DETAILED ACTION
This is a non-final office action on the merits. Claims 1-20 are pending and addressed below.
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 1/6/2025 is being considered by the examiner.
The information disclosure statement (IDS) submitted on 6/4/2026 is being considered by the examiner.
Non-English documents have been considered in as much as the drawings and translated portions provided therein (See MPEP 609).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 10-20 rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor (or for applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
Claims 10-13 recites the limitation "etching solution". It is not certain if this is referring to the “etching solution information” introduced in claim 9. In addition, there is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claim 14 recites the limitation "