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 .
Information Disclosure Statement
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on December 2, 2025 is in compliance with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.97. Accordingly, the information disclosure statement is being considered by the examiner.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
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 text of those sections of Title 35, U.S. Code not included in this action can be found in a prior Office action.
Claims 1-6, 8 and 10-14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Soini (US Pub. No. 2021/0039451).
Regarding claims 1-2, Soini teaches a housing body 400 with a functional component 300 (paragraph [0083]; figure 4a), the housing body comprising a functional component configured to acquire tire information such as tire pressure, treadwear, moisture level, or forces (paragraph [0086]), and a housing body housing the functional component, the housing body comprising a bottom portion fixed to a tire inner surface, a side wall portion 402 protruding from the bottom portion, a housing portion formed by the bottom portion and the side wall portion, and an opening portion 410 communicating with the housing portion, and at least part of an inner wall surface of the side wall portion having an uneven region with a surface roughness of at least 5 micrometers (taken to be the claimed protruding and/or recessed portions) (paragraph [0109]; figure 4a). Such an uneven region protruding and/or recessed portions would not be fitted to the functional component.
Regarding claims 3 and 11, Soini teaches using sandblasting to bring about the surface roughness (paragraph [0109]). Using too little sandblasting would result in inadequate surface roughness to provide increased grip between the module and the wall (see paragraph [0109]), and too much sandblasting would potentially compromise the structural integrity of the housing, thus rendering the sandblasting amount a result effective variable. It is expected that optimizing sandblasting amount will result in an overlapping range of A/As, because such is an extremely broad range, and because sandblasting will increase the value of A/As.
Regarding claims 4, 6, 12 and 14, Soini does not limit the range of the roughened region (see paragraph [0109]), thus teaching or suggesting that the uneven region can extend from the top of the housing portion to the bottom of the height of the housing portion.
Regarding claims 5 and 13, Soini does not limit the range of the roughened region and teaches that such a region is optional (see paragraph [0109]), thus suggesting that the uneven region can extend an amount ½ or less of the total height of the wall, overlapping the claimed range. It is noted that Applicant has no embodiments where A1/A0 > 1.0, thus there is no evidence for benefit of only having the bottom of the wall with the uneven region.
Regarding claim 8, regarding the limitation with respect to the inclination angle difference, the claims are directed to an article including a housing body and a functional component, this article has a side wall portion; however, the angle of the side wall portion in a state where the functional component is not provided does not further limit the structure of the claimed article, and the relationship between the angle of the article and an additional, hypothetical angle does not further define the structure of the claimed article.
Regarding claim 10, Soini teaches fixing the housing component with a functional component to the tire inner surface, the functional component being housed in the housing portion (paragraphs [0077]-[0083]; figures 3a-3b).
Claims 7, 9 and 15-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Soini as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Hayashi (JP2019-064543; machine translation relied upon).
Regarding claim 7 and 15, Soini does not specifically disclose the 100% modulus of the rubber of the protruding portions. Hayashi teaches a 50% modulus value of a housing body of 0.8 to 1.4 MPa (machine translation at page 3, fourth and fifth full paragraphs), and as 100% modulus will be somewhat greater than 50% modulus, it is expected that the 100% of Hayashi will fall fully within or overlapping with the claimed range of 100% modulus of 1.0 to less than 12 MPa. It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use a 50%/100% modulus value as taught or suggested by Hayashi in the housing body (including the protruding portions) of Koch in order to prevent the functional component from falling off (see Hayashi machine translation at page 3, fifth full paragraph).
Regarding claim 16, regarding the limitation with respect to the inclination angle difference, the claims are directed to an article including a housing body and a functional component, this article has a side wall portion; however, the angle of the side wall portion in a state where the functional component is not provided does not further limit the structure of the claimed article, and the relationship between the angle of the article and an additional, hypothetical angle does not further define the structure of the claimed article.
Regarding claims 9 and 17, Soini does not specifically disclose that the opening portion has a width smaller than the minimum width of the housing portion, or a relationship between D2u/D1u. Hayashi teaches a housing body where the opening portion has a width smaller than a minimum width of the housing space (machine translation at pages 2-3; figure 3). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to use an opening portion width smaller than the minimum width of the housing portion in order to further prevent the functional component from falling out of the housing portion (see Hayashi machine translation at page 3, last full paragraph). Hayashi further teaches or suggests that the height of the side surface 210 of the functional component 200 is slightly larger than the height of the wall portion 110 of the housing body in order to provide constant pressure on the functional component (machine translation at page 3, seventh full paragraph). It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art to similarly use a slightly larger height and circumferential length of the functional component than that of the housing body in order to provide constant pressure on the functional component. As too high of a ratio between heights or circumferential lengths would not apply constant pressure and too low of a ratio would result in either too much pressure or being unable to fit the component in the housing body, these ratios are a result effective variable, and thus it would have been obvious to optimize the D2u/D1u ratio to arrive at Applicant’s claimed 0.60 ≤ D2u/D1u ≤ 0.95.
Regarding claim 18, Soini teaches fixing the housing component with a functional component to the tire inner surface, the functional component being housed in the housing portion (paragraphs [0077]-[0083]; figures 3a-3b).
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s amendments and arguments with respect to the prior art rejections of the claims have been fully considered and are persuasive. Therefore, the rejections have been withdrawn. However, upon further consideration, a new ground(s) of rejection is made in view of Soini as are set forth above.
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.
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/P.N.S/ Examiner, Art Unit 1749 February 2, 2026
/JUSTIN R FISCHER/ Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1749