USPQ 193, 194 (CCPA 1958). In this case, given a supplying device for the purpose of component insertion already exists, it would stand to reason that one of ordinary skill would have simply employed it for re-insertion in view of the teachings of Huff.
Referring to MPEP 2111.04 II., “[t]he broadest reasonable interpretation of a method (or process) claim having contingent limitations requires only those steps that must be performed and does not include steps that are not required to be performed because the condition(s) precedent are not met. In this case, the repeating and diagnosing steps are only required “if the at least one seat remains empty after each repeated second operating cycle” and “if the at least one seat remains empty after the predetermined number of times”. If the issue was corrected after the first attempt, then no further attempts would be necessary.
Claim 7: Guenther further discloses that the automatic machine comprises a plurality of stations (e.g. 502-518) comprising the first loading station and a plurality of carriages (604) independently arranged at each of the plurality of stations (paragraph 151), the method further comprising the step of moving, along the processing path and in a synchronized manner, the plurality of carriages so that, at the beginning of each operating cycle, either all carriages move from a current station to a following station or all carriages stand still in the respective current station (implied in that multiple carriages 604 flow around a shared track 602 and stop, and each of the substations operate simultaneously - e.g. paragraph 151 and as cited previously; Each carriage is also provided with a means to stop at each station, e.g. paragraph 160, and carriages are synchronized for movement with downstream carriages, e.g. paragraphs 178-179, 201, 229, 258).
Claim 13: Guenther further discloses wherein the automatic machine has a plurality of stations (e.g. 502-518) comprising the first loading station, and the method further comprises arranging, along the processing path, a plurality of carriages (604 - paragraph 151) able to move in a synchronized manner so that each station of the plurality of stations is coupled to a respective carriage (“multiple carriages 604 may be employed such that each of the substations 502-518…may simultaneously operate”, Id.). Each carriage is also provided with a means to stop at each station (e.g. paragraph 160), and carriages are synchronized for movement with downstream carriages (e.g. paragraphs 178-179, 201, 229, 258). In view of the above, if any carriage is stopped during an operation cycle as taught by Huff, then it would have been obvious for the process to involve keeping, at the beginning of the second operating cycle, all carriages standing still in the respective current stations since, at the end of the first operating cycle, the first component is actually not present in the seat. Such would have prevented carriage pileups and collisions, for example, and maintain the desired flow of carriages at each station.
Claim 16: Guenther and Huff do not explicitly teach in the second operating cycle, the at least one seat is empty after checking the at least one seat for insertion of the first component into the at least one seat and the second operating cycle is repeated. However, the examiner submits that such is simply one of limited possible outcomes and implied from Huff in that the carriage is not allowed to proceed until the sensors detect a proper seating of the component. If nothing else, this would have been obvious as it merely represents re-attempting the same process until successful. The “second cycle” being repeated can simply represent any additional periods of time that elapse during the repeated attempts.
Claim 17: Guenther and Huff do not explicitly teach that the second operating cycle is repeated one or more times, but less than the predetermined number of times and the at least one seat has the first component after the second operating cycle is [repeated] the one or more times. However, it is noted that the “predetermined number of times” is an optional, contingent limitation from claim 15, and is also not specifically defined, such that the number of repeats meeting “less than the predetermined number of times” may be any number greater than one. Otherwise, the claim is merely reciting some arbitrary number of repeats until a successful insertion, which is obvious in view of the discussion for claim 16 above. The examiner also notes that the specific number of repeats cannot be considered innovative given that one of ordinary skill would presumably be motivated to minimize this number and preferably would avoid any need for re-attempted insertion altogether, such that any need for repeated attempts would be due to random error and not a willful, conscious decision on the part of the inventor.
Claim 19: Guenther further discloses a third operating cycle (i.e. any subsequent cycle following successful insertion of the first component), wherein the carriage having a first component in each of the at least one seats after the second operating cycle is moved from the first loading station to an application station (“application” being broad, any of the subsequent assembly stations may be considered an “application station” in that further components are applied - e.g. paragraph 149).
Claim 20: Guether further discloses a fourth operating cycle (any subsequent cycle after the third), wherein the carriage is moved from the application station to a second loading station (“loading” being broad, any of the subsequent assembly stations may be considered a “loading station” in that further components are applied - e.g. paragraph 149).
