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
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.
Claim(s) 1-5 is/are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Kamibayshi (EP 3460947, cited by the applicant) in view of Ashtiani et al. (US 6078165).
Re claim 1: Kamibayshi teaches a battery pack (fig. 9) comprising a first battery cell (C[0]), a second battery cell (C[1]) serially connected to the first battery cell, and a master board (800) electrically connected to the first battery cell and the second battery cell, wherein the master board comprises a first power line connected to a positive terminal of the first battery module, a second power line connected to the positive terminal of the second battery module, a multiplexer (MUX) circuit (121) connected to the first power line and the second power line and connected to one of the first battery cell and the second battery cell, having a relatively higher voltage among the first battery cell and the second battery cell (paragraph 0089), a direct current-to-direct current (DC-DC) converter (811) connected to the multiplexer (MUX) circuit and configured to perform DC-DC conversion (fig. 11, paragraphs 0133, 0141), and a control unit (130) configured to receive driving power from the DC-DC converter (paragraph 0133)(see figs. 9-11; paragraphs 0132-0145).
However, Kamibayshi fairly suggests that the multiplexer is connected to the battery modules.
Ashtiani teaches a multiplexed modular battery management system comprising a plurality of battery modules (14, 16, 18) wherein the plurality of battery modules connected to the multiplexer (MUX)(21) (see figs. 1-3; col. 2, line 34- col. 4, line 24).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention was made to incorporate the teachings of Ashtiani to the teachings of Kamibayshi in order to provide the increased voltage and capacity by grouping battery cells into the battery module, in which it is well known in the art.
Re claim 2: Wherein voltages of the first battery cell and the second battery cell are balanced by the multiplexer (MUX) circuit (fig. 6; paragraph 0089-0090).
Re claim 3: The battery pack further comprising a voltage sensor (131), wherein the voltage sensor transmits voltage information of each of the first battery cell and the second battery cell to the control unit (paragraph 0029).
Re claims 4, 5: Although, Kamibayshi as modified by Ashtiani fails to particularly teach that the particular voltages of the battery modules and converter. However, it would have been an obvious design variation well within the ordinary skill in the art failing to provide any unexpected results for choosing the voltages of the modules and converter, in fact, voltages of the battery modules can be various depends on applications and/or devices to operate, and therefore an obvious expedient.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 6-8 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
None of prior art teaches the battery pack comprising a first battery module and a second battery module, wherein if a voltage of the first battery module is higher than a voltage of the second battery module, the control unit is configured to receive power from the first battery module by connecting the DC-DC converter to the first battery module using the multiplexer (MUX) circuit, and if the voltage of the second battery module is higher than the voltage of the first battery module, the control unit is configured to receive power from the second battery module by connecting the DC-DC converter to the second battery module using the multiplexer (MUX) circuit.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Lee et al. (US 2010/0207579), Chen et al. (US 10921378), and Bulur et al. (US 9557387) teach battery packs.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SEUNG H LEE whose telephone number is (571)272-2401. The examiner can normally be reached 7-4:00PM.
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/SEUNG H LEE/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2876
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