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.
This application currently names joint inventors. In considering patentability of the claims the examiner presumes that the subject matter of the various claims was commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the claimed invention(s) absent any evidence to the contrary. Applicant is advised of the obligation under 37 CFR 1.56 to point out the inventor and effective filing dates of each claim that was not commonly owned as of the effective filing date of the later invention in order for the examiner to consider the applicability of 35 U.S.C. 102(b)(2)(C) for any potential 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(2) prior art against the later invention.
Claims 1-3 and 8-10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Warnick et al. (US 2018/0011180) in view of Zaghloul et al. (US 2004/0252059).
Warnick (e.g. Fig. 5) teaches printed circuit board (e.g. see [0130]) including:
Regarding Claim 1, and a Wilkinson power divider on the printed circuit board, wherein the Wilkinson power divider comprises coplanar waveguides (e.g. see Fig. 5 and [0130]).
Regarding Claim 2, wherein the Wilkinson power divider comprises a coplanar waveguide with ground (CPWG) device (e.g. see [00130]).
Regarding Claim 3, wherein the Wilkinson power divider is a two-way power divider (e.g. see Fig. 5, two outputs and one input).
Regarding Claim 9, wherein the device further comprises a plurality of stitching vias formed in the printed circuit board (e.g. see Fig. 5, vias are aligned along the sides of the coplanar lines to connect to ground to form the CPWG).
Regarding Claim 10, wherein stitching vias enclose at least the Wilkinson power divider (e.g. see in Fig. 5 the ground vias are on both sides surrounding the coplanar line in the same manner as present application’s Fig. 2).
However, Warnick does not teach that the CPWG divider is embedded (Claims 1-2), that the device further comprises one of more feed vias and one or more corresponding antipads formed in the printed circuit board (Claim 8).
Zaghloul (e.g. Fig. 2A) provides the general teaching of embedding a CPW Wilkinson divider (e.g. 230) in a printed circuit board (e.g. see [0013] and [0022], [0025]) and using vias to connect to components on different layers (e.g. see [0013]).
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified Warnick’s Wilkinson CPWG device to have been embedded in the circuit board and including feed vias connected to the divider such as generally taught by Zaghloul, because the embedded and layered device having connecting feed vias would have provided the advantageous benefit of integrating multiple circuitry elements with the Wilkinson divider to communicate together as an integrated system. Additionally, antipads around the vias would have been obvious because it is well-known that areas around vias need to have portions where the ground is missing/spaced (i.e. antipads) from the signaling feed via for the benefit of avoiding short circuiting of the feed via to ground which would make the circuitry fail to operate.
Claim 4 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Warnick et al. (US 2018/0011180) in view of Zaghloul et al. (US 2004/0252059) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362).
The combination of Warnick and Zaghloul discloses an embedded Wilkinson device as described above and including a resistor for the gap of the Wilkinson (e.g. [0131]). However, the combination does not explicitly teach that the resistor of the Wilkinson can be a foil.
Edenfield provides the general teaching that the resistor of a Wilkinson can be a resistor foil (e.g. [0040] and Fig. 14 and resistive foil 60).
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the combination Warnick/Zaghloul device to have the resistor to have been a resistor foil such as taught by Edenfield, because the resistive foil would have been a mere substitution of art-recognized equivalent resistor means for the same purpose of connecting between the outputs of a Wilkinson divider as is the same purpose in both Warnick and Edenfield.
Claims 5-6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Warnick et al. (US 2018/0011180) in view of Zaghloul et al. (US 2004/0252059) and Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362) as applied to claim 4 above, and further in view of Gendron et al. (US 2017/0005416).
The combination of Warnick, Zaghloul, and Edenfield discloses an embedded Wilkinson device as described above and including a foil resistor.
However, the combination does not teach the specific ohms per square (OPS) such as 50 in Claims 5-6.
Gendron (e.g. see [0041]) provides the general teaching of the resistor of a Wilkinson can be 50 OPS.
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the generic unspecified resistor OPS of the combination to have been 50 OPS such as taught by Gendron, because it would have been a mere selection of a specific known OPS resistor characteristic for a Wilkinson divider for the unspecified OPS of the combination for which the resistors are for the same purpose of connecting between the outputs of a Wilkinson divider.
Claim 7 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Warnick et al. (US 2018/0011180) in view of Zaghloul et al. (US 2004/0252059) and Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362) as applied to claim 4 above, and further in view Varonen et al. (US 2022/0166122).
