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 .
Response to Amendment
The amendment filed May 18th, 2026 has been entered. Claims 1-6, and 8-9 are pending in the application. The applicant’s amendments to the claims have overcome all claim rejections under 35 USC 101 previously set forth in the Non-Final Office Action of March 5th, 2026.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed May 18th, 2026 have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Applicant states (Remarks p. 8):
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The examiner disagrees because the test for obviousness is not whether the features of a secondary reference may be bodily incorporated into the structure of the primary reference; nor is it that the claimed invention must be expressly suggested in any one or all of the references. Rather, the test is what the combined teachings of the references would have suggested to those of ordinary skill in the art. See In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 208 USPQ 871 (CCPA 1981).
Further, in response to applicant's arguments against the references individually, one cannot show nonobviousness by attacking references individually where the rejections are based on combinations of references. See In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 208 USPQ 871 (CCPA 1981); In re Merck & Co., 800 F.2d 1091, 231 USPQ 375 (Fed. Cir. 1986).
Applicant states (Remarks p. 8):
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The examiner disagrees because transparency is one way to achieve non-representation. Dyke is relied upon for teaching non-representation, not deletion. Non-representation can be achieved in many ways including transparency (such as 100% transparency). Kim teaches one known way that non-representation may be achieved. A person of ordinary skill in the art would have been motivated to use Kim’s transparency in Dyke’s non-representation to improve visibility and reduce occlusion.
Applicant states (Remarks p. 9):
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In response to applicant's argument that the references fail to show certain features of the invention, it is noted that the features upon which applicant relies (i.e., "detecting, using, or responding to a transition from a moving state to a stopped state as the triggering condition for the claimed control”) are not recited in the rejected claim(s). Although the claims are interpreted in light of the specification, limitations from the specification are not read into the claims. See In re Van Geuns, 988 F.2d 1181, 26 USPQ2d 1057 (Fed. Cir. 1993).
To elaborate, the claim does not recite steps of “detecting, using, or responding to a transition”. The claim instead recites “when the user object transitions….” Under the broadest reasonable interpretation, the scope of term “when” in the claim language cannot be narrowly constrained / restricted to the meaning of "detecting, using, or responding to a transition from a moving state to a stopped state as the triggering condition for the claimed control.”
Applicant states (Remarks p. 9):
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In response to applicant's arguments against the references individually, one cannot show nonobviousness by attacking references individually where the rejections are based on combinations of references. See In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 208 USPQ 871 (CCPA 1981); In re Merck & Co., 800 F.2d 1091, 231 USPQ 375 (Fed. Cir. 1986). See MPEP 2145, subsection IV.
Further, the test for obviousness is not whether the features of a secondary reference may be bodily incorporated into the structure of the primary reference; nor is it that the claimed invention must be expressly suggested in any one or all of the references. Rather, the test is what the combined teachings of the references would have suggested to those of ordinary skill in the art. See In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413, 208 USPQ 871 (CCPA 1981).
Furthermore, the Pruehs reference teaches wherein when the user object transitions from a moving state to a stopped state, the user object is controlled so that the virtual camera follows the user object and stops moving relative to the user object. In Pruehs teaching, both the camera and the character / user object are controlled in relation to each other and occurring when the character/ user object transitions from a moving state to a stopped state. Eguchi is relied upon to modify Prueh’s control to include an orientation of the user object and a viewing direction of the virtual camera are aligned. Thus, the limitation in question is taught by the combination of references.
Applicant states:
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The examiner disagrees because under the broadest reasonable interpretation, the use of term “when” in the context of the claim does not narrowly specify that the recited control must occur at an exact point of active transition. “When the user object transitions from a moving state to a stopped state” can be reasonably interpretated to mean upon the completion of the transition.
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, 5-6, and 8-9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Dyke et al. (JP 2005111007 A; hereinafter Dyke) in view of Kim et al. (KR 20000050246 A; hereinafter Kim) in further view of Nick Pruehs, "Six ingredients for a dynamic third person camera," 27 April 2018, pages 1-17; hereinafter Pruehs in further view of Eguchi et al. (JP 2019083964 A; hereinafter Eguchi).
Regarding claim 1, Dyke teaches a non-transitory storage medium having stored thereon a program which, when executed by a computer including a processor and a memory, causes the processor to perform operations ("The game apparatus 3 selectively uses an optical disk 4 that is an example of an information storage medium by attaching and detaching it," (page 5, para 1).
