Prosecution Insights
Last updated: April 19, 2026
Application No. 18/714,233

POWER CONVERTING APPARATUS, MOTOR DRIVE APPARATUS, AND REFRIGERATION-CYCLE APPLICATION DEVICE

Non-Final OA §103
Filed
May 29, 2024
Examiner
LUO, DAVID S
Art Unit
2846
Tech Center
2800 — Semiconductors & Electrical Systems
Assignee
Mitsubishi Electric Corporation
OA Round
1 (Non-Final)
90%
Grant Probability
Favorable
1-2
OA Rounds
2y 3m
To Grant
97%
With Interview

Examiner Intelligence

Grants 90% — above average
90%
Career Allow Rate
1007 granted / 1115 resolved
+22.3% vs TC avg
Moderate +6% lift
Without
With
+6.5%
Interview Lift
resolved cases with interview
Typical timeline
2y 3m
Avg Prosecution
27 currently pending
Career history
1142
Total Applications
across all art units

Statute-Specific Performance

§101
1.6%
-38.4% vs TC avg
§103
46.4%
+6.4% vs TC avg
§102
48.7%
+8.7% vs TC avg
§112
2.8%
-37.2% vs TC avg
Black line = Tech Center average estimate • Based on career data from 1115 resolved cases

Office Action

§103
DETAILED ACTION 1. The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . 2. The specification, the abstract and the drawings are all acceptable. 3. Claims 11, 14 and 17 are objected to as they depend from the cancelled claim 5. Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103 4. 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. 5. Claims 1, 3-4, 7-8, 12-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over USPN 9,787,246 to Tsumura, and in view of USPN 7,912,530 to Seki. As to claim 1, Tsumura teaches a power converting apparatus (col. 2: lines 31 – col. 3: lines 20) comprising: a rectifier unit (fig. 1: “11”) rectifying first alternating-current power supplied from a commercial power supply(fig. 1: “3”); a capacitor (fig. 1: “15”) connected to an output end of the rectifier unit(fig. 1: “11”); an inverter (fig. 1: “17 ”) connected across the capacitor(fig. 1: “15”), the inverter(fig. 1: “3”) generating second alternating-current power and outputting the second alternating-current power to a motor(fig. 1: “81”); a detecting unit (fig. 1: “43”) detecting a first direct-current bus voltage(col. 6: lines 15-17), the first direct-current bus voltage being a voltage across the capacitor(col. 6: lines 23-26), and the control unit (fig. 1: “53”) controlling an operation of the inverter and the motor by using a second direct-current bus voltage(col. 6: lines 46-48), the second direct-current bus voltage being the first direct-current bus voltage after passing through the specific frequency bandpass unit(col. 6: lines 53-67 wherein the DC bus voltage is obtained after the current passes through the smoothing capacitor “15”). Tsumura does not teach a control unit including a specific frequency bandpass unit passing a defined frequency band among power-supply pulsatile components contained in the first direct-current bus voltage wherein in a case where the commercial power supply is a single-phase commercial power supply, the control unit sets a control band of the specific frequency bandpass unit to be twice or lower than a frequency of the single-phase commercial power supply, and attenuates a second-order or lower component of the frequency of the single-phase commercial power supply at a rate of −40 dB/decade or more. Seki teaches a control unit including a specific frequency bandpass unit (col. 10: lines 53 “bandpass filter”) passing a defined frequency band among power-supply pulsatile components contained in the first direct-current bus voltage wherein in a case where the commercial power supply is a single-phase commercial power supply, the control unit sets a control band of the specific frequency bandpass unit to be twice or lower than a frequency of the single-phase commercial power supply, and attenuates a second-order or lower component of the frequency of the single-phase commercial power supply at a rate of −40 dB/decade or more(col. 10: lines 53 – 62, col. 11: lines 33-45 wherein apparatus and method are taught to filter the commercial power supply in a wide range of frequencies including but not limiting to -40 dB/decade or more). Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Seki into Tsumura since Tsumura suggests a motive power system and Seki suggests the beneficial use of power filtering technique in the analogous art of power control technology. The motivation for this comes from the fact that Seki teaches the power filtering technique which can be used to improve the motive power system disclosed by Tsumura. As to claim 3, Tsumura teaches a power converting apparatus (col. 2: lines 31 – col. 3: lines 20) comprising: a rectifier unit (fig. 1: “11”) rectifying first alternating-current power supplied from a commercial power supply (fig. 1: “3”); a capacitor (fig. 1: “15”) connected to an output end of the rectifier unit(fig. 1: “11”); an inverter (fig. 1: “17 ”) connected across the capacitor(fig. 1: “15”), the inverter(fig. 1: “3”) generating second alternating-current power and outputting the second alternating-current power to a motor(fig. 1: “81”); a detecting unit (fig. 1: “43”) detecting a first direct-current bus voltage(col. 6: lines 15-17), the first direct-current bus voltage being a voltage across the capacitor(col. 6: lines 23-26); and, the second direct-current bus voltage being the first direct-current bus voltage after passing through the specific frequency bandpass unit (col. 6: lines 53-67 wherein the DC bus voltage is obtained after the current passes through the smoothing capacitor “15”). Tsumura does not teach a control unit including a specific frequency bandpass unit passing a defined frequency band among power-supply pulsatile components contained in the first direct-current bus voltage, the control unit controlling an operation of the inverter and the motor by using a second direct-current bus voltage wherein in a case where the commercial power supply is a three-phase commercial power supply, the control unit sets a control band of the specific frequency bandpass unit to be six times or lower than a frequency of the three-phase commercial power supply, and attenuates a six-order or lower component of the frequency of the three-phase commercial power supply at a rate of −40 dB/decade or more. Seki teaches a control unit including a specific frequency bandpass unit passing a defined frequency band among power-supply pulsatile components contained in the first direct-current bus voltage, the control unit controlling an operation of the inverter and the motor by using a second direct-current bus voltage wherein in a case where the commercial power supply is a three-phase commercial power supply, the control unit sets a control band of the specific frequency bandpass unit to be six times or lower than a frequency of the three-phase commercial power supply, and attenuates a six-order or lower component of the frequency of the three-phase commercial power supply at a rate of −40 dB/decade or more (col. 10: lines 53 – 62, col. 11: lines 33-45 wherein apparatus and method are taught to filter the commercial power supply in a wide range of frequencies including but not limiting to -40 dB/decade or more). Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Seki into Tsumura since Tsumura suggests a motive power system and Seki suggests the beneficial use of power filtering technique in the analogous art of power control technology. The motivation for this comes from the fact that Seki teaches the power filtering technique which can be used to improve the motive power system disclosed by Tsumura. As to claim 4, Tsumura teaches a power converting apparatus comprising: a rectifier unit (fig. 1: “11”) rectifying first alternating-current power supplied from a commercial power supply (fig. 1: “3”); a capacitor (fig. 1: “15”) connected to an output end of the rectifier unit (fig. 1: “11”); an inverter (fig. 1: “17 ”) connected across the capacitor (fig. 1: “15”), the inverter (fig. 1: “3”) generating second alternating-current power and outputting the second alternating-current power to a motor (fig. 1: “81”); a detecting unit (fig. 1: “43”) detecting a first direct-current bus voltage (col. 6: lines 15-17), the first direct-current bus voltage being a voltage across the capacitor (col. 6: lines 23-26), the control unit (fig. 1: “53”) controlling an operation of the inverter and the motor by using a second direct-current bus voltage (col. 6: lines 46-48), the second direct-current bus voltage being the first direct-current bus voltage after passing through the specific frequency bandpass unit (col. 6: lines 53-67 wherein the DC bus voltage is obtained after the current passes through the smoothing capacitor “15”) and a booster unit (fig. 1: “51”) boosting a voltage of direct-current power output from the rectifier unit(fig. 1: “11”). Tsumura does not teach a control unit including a specific frequency bandpass unit passing a defined frequency band among power-supply pulsatile components contained in the first direct-current bus voltage in a case where the commercial power supply is a single-phase commercial power supply, the control unit sets a control band of the specific frequency bandpass unit to be twice or lower than a frequency of the single-phase commercial power supply, and attenuates a 2 n-th order component of the frequency of the single-phase commercial power supply at a rate of −40 dB/decade or more, where n is an integer of two or more, and controls an operation of the booster unit by using the second direct-current bus voltage. Seki teaches a control unit including a specific frequency bandpass unit (col. 10: lines 53 “bandpass filter”) passing a defined frequency band among power-supply pulsatile components contained in the first direct-current bus voltage in a case where the commercial power supply is a single-phase commercial power supply, the control unit sets a control band of the specific frequency bandpass unit to be twice or lower than a frequency of the single-phase commercial power supply, and attenuates a 2 n-th order component of the frequency of the single-phase commercial power supply at a rate of −40 dB/decade or more, where n is an integer of two or