The combination of Warnick, Zaghloul, and Edenfield discloses an embedded Wilkinson device as described above. Warnick also teaches non-circular couplings from the input to the respective outputs (e.g. see Fig. 5, the central portion has squared looking couplings that are not clearly shown if they have curves).
However, the combination (particularly Warnick Fig. 5) does not explicitly teach/show the curved non-circular couplings from the input to the respective outputs.
Varonen (e.g. Fig. 3) teaches curved coupling portions (e.g. see at 30).
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the transmission lines of Warnick in the combination to have been shaped so as to have curves such as taught by Varonen because the change in shapes would have been a mere design choice of art-recognized alternative Wilkinson divider orientations for providing the same purpose of Wilkinson power dividing functionality.
Claim 11 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Warnick et al. (US 2018/0011180) in view of Zaghloul et al. (US 2004/0252059) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Varonen et al. (US 2022/0166122).
The combination of Warnick and Zaghloul discloses an embedded Wilkinson device as described above, and Warnick teaches the device can operate in a wide GHz range (e.g. see [0127]).
However, Warnick does not appear to explicitly disclose the claimed range. Varonen, (e.g. [0052]) provides the general teaching a Wilkinson divider operating in all microwave frequencies.
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the combination of Warnick and Zaghloul to have operated in any selected portion of the full microwave range such as taught by Varonen including the microwave frequencies of 8GHz to 110GHz, because the selected range capabilities/operation would have been a mere design choice of known frequencies based on the use of the device such as is generally implied by Varonen.
Claim 12 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Warnick et al. (US 2018/0011180) in view of Zaghloul et al. (US 2004/0252059) as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Lear et al. (US 2023/0187826).
The combination of Warnick and Zaghloul discloses an embedded Wilkinson device as described above. However, the combination does not explicitly teach the footprint size as in Claim 12.
Lear (e.g. [0003]) provides the general teaching that the transmission line sizes/footprints of power dividers is related to operating frequencies, as is fundamental characteristic of transmission lines.
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the footprint of the combination of Warnick and Zaghloul to have been within the claim 12 size, especially since the size of the divider footprint is a recognized result effective variable based on the frequencies of operation (as is recognized by Lear [0003]), and thus minimizing size of the footprint would have been a mere optimization to minimize circuit real estate requirements of the device.
Claims 13-14 and 21 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Varonen et al. (US 2022/0166122) in view of Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362).
Varonen (e.g. Figs. 3-4) teaches a printed circuit board including:
Regarding Claim 13, a Wilkinson power divider (30) embedded in the printed circuit board (e.g. see Fig. 4, and the lines of the device can be stripline (e.g. see [0041]), and stripline is an embedded transmission line by definition), wherein the Wilkinson power divider comprises: an input trace (e.g. to Port 1); first and second output traces (e.g. to Ports 2/3); a first curved non-circular trace coupling the input trace to the first output trace at a first trace junction; a second curved non-circular trace coupling the input trace to the second output trace at a second trace junction (e.g. see the two respective curved portions in the central portion of the device 30); and a resistor (40) formed between the first and second trace junctions.
Regarding Claim 14, wherein the traces are striplines (e.g. see [0041]).
Regarding claim 21, wherein the device is configured to operate from 8 GHz to 110 GHz (e.g. see [0052], the device can be for all microwave frequencies and 8 GHz to 110 GHz are microwaves)
However, Varonen does not teach that the resistor can be a foil (Claim 13).
Edenfield provides the general teaching that the resistor of a Wilkinson can be a resistor foil (e.g. [0040] and Fig. 14 and resistive foil 60).
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the combination Varonen device to have the resistor to have been a resistor foil such as taught by Edenfield, because the resistive foil would have been a mere substitution of art-recognized equivalent resistor means for the same purpose of connecting between the outputs of a Wilkinson divider as is the same purpose in both Varonen and Edenfield.
Claims 16-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Varonen et al. (US 2022/0166122) in view of Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362) as applied to claim 13 above, and further in view of Gendron et al. (US 2017/0005416).
The combination of Varonen and Edenfield teaches a device as described above.
However, the combination does not teach the specific ohms per square (OPS) such as 50 in Claims 16-17.
Gendron (e.g. see [0041]) provides the general teaching of the resistor of a Wilkinson can be 50 OPS.