"In FIG. 2, the game apparatus 3 includes, for example, a risk (RISC) CPU (Central Processing Unit) 31 and executes various programs. The CPU 31 executes a startup program stored in a boot ROM (not shown), and initializes a memory such as the work memory 32. Thereafter, the CPU 31 executes a game program stored on the optical disc 4 and performs a game process corresponding to the game program. A work memory 32, a video RAM (VRAM) 33, an external memory interface (I / F) 34, a controller I / F 35, a GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) 36, and an optical disk drive 37 are connected to the CPU 31 via a predetermined bus," (page 5, para 4). The disclosed optical disc reads on the storage medium.) comprising:
generating a virtual space ("The game space construction program GAP defines a process for constructing a game space by arranging each object in accordance with an operation signal input from the controller 6 and a game situation progressed by each program (S3, S4)," (page 6, para 3). Constructing a game space reads on generating a virtual space.);
placing a virtual camera and a user object in the virtual space ("...Next, the CPU 31 moves the coordinates of the center position and viewpoint (virtual camera) of the player object in the world coordinate system in accordance with the currently set movement amount in one frame unit and its direction (step S33), and performs the processing. Proceed to the next step. Here, the viewpoint for generating the game image is set so that the player character is always included in the field of view. For example, the positional relationship between the viewpoints is fixedly arranged behind the player character so that the player character is arranged near the center of the game screen.
Next, the CPU 31 arranges all the objects including the player object in the world coordinate system representing the game space (step S34), and advances the processing to the next step. In step S34, the respective local coordinates are converted into world coordinates based on the center position coordinates of the respective objects calculated with respect to the world coordinate system, whereby the respective objects are arranged in the world coordinate system," (page 8, para 1-4; Figures 8-13). The disclosed viewpoint reads on virtual camera. The player object reads on user object. The world coordinate system represents the game space and thus reads on virtual space.);
generating, based on the virtual camera, a virtual space image obtained by capturing an inside of the virtual space from the virtual camera ("Next, the CPU 31 converts the game space shown in the world coordinate system in which all objects are arranged into the camera coordinates (view coordinates) of the viewpoint center and performs perspective projection conversion (step S35), and according to the subroutine. The process ends. For example, as shown in FIG. 8, the game image GI generated through the processes of steps S <b> 31 to S <b> 35 includes a player character P, an enemy character E, and a building object B. Since the virtual camera is arranged behind the player object and the player object is located near the center of the game screen, the back surface of the player character P is represented in the game image GI. Since the player character P is moving in the game space at a speed exceeding the predetermined value, the game image GI is expressed as moving at a speed exceeding the predetermined value in the X direction shown in the figure. As shown in FIG. 8, since the positional relationship between the player character P, the enemy character E, and the building object B is clear on the game image GI, the player can easily perform an operation of moving the player character P," (page 8, para 5; Figures 8 - 13). The game image reads on a virtual space image. Converting the game space into the camera coordinates of the viewpoint center and performing perspective projection conversion reads on generating based on the virtual camera. The game space (reads on virtual space) is captured in the game image since there is a clear correlation between the game space and the generated game image.); and
moving, based on a movement operation for moving the user object being performed, the user object in the virtual space, wherein, in the generating the virtual space image, when the movement operation is not performed the user object is set as not represented and when the movement operation is performed the user object is set as opaque; ("However, since the player object has been deleted in step S44, the player character P is not represented. At this time, the player character P exists in the game space in a state of moving or stopped at a low speed not exceeding the predetermined value. Note that a tool such as a muzzle for shooting may be displayed on the game image GI as part of the player character P," (page 9, para 3; Fig. 9). When the player character is in a stopped state, there is no movement operation being performed. When the player object (reads on user object) is deleted it is effectively transparent since it is not visually represented, as is clear in Fig. 9.
"For example, as shown in FIG. 8... Since the player character P is moving in the game space at a speed exceeding the predetermined value, the game image GI is expressed as moving at a speed exceeding the predetermined value in the X direction shown in the figure. As shown in FIG. 8, since the positional relationship between the player character P, the enemy character E, and the building object B is clear on the game image GI, the player can easily perform an operation of moving the player character P," (page 8, para 5; Fig. 8). The player character corresponds to the player object (reads on user object). In Figure 8, it is clear that the player character is opaque. It is disclosed that Figure 8 represents a scenario where the player character is moving. The player can perform an operation of moving the player character, which reads on a movement operation for moving the user object.).
Dyke fails to explicitly teach achieving non-representation by setting an object as transparent.