more, and controls an operation of the booster unit by using the second direct-current bus voltage (col. 10: lines 53 – 62, col. 11: lines 33-45 wherein apparatus and method are taught to filter the commercial power supply in a wide range of frequencies including but not limiting to -40 dB/decade or more). Thus, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the teachings of Seki into Tsumura since Tsumura suggests a motive power system and Seki suggests the beneficial use of power filtering technique in the analogous art of power control technology. The motivation for this comes from the fact that Seki teaches the power filtering technique which can be used to improve the motive power system disclosed by Tsumura. As to claim 7, Tsumura in view of Seki teaches a motor drive apparatus comprising the power converting apparatus (Tsumura fig. 1: “1”) according to claim 1. As to claim 8, Tsumura in view of Seki teaches a refrigeration-cycle application device (Tsumura col. 5: lines 32-43) comprising the power converting apparatus (Tsumura fig. 1: “1”) according to claim 1. As to claim 12, Tsumura in view of Seki teaches a motor drive apparatus comprising the power converting apparatus (Tsumura fig. 1: “1”) according to claim 3. As to claim 13. Tsumura in view of Seki teaches a motor drive apparatus comprising the power converting apparatus (Tsumura fig. 1: “1”) according to claim 4. As to claim 14. Tsumura in view of Seki teaches a motor drive apparatus comprising the power converting apparatus (Tsumura fig. 1: “1”) according to claim 5. As to claim 15. Tsumura in view of Seki teaches a refrigeration-cycle application device (Tsumura col. 5: lines 32-43) comprising the power converting apparatus (Tsumura fig. 1: “1”) according to claim 3. As to claim 16. Tsumura in view of Seki teaches a refrigeration-cycle application device (Tsumura col. 5: lines 32-43) comprising the power converting apparatus (Tsumura fig. 1: “1”) according to claim 4. As to claim 17. Tsumura in view of Seki teaches a refrigeration-cycle application device (Tsumura col. 5: lines 32-43) comprising the power converting apparatus (Tsumura fig. 1: “1”) according to claim 5. Allowable Subject Matter 6. Claims 6, 9-11 are objected to as being dependent upon the rejected base claims 1, 3, 4, but could be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claims and any intervening claims for the following reasons: No prior art of record discloses the features as claimed in the noted claims. 7. The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter. The non-obvious features are: In comparison with the closest prior art as cited in this Office action and any previous Office actions, no prior art of record discloses the following features as claimed in the following claim limitations: As per claim 6: A first filter with a second order or higher; a second filter with a smaller order than the first filter; and a selection unit selecting an output from the first filter or an output from the second filter depending on a computing load. As per claims 9-11: It is the same reason as claim 6. Conclusion 8. The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. USPN 6,958,589 to Kawaji discloses a motor control system. 9. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DAVID S LUO whose telephone number is (571)270-5251. The examiner can normally be reached 8AM-5PM. Examiner interviews are available via telephone, in-person, and video conferencing using a USPTO supplied web-based collaboration tool`. To schedule an interview, applicant is encouraged to use the USPTO Automated Interview Request (AIR) at http://www.uspto.gov/interviewpractice. If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Eduardo Colon-Santana can be reached at 571-272-2060. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300. Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov. Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). If you would like assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000. /DAVID LUO/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2846
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Prosecution Timeline

May 29, 2024
Application Filed
Feb 23, 2026
Non-Final Rejection — §103 (current)

Precedent Cases

Applications granted by this same examiner with similar technology

Patent 12603588
CONTROL CIRCUIT AND METHOD FOR DC MOTORS
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Patent 12597877
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Patent 12597876
POWER CONVERTER
2y 5m to grant Granted Apr 07, 2026
Patent 12597873
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2y 5m to grant Granted Apr 07, 2026
Study what changed to get past this examiner. Based on 5 most recent grants.

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Prosecution Projections

1-2
Expected OA Rounds
90%
Grant Probability
97%
With Interview (+6.5%)
2y 3m
Median Time to Grant
Low
PTA Risk
Based on 1115 resolved cases by this examiner. Grant probability derived from career allow rate.

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