DETAILED ACTION
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.
Claims 1, 2, 5-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Jau (US 20200247051).
As to claims 1 and 5, Jau additive manufacturing apparatus (Fig. 1) for additively manufacturing a component. The Jau apparatus comprises a resin vat unit (100) which includes a reservoir (120) for storing UV-light photocurable resin (10) and a frame assembly (110, 112, 140, 130) holding a UV-transmissive window (110, 130, 140) at the bottom of the reservoir (120). The Jau UV-transmissive window includes a UV-transmissive plate (110; [0029]), a UV-transmissive anti-adhesive flexible foil (130; [0029]), a projection unit (400) for projecting UV-light ([0025]) through the UV-transmissive window into the reservoir. Jau also teaches a movable building platform (200) having a surface onto which said component (20) can be formed through layerwise curing of said resin. Jau also teaches that the UV-transmissive window further includes a removable, obviously exchangeable frame-shaped spacer foil (140) which has a predetermined thickness and is removably mounted by the frame assembly (110, 112, 140, 130) between the UV-transmissive plate (110) and the UV-transmissive anti-adhesive flexible foil (130) in order to create a plate-foil air gap (111) and at least one air hole (see holes in 140 and 112 with left arrows) for communicating said plate-foil air gap (111) with the atmosphere.
While Jau does not specifically teach that the components described above are “transparent”, Jau does teach that these components are light “transmissive”. One of ordinary skill in this art would have recognized that Jau’s teaching of “transmissive” to also suggest “transparent” components because a “transparent” component to be perfectly transmissive.
Jau does not specifically teach the air hole being disposed in at least one corner of the frame assembly. However, Jau teaches specifically that the ring could be rectangular with a plurality of through holes on lateral surfaces of the frame ([0027]). When lateral surfaces of a rectangular frame are provided with a plurality of through holes, it would have been obvious to dispose at least some of those lateral surface through holes in or at the corner. Alternatively, increasing/duplicating the number of through holes to provide more through holes would cause some lateral surface through holes to be positioned in or at the corner.
As to claim 2, Jau teaches a reservoir (120), a frame assembly (110, 112, 140, 130), and a UV-transmissive window (110, 130, 140) not depicted as connected to an additive manufacturing apparatus. It would have been prima facie obvious to make separable these components from the additive manufacturing apparatus in order to allow replacement, refilling, or cleaning. As to claim 6, in Jau, although the exact color of the frame-shaped spacer foil (140) is unknown, the color of the material it is made from meets the claim. Note that there are no other/different frame-shaped spacer foils claimed of different colors indicative of thickness, material or size. As to claim 7, although Jau does not teach a specific thickness for the frame-shaped spacer foil, Jau does depict that item 111 is an “open chamber” created by the frame-shaped spacer foil (140) which permits flow from oxygen supplying module (500) through the apparatus. One of ordinary skill in the art would have recognized the thickness of the “open chamber” would be a result effective variable in order to permit oxygen supply and flow and produce an “open” chamber, and one would have arrived at the claimed at least 100 micrometers through routine optimization. Additionally, it is unclear how a chamber could be considered an “open chamber” if it were less than 100 microns.
As to claims 8 and 9, increasing/duplicating the number of through holes in the Jau rectangular frame to provide more through holes would cause some through holes to be positioned at respective corners of the frame assembly. Jau provides a perpipherally running channel (between 140 and 112) that connects the plurality of holes to one another.
Claims 3 and 4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Jau (US 20200247051) in view of Demers (US 20150257974). Jau teaches the subject matter of claim 2 above under 35 U.S.C. 103.
As to claims 3 and 4, Jau is silent to an RFID tag reader/writer and an RFID tag on the resin vat unit in claim 3 and an optical reader unit with optically readable labels on the resin vat unit in claim 4. The “information relating to the removable frame-like spacer foil” in claims 3 and 4 is not interpreted to be a structural limitation since a tag or label is always an identifier of the article it is attached to.
Demers teaches that it is known to provide a controller (31) which inherently reads a barcode (optical readable label) or RFID tag provided on a reservoir for identification of the reservoir. An RFID “writer” is interpreted to be present if the RFID contains identifying information identifiable by the controller. In the combination with Jau, one would have recognized that the Demers RFID tag/reader and barcode tag/reader could be used to similarly identify Jau reservoirs.
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to incorporate the Demers reader/controller and RFID or barcode on the Jau reservoirs because this is the use of a known technique to improve a similar device in the same way. Jau provides a base device upon which the claimed invention can be seen as an improvement by its use of RFID tags or barcodes for identifying reservoirs. Demers provides a comparable device (reservoir) improved in the same way as the claimed invention using RFID tags or barcodes. One of ordinary skill in the art could have applied the Demers improvement to Jau to predictably identify the Jau reservoirs in the same manner.
Claim 6 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Jau (US 20200247051) in view of Scordato (US 20140267695). Jau teaches the subject matter of claim 5 above under 35 U.S.C. 103.
As to claim 6, Jau is silent to a color-coded frame-shaped spacer foil indicating its thickness, material, or size.
Scordato teaches a fluid receptacle with a color-coded spacer corresponding to its thickness so that the spacer distance is readily apparent to a user ([0040]).
It would have been prima facie obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to incorporate the Scordato color-coded spacers into the Jau device as an obvious improvement that would make the spacing between the Jau UV-transmissive plate (110) and the UV-transmissive anti-adhesive flexible foil (130) “readily apparent to a user.” (Scordato, [0040]). Scordato contained a comparable device (two optically transparent plates” that is not an additive manufacturing device but has been improve in the same way as the claimed invention by color coding a spacer thickness. One of ordinary skill in the art could have applied the known improvement (color coding by thickness/spacing) in the same way to Jau to provide the predictable result that the spacing of these components during focusing of the projector would be readily apparent to the user.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed January 21, 2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive. The arguments appear to be directed to the amended claim feature that the air hole is disposed at least one corner of the frame assembly. Applicant argues that Jau is silent to where on the lateral surface of the through holes are located.
First, Applicant does not appear to describe any different operational effect provided by holes provided on the lateral surfaces versus at the corners. Without any argument that the prior art device operates differently from the claimed invention with holes at the corners, it seems the location of the holes represents an obvious matter of design choice. Second, when the number of holes on the lateral surfaces is large (which is an obvious matter of duplication or selection of the number of holes), the outermost holes would be pushed to or into the corners. The Examiner maintains the position that the claimed invention is obvious over the high degree of similarity between Jau and the claimed invention.
Other arguments were on the grounds that the additional references do not provide the feature alleged to be missing from Jau. However, because Jau renders obvious the amended features and the arguments against the additional references were not substantive, those additional rejections are maintained.
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.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MATTHEW J DANIELS whose telephone number is (313)446-4826. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday, 8:30-5:00 pm.
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, Christina Johnson can be reached at 571-272-1176. 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.
/MATTHEW J DANIELS/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1742