Kim teaches achieving non-representation by setting an object as transparent (“Then, the color value is given only to the consumable character to be displayed on the current screen, and the remaining consumable character is made transparent by removing the color value. Therefore, only consumable characters with color values appear in the eyes of the user. If you want to change this, adjust the transparency to determine whether the color value exists. If the user turns on / off the button corresponding to the consumable character to be displayed, the transparency of this consumable character is set to 0%. It is displayed on the screen, and the consumable character that was displayed before is changed to 100% transparency so that it does not appear on the screen,” (page 4, para 6-8)).
Before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art to apply the teachings of Kim to Dyke. The motivation would have been to improve visibility and reduce occlusion.
Dyke in view of Kim are not relied upon teaching but Pruehs teaches and wherein when the user object transitions from a moving state to a stopped state, the user object is controlled so that the virtual camera follows the user object and stops moving relative to the user objectPruehs; “We could just use camera modifiers for changing the distance between the character and the camera. However, in that case, we would lose the advantage of the engine built-in USpringArmComponent, which ensures a specific distance from camera to player character unless the line of sight between both is occluded by an obstacle. In that case, the spring arm will automatically pull the camera closer to the character in order to keep line of sight. The default camera distance can be changed through the Socket Offset of the USpringArmComponent," (pages 4-5).
"The spring arm component in turn also provides an option for enabling camera lag. You can enable this feature by enabling Camera Lag and Camera Rotation Lag and specifying the respective speeds in order to create what is sometimes called a rubber band camera: Each time the character starts moving in any direction after having stood still for a short while, the camera won’t follow immediately but wait a short moment to provide a less abrupt game experience. Consequently, it will also take a moment to stop moving after the player character has stopped moving," (Pruehs; page 17). Pruehs teaches following the character with the camera. The camera takes a moment to stop moving after the player character has stopped moving reads on the user object transitions from the moving state to the stopped state. The camera waits a moment before stopping after the player character has stopped moving, which reduces the distance between the player character and the camera. Motion is relative, and thus reducing the distance also moves the user object closer to the virtual camera. In order to reduce this distance both the camera and the character must be controlled.).
Before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art to apply the teachings of Pruehs to Dyke in view of Kim. The motivation would have been to improve a user’s spatial awareness and navigation.
Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs does not explicitly disclose an orientation of the user object and a viewing direction of the virtual camera are aligned when the virtual camera stops moving relative to the user object.
Eguchi teaches an orientation of the user object and a viewing direction of the virtual camera are aligned when the virtual camera stops moving relative to the user object (Eguchi; "Further, in the above embodiment, before setting of the reference point R (before touch operation), when the direction of the player character P1 does not match the shooting direction of the virtual camera, the game screen display means 31 captures the virtual camera An example of moving the virtual camera so as to align the direction with the direction of the player character P1 is illustrated. Instead of this, the operation target control means 34 starts the movement (forward movement) of the player character P1 after rotating the player character P1 so that the direction of the player character P1 is aligned with the shooting direction of the virtual camera," (page 10, para 2). The disclosed direction of the player character reads on an orientation of the user object. The shooting direction of the virtual camera reads on the viewing direction of the virtual camera.).
Before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art to apply the teachings of Eguchi to Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs. The motivation would have been to improve user orientation and control.
Regarding claims 8 and 9, they are rejected using the same citations and rationales described in the rejection of claim 1.
Regarding claim 5, Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi teaches the non-transitory storage medium according to Claim 1, wherein a distance between the virtual camera and the user object is kept constant before and after of a start of the movement operation and before and after an end of the movement operation (Dyke; "Next, the CPU 31 moves the coordinates of the center position and viewpoint (virtual camera) of the player object in the world coordinate system in accordance with the currently set movement amount in one frame unit and its direction (step S33), and performs the processing. Proceed to the next step. Here, the viewpoint for generating the game image is set so that the player character is always included in the field of view. For example, the positional relationship between the viewpoints is fixedly arranged behind the player character so that the player character is arranged near the center of the game screen," (page 8, para 3). The fixed positional relationship reads on a distance between the virtual camera and the user object is kept constant.
"Further, as apparent from a comparison between FIG. 8 and FIG. 9, each game image GI has the same base point from which the player character fires a shooting bullet. This is because the difference between the two is only whether or not the player character P is displayed, and the position coordinates of the player object and the viewpoint set in each game space are common. Therefore, even when the player switches from the game image GI shown in FIG. 8 to the game image GI shown in FIG. 9 (that is, the movement of the player character P is decelerated below the prescribed value in the state shown in FIG. 8), It can be performed. Further, the switching of the game image GI described above does not change the viewpoint with respect to objects other than the player character P. Therefore, it is possible to give the player a feeling as if the player character P suddenly disappeared." (Dyke; page 9, para 5; Fig. 8; Fig. 9). The camera distance remains constant even when switching display modes. The switching between display modes is based on the movement state.
