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 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) 1-12 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kurosawa(USPGPUB DOCUMENT: 2011/0149537, hereinafter Kurosawa) in view of Liu (USPGPUB DOCUMENT: 20220146216, hereinafter Liu).
Re claim 1 Kurosawa discloses a heat spreader(24/20/26) comprising: a metal substrate[0030] having a surface in which a plurality of depressions(depressions between projected portions) and a plurality of projections(projected portions)[0039] are alternately arranged
Kurosawa does not disclose a plating layer covering the surface.
Liu discloses in Fig 7 a plating layer(14 of Liu) covering the surface(111).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filling date of the invention to apply the teachings of Liu to the teachings of Kurosawa in order to make heat dissipation more efficient [0003, Liu].
Re claim 2 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 1, wherein the plating layer(14 of Liu) includes a nickel plating layer(14 of Liu) contacting the surface; and a gold plating layer(14 of Liu) on the nickel plating layer(14 of Liu).
Re claim 3 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 1, wherein each of the plurality of projections(projected portions)[0039] has a flat surface at a top of said each of the plurality of projections(projected portions)[0039].
Re claim 4 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 1, wherein a height[0006 of Liu] of the plurality of projections(projected portions)[0039] relative to a bottom of the plurality of depressions(depressions between projected portions) is 5 μm or more and 15 μm or less.
Re claim 5 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 1, wherein the surface has an arithmetic average roughness[0006 of Liu] Ra of 1.0 μm or more and 3.5 μm or less.
Re claim 6 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 1, wherein the metal substrate[0030] contains copper[0009 of Liu].
Re claim 7 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 1, wherein the plurality of depressions(depressions between projected portions) and the plurality of projections(projected portions)[0039] are alternately arranged at regular intervals in two directions that are parallel to the surface and are perpendicular to each other.
Re claim 8 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 1, wherein the surface includes a first region and a second region surrounding the first region, and the plurality of depressions(depressions between projected portions) and the plurality of projections(projected portions)[0039] are present in the first region and are absent in the second region.
Re claim 9 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 1, wherein the surface is embossed with the plurality of depressions(depressions between projected portions) and the plurality of projections(projected portions)[0039].
Re claim 10 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 9, wherein the surface includes a first region embossed with the plurality of depressions(depressions between projected portions) and the plurality of projections(projected portions)[0039]; and a second region surrounding the first region, the second region being a non-embossed region.
Re claim 11 Kurosawa and Liu disclose the heat spreader(24/20/26) as claimed in claim 10, wherein the plating layer(14 of Liu) includes a nickel plating layer(14 of Liu) contacting the surface; and a gold plating layer on the nickel plating layer, the nickel plating layer covers the first region and the second region, the gold plating layer covers at least the first region, and an area[0007 of Liu] of the gold plating layer is smaller than an area[0007 of Liu] of the nickel plating layer in a plan view.
Re claim 12 Kurosawa and Liu disclose an electronic component device comprising: a wiring[0012] substrate; an electronic component on the wiring[0012] substrate; the heat spreader(24/20/26) as set forth in claim 1; and a metallic joining material joining the electronic component and the plating layer(14 of Liu) of the heat spreader(24/20/26).
Conclusion
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/PATRICIA D VALENZUELA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2812
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