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the generic unspecified resistor OPS of the combination to have been 50 OPS such as taught by Gendron, because it would have been a mere selection of a specific known OPS resistor characteristic for a Wilkinson divider for the unspecified OPS of the combination for which the resistors are for the same purpose of connecting between the outputs of a Wilkinson divider.
Claims 19-20 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Varonen et al. (US 2022/0166122) in view of Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362) as applied to claim 13 above, and further in view of Warnick et al. (US 2018/0011180).
The combination of Varonen and Edenfield teaches a device as described above.
However, the combination does not teach that the stitching vias enclosing the power divider (Claims 19-20).
Warnick (e.g. Fig. 5) teaches forming a Wilkinson divider as a coplanar waveguide that is grounded (CPWG) using stitching vias.
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the combination of Varonen/Edenfield to have the Wilkinson divider be formed as a CPWG such as taught by Warnick, because the CPWG would have provided the advantageous benefits of making the device small (e.g. see Warnick [0128]) and the added fundamental benefit of additional shielding provided by the via wall/stitching adjacent the transmission lines.
Claims 18 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Varonen et al. (US 2022/0166122) in view of Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362) as applied to claim 13 above, and further in view of Zaghloul et al. (US 2004/0252059).
The combination of Varonen and Edenfield teaches a device as described above.
However, the combination does not teach that the device further comprises one of more feed vias and one or more corresponding antipads formed in the printed circuit board.
Zaghloul (e.g. Fig. 2A) provides the general teaching of embedding a CPW Wilkinson divider (e.g. 230) in a printed circuit board (e.g. see [0013] and [0022], [0025]) and using vias to connect to components on different layers (e.g. see [0013]).
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified combination’s Wilkinson CPW device to have been embedded in the circuit board and including feed vias connected to the divider such as generally taught by Zaghloul, because the embedded and layered device having connecting feed vias would have provided the advantageous benefit of integrating multiple circuitry elements with the Wilkinson divider to communicate together as an integrated system. Additionally, antipads around the vias would have been obvious because it is well-known that areas around vias need to have portions where the ground is missing/spaced (i.e. antipads) from the signaling feed via for the benefit of avoiding short circuiting of the feed via to ground which would make the circuitry fail to operate.
Claims 22 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Varonen et al. (US 2022/0166122) in view of Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362) as applied to claim 13 above, and further in view of Lear et al. (US 2023/0187826).
The combination of Varonen and Edenfield teaches a device as described above.
However, the combination does not explicitly teach the footprint size as in Claim 22.
Lear (e.g. [0003]) provides the general teaching that the transmission line sizes/footprints of power dividers is related to operating frequencies, as is fundamental characteristic of transmission lines.
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the footprint of the combination to have been within the claim 22 size, especially since the size of the divider footprint is a recognized result effective variable based on the frequencies of operation (as is recognized by Lear [0003]), and thus minimizing size of the footprint would have been a mere optimization to minimize circuit real estate requirements of the device.
Claim 15 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Varonen et al. (US 2022/0166122) in view of Edenfield et al. (US 2019/0140362) as applied to claim 13 above, and further in view of Warnick et al. (US 2018/0011180) and Zaghloul et al. (US 2004/0252059).
The combination of Varonen and Edenfield teaches a device as described above.
However, the combination does not explicitly teach that the Wilkinson device is a CPWG that is embedded.
Warnick provides the general teaching of forming a Wilkinson divider as a CPWG and Zaghloul provides the general teaching of forming a coplanar Wilkinson embedded in a circuit board as described in detail previously.
It would have been considered obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to have modified the combination device of Varonen/Edenfield to have been embedded such as taught by Zaghloul and be CPWG such as taught by Warnick, because the modification would have provided the advantageous benefits of: the embedding and layering of the device having connecting feed vias as taught by Zaghloul would have provided the advantageous benefit of integrating multiple circuitry elements with the Wilkinson divider to communicate together as an integrated system, and forming the divider as CPWG such as taught by Warnick would have provided the advantageous benefits of making the device small (e.g. see Warnick [0128]) and the added fundamental benefit of additional shielding provided by the via wall/stitching adjacent the transmission lines.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to STEPHEN E JONES whose telephone number is (571)272-1762. The examiner can normally be reached 9AM to 5PM.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Andrea Lindgren Baltzell can be reached at 571-272-5918. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/Stephen E. Jones/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2843
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