At least one embodiment of this reference teaches that the distance between the player character and the viewpoint is fixed, and remains constant across display modes. In that embodiment, the distance between the player character and the viewpoint remains constant before and after of a start of the movement operation and before and after an end of the movement operation.).
Regarding claim 6, Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi teaches the non-transitory storage medium according to Claim 1, wherein when the user object transitions from the stopped state to the moving state, the user object is controlled so that the user object is moved away from the virtual camera, and when the user object transitions from the moving state to the stopped state, the user object is controlled so that the user object is moved closer to the virtual camera (Pruehs; “We could just use camera modifiers for changing the distance between the character and the camera. However, in that case, we would lose the advantage of the engine built-in USpringArmComponent, which ensures a specific distance from camera to player character unless the line of sight between both is occluded by an obstacle. In that case, the spring arm will automatically pull the camera closer to the character in order to keep line of sight. The default camera distance can be changed through the Socket Offset of the USpringArmComponent," (pages 4-5).
"The spring arm component in turn also provides an option for enabling camera lag. You can enable this feature by enabling Camera Lag and Camera Rotation Lag and specifying the respective speeds in order to create what is sometimes called a rubber band camera: Each time the character starts moving in any direction after having stood still for a short while, the camera won’t follow immediately but wait a short moment to provide a less abrupt game experience. Consequently, it will also take a moment to stop moving after the player character has stopped moving," (Pruehs; page 17). Pruehs teaches following the character with the camera. The character starts moving in any direction after having stood still for a short while reads on the user object transitions from a stopped state to a moving state. The camera waits a short moment before following the character, which creates more distance between the camera and character. Motion is relative, and thus creating more distance also moves the character away from the from the camera. In order to create this distance both the camera and the character must be controlled.
The camera takes a moment to stop moving after the player character has stopped moving reads on the user object transitions from the moving state to the stopped state. The camera waits a moment before stopping after the player character has stopped moving, which reduces the distance between the player character and the camera. Motion is relative, and thus reducing the distance also moves the user object closer to the virtual camera. In order to reduce this distance both the camera and the character must be controlled.).
Before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art to apply the teachings of Pruehs to Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Eguchi. The motivation would have been to improve a user’s visual experience and reduce visual discomfort.
Claim 2 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi in further view of Ando et al. (WO 2005030355 A1; hereinafter Ando).
Regarding claim 2, Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi teaches the non-transitory storage medium according to Claim 1, wherein, in the generating the virtual space image, when changing the user object from opaque to transparent, a level of transparency of the user object is gradually raised (Dyke; “Further, when the player character image is represented by an object whose transmission amount gradually increases as the moving speed decreases, it is possible to give the player a feeling that the player character gradually disappears,” (page 4, para 2).
"Further, as the speed at which the player character P moves through the game space, an image showing the player character P may be displayed on the game image GI in a translucent state in which the transmission amount gradually increases. Also in this case, the game image GI is displayed with the player character P finally deleted as shown in FIG," (Dyke; page 10, para 2). The transmission amount gradually increasing reads on gradually raising the transparency.), and
when changing the user object from transparent to opaque, the level of transparency of the user object is Dyke; "For example, as shown in FIG. 11, the player character Pt is displayed on the game image GI with a semi-transparent object, so that the front of the player character Pt can be easily viewed and the game space can be moved at high speed. it can. At this time, according to the acceleration of the speed at which the player character P moves in the game space, the image indicating the player character P may be changed so as to be displayed darker (so that the transmission amount decreases)," (page 10, para 2). The transmission amount decreases reads on lowering the transparency.).
Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi does not explicitly teach that the level of transparency is changed gradually when making the character more opaque.
However, Ando teaches that the level of transparency is changed gradually when making the character more opaque (Ando; “In step 262, the transparency of the next runner character is set according to the change time information, and the process proceeds to step 264. In other words, immediately after the replacement time is received, the transparency of the next runner character is almost 100%, and as the current runner character approaches the reference point, the transparency gradually decreases, and the replacement time (when the current runner character reaches the reference point) In this case, the transparency is set to 0% (see Fig. 7).
In step 264, it is determined whether or not the reference point has been reached. If a negative determination is made, the process returns to step 258. If the determination in step 264 is affirmative, this routine is executed. However, at the start of the next processing of the routine, an affirmative determination is made at step 230.In this second embodiment, as the current runner character approaches the reference point, the transparency is gradually increased. The so-called morphing process in which the current runner character gradually transforms into the next runner character is increased, although the next runner character's transparency is gradually lowered (gradually darker),” (page 10, para 2-3)).