Claim 23: Guenther discloses a method for addressing a loading failure in the production of an article (e.g. an electronic cigarette) in an automatic machine (e.g. 400, or subsystem 402 thereof) that is configured to operate in a succession of operating cycles (implied in paragraphs 151-152, 158, 160 - i.e. several carriages 604 cycle through the track, stopping at each station along the way, and the stations operate simultaneously), the method comprising: a first operating cycle in which a failure occurs, comprising: moving a carriage (604) by a conveyor (602) along a processing path (Fig. 4) to a first loading station (e.g. a first one of 502, 504, 506, etc.), the carriage comprising a plurality of seats (608a/608b - see Fig. 5), each configured to accommodate a first component (e.g. base 204 - paragraph 154); holding the carriage at the first loading station for loading each of the plurality of seats with a first component by a supplying device (generally described in paragraph 162) configured to supply and insert the first component into each of the plurality of seats (e.g. 754a of 502 - paragraphs 161, 178-179); attempting to supply and insert the first component into each of the plurality of seats while the carriage is held at the first loading station (paragraphs 180-181); and checking each of the plurality of seats for insertion of the first component into the at least one seat and determining that at least one seat is empty (the machine checks for the presence or improper engagement of the component in the carriage as in paragraphs 182, 184, 187, 232).
Guenther thus checks for improperly seated and/or missing components, but does not disclose a second operating cycle, comprising: holding the carriage at the first loading station after the first operating cycle; attempting, using the supplying device, to supply and insert the first component into the at least one seat while the carriage is held at the first loading station; checking the at least one seat for insertion of the first component into the at least one seat and determining if the at least one seat is empty. Guenther instead opts to mark the carriage as lacking the component and avoids subsequent operations thereto (e.g. paragraphs 182, 187, 183). However, Huff et al. teaches an assembly line using a carriage (pallet 14) moving along a conveyor (20), including a second operating cycle (i.e. the arbitrary period of time following a preliminary placement step and during a time period that presumably would otherwise have been a subsequent step) comprising holding the carriage at a first station after the first operating cycle following a failed component placement (column 4, lines 12-50); attempting to supply and insert the missing component into the seat while the carriage is held at the first loading station (i.e. correcting placement of the improperly placed component; and checking the at least one seat for insertion of the component into the at least one seat and determining if the at least one seat is empty (the carriage does not proceed until the sensors confirm proper placement of the component, Id.). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have provided for keeping the carriage and re-inserting the component as claimed as taught by Huff et al. in order to have ensured a proper component placement prior to proceeding with the remaining process rather than avoiding further assembly thereof and potentially wasting components or carriage space.
Regarding the above, it is noted that Huff corrects a component which is “not properly situated upon pallet”, such as to “detect gaps between portions of the pallet 14 and the underbody 12 which would exist if the underbody 12 was not properly situated upon pallet 14” in a non-limiting example (column 3, lines 48-50). The examiner submits that there is a fine line between a misalignment of a component and the seat of the carriage such that there is a gap therebetween, such as in Huff, and a situation where “the first component is actually not present in the seat” and the seat is “empty”, depending on the nature of the seating arrangement. If the component is improperly seated to a sufficient extent, then the seat could be considered effectively empty, or the first component “not present in the seat”, and such would presumably be detected by the respective sensors as a fault in the same way as an entirely missing component. Consequently, correcting the issue by fully seating the component could also be considered a form of “supply[ing] the missing first component” (it is supplied by being present) and “insert[ing] the missing first component…into the seat” (i.e. by fully inserting it). Additionally or alternatively, given that Guenther detects both misaligned and entirely missing components, and Huff generally teaches the concept of correcting a faulty seating prior to moving to subsequent stations, then it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have corrected for either issue as appropriate, i.e. by re-aligning the component or providing it again. In other words, if motivated to correct a faulty component placement prior to proceeding as taught by Huff, and if the faulty placement happened to be a missing part as contemplated by Guenther, then common sense would dictate the missing part simply be re-supplied by some means to correct the issue.
Huff uses the sensors for “notifying an operator and allowing the placement to be corrected”, though it is not explicitly described how the correction is made, and so does not necessarily teach using the supplying device to attempt re-insertion of the component. However, whether the correction is manual or automated in Huff, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have used the supplying device of Guenther to re-insert the component since it has been held that broadly providing an automatic or mechanical means to replace a manual activity which accomplishes the same result is not sufficient to distinguish over the prior art. In re Venner, 262 F.2d 91, 95, 120 USPQ 193, 194 (CCPA 1958). In this case, given a supplying device for the purpose of component insertion already exists, it would stand to reason that one of ordinary skill would have simply employed it for re-insertion in view of the teachings of Huff.
Referring to MPEP 2111.04 II., “[t]he broadest reasonable interpretation of a method (or process) claim having contingent limitations requires only those steps that must be performed and does not include steps that are not required to be performed because the condition(s) precedent are not met. In this case, the repeating and diagnosing steps are only required “if the at least one seat remains empty after each repeated second operating cycle” and “if the at least one seat remains empty after the predetermined number of times”. If the issue was corrected after the first attempt, then no further attempts would be necessary.
Claim 24: Guenther and Huff do not explicitly teach in the second operating cycle, at least one of the seats is empty after checking the plurality of seats for insertion of the first component into the plurality of seats and the second operating cycle is repeated. However, the examiner submits that such is simply one of limited possible outcomes and implied from Huff in that the carriage is not allowed to proceed until the sensors detect a proper seating of the component. If nothing else, this would have been obvious as it merely represents re-attempting the same process until successful. The “second cycle” being repeated can simply represent any additional periods of time that elapse during the repeated attempts.
Claims 18 and 25 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Guenther, JR. et al. and Huff et al. as applied to claim 16 and 24 above, and further in view of Nomaru et al. (U.S. Patent 5,155,690).
Guenther and Huff teach a method substantially as claimed except for wherein the second operating cycle is repeated the predetermined number of times and the at least one seat remains empty after each repeated second operating cycle, and a malfunction is diagnosed. However, Nomaru teaches a method of operating an assembly wherein at several points during the process, if a determination step results in a predetermined number (e.g. four) successive failures, then the production is stopped and an operator is alerted of the error (e.g. column 7, lines 13-41; column 9, lines 1-20; column 9, lines 31-47). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have provided for this functionality in order to have prevented an endless failure loop and to have altered an operator to a repeated issue. The examiner submits that it have additionally been obvious that one would then seek to diagnose the issue as otherwise production could not be resumed with any reasonable expectation of success.
Claims 8, 10, and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Guenther, JR. et al. and Huff et al. as applied to claims 15, 19, and 20 above, and further in view of Boldrini (WO2023002427, cited in IDS).
Claim 8: Guenther and Huff teach a method substantially as claimed except for the step of coupling, in at least one winding station arranged along the processing path downstream of the first loading station, a wire around the first component carried by the carriage so as to create a corresponding coil. It is noted that Guenther mentions that the methods, systems, and apparatuses described therein may be employed to form various embodiments of cartridges that differ from the above described cartridges (paragraph 140). To that end, Boldrini teaches a method of manufacturing a cartridge for an electronic cigarette (page 1, lines 12-19) comprising coupling, in at least one winding station (S5) arranged along the processing path (conveyor 15) downstream of a first loading station (S1), a wire around a first component carried by a carriage (16) so as to create a corresponding coil (page 10, lines 10-17). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have performed these steps in the method otherwise disclosed by Guenther and optionally Huff depending upon the type of cartridge to be assembled, i.e. one using a transponder to store data therein.
Claim 10: Guenther and Huff teach a method substantially as claimed except for the structure of the conveyor as claimed. However, Boldrini further teaches a main conveyor (15) comprising: an annular guide (19); a slide (20), which is coupled to the guide (19) so as to freely slide along the guide (19) and supports the carriage (16); and a linear electric motor (21), which moves the slide (20) and is provided with an annular stator (22), which is arranged in a fixed position along the guide (19), and with a movable slider (23), which is electromagnetically coupled to the stator (22) so as to receive, from the stator (22), a driving force and is rigidly connected to the slide (pages 7, line 27 - page 8, line 15). Since both Guenther and Boldrini disclose conveyors for performing a similar method, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have substituted one for the other to achieve the predictable result of conveying the number of carriages about the conveying path. MPEP 2143 I. B.
Claim 22: As noted above, Guenther mentions that the methods, systems, and apparatuses described therein may be employed to form various embodiments of cartridges that differ from the above described cartridges (paragraph 140). To that end, Boldrini further discloses holding the carriage (16) at a second loading station (S4) and attempting to insert an integrated circuit (10), which is provided with two electrical contacts (12) and is coupled to the first component (1) into the seat (page 9, lines 18-24). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have performed these steps in the method otherwise disclosed by Guenther and optionally Huff depending upon the type of cartridge to be assembled, i.e. one using a transponder to store data therein.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 11/21/2025 have been fully considered.
Applicant’s arguments primarily rely on amendments to the claims, which have been addressed in the updated rejection above.
Applicant continues to assert that Huff teaches an operator who manually corrects the position of the underbody 12 on a pallet 14. The examiner maintains that Huff does not disclose how, specifically, the position of the component on the carriage is corrected, and only teaches alerting an operator, thereby "allowing the placement to be corrected", which does not necessarily mean the operator manually corrects the placement. The examiner also submits that use of the supplying device, i.e. a device already used for the purpose of supplying components to the carriage and which is already provided by Guenther, would have been an obvious matter of automating what Applicant argues is an otherwise manual activity.
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 nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) 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 mailing date of this final action.
Contact Information
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MATTHEW P TRAVERS whose telephone number is (571)272-3218. The examiner can normally be reached 10:00AM-6:30PM.
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/Matthew P Travers/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3726