Before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art to apply the teachings of Ando to Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi. The motivation would have been to improve the smoothness of transitions and to improve the user experience.
Claims 3-4 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi in further view of Ronan Boulic et al., "Integration of motion control techniques for virtual human and avatar real-time animation", 01 September 1997, Association for Computing Machinery, Proceedings of the ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology, pages 111-118; hereinafter Boulic.
Regarding claim 3, Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi is not relied upon teaching but Boulic teaches the non-transitory storage medium according to Claim 1, wherein the program further causes the processor to perform operations comprising: causing the user object to perform a collateral action accompanying a movement or a stop of the user object during at least one of a first period after a start of the movement operation or a second period after an end of the movement operation, wherein the collateral action includes at least one of a preparation action while the user object transitions from the stopped state to the moving state or a lingering action while the user object transitions from the moving state to the stopped state (Boulic; "In the present paper we use the AGENT term to represent both a Virtual Human and an Avatar. We call ‘Avatar’ a Virtual Human whose posture is controlled by the EU with a motion capture device [MBT96]," (page 112, section 3 The Agent Entity, para 2). EU stands for End user. Agent reads on user object.
"The ease-in and ease-out technique, based on cubic step functions, is applied to smoothen the motion transition. These two transitions are managed while the action is in the active status. The ease-in transition is also called the initiating phase while the ease-out transition is also called the terminating phase (Fig. 5). An action is responsible for reporting when it is “completed”, i.e. when it reaches its final state and remains in the corresponding final posture. This information can be important for the AGENT to compute the transitions depending on the action transition constraints explained below," (Boulic; pages 112- 113, section 3.2 Action Activation, para 4-5; page 113, Figure 5 and Figure 6). From Figure 5, it is clear that the initiating phase occurs after the onset of the action activity, this reads on a first period after a start of the movement operation. From figure 6, it is clear that during the initiating phase includes “posture blending on the initial posture.” The transition that occurs during the initiating phase reads on a collateral action.
"Besides, in a sitting action it is important to begin from a prescribed standing posture for balance purpose; so the sitting- down action initiating type specifies a blending with an initial posture instead of the initial motion (Figure 6b, left side)," (Boulic; page 113, section 3.3 Action Transition Constraints, para 1-3). From figures 5 and 6 the initiating phase occurs before executing an action such as the disclosed sitting action performed by an agent, this reads on accompanying a movement of the user object. An action such as the sitting down action reads on a movement operation. Standing reads on a stopped state, and sitting down reads on a moving state, and blending with an initial posture reads on a preparation action.).
Before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art to apply the teachings of Boulic to Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi. The motivation would have been to improve the smoothness of transitions and to improve the user experience.
Regarding claim 4, Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi is not relied upon teaching but Boulic teaches the non-transitory storage medium according to Claim 3, wherein the collateral action includes a change in a posture of the user object (Boulic; "The ease-in and ease-out technique, based on cubic step functions, is applied to smoothen the motion transition. These two transitions are managed while the action is in the active status. The ease-in transition is also called the initiating phase while the ease-out transition is also called the terminating phase (Fig. 5). An action is responsible for reporting when it is “completed”, i.e. when it reaches its final state and remains in the corresponding final posture. This information can be important for the AGENT to compute the transitions depending on the action transition constraints explained below," (pages 112- 113, section 3.2 Action Activation, para 4-5; page 113, Figure 5 and Figure 6).
"Besides, in a sitting action it is important to begin from a prescribed standing posture for balance purpose; so the sitting- down action initiating type specifies a blending with an initial posture instead of the initial motion (Figure 6b, left side)," (Boulic; page 113, section 3.3 Action Transition Constraints, para 1-3). The transition that occurs during the initiating phase reads on a collateral action. The disclosed posture blending is included in the transition that occurs during the initiating reads on a change in posture of the user object.).
Before the effective filling date of the claimed invention, it would have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art to apply the teachings of Boulic to Dyke in view of Kim in further view of Pruehs in further view of Eguchi. The motivation would have been to improve the smoothness of transitions and to improve the user experience.
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 ERICA G THERKORN whose telephone number is (571)272-2939. The examiner can normally be reached Monday - Friday 9:00am - 5:00pm.
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, Devona Faulk can be reached at 571-272-7515. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/ERICA G THERKORN/Examiner, Art Unit 2618
/DEVONA E FAULK/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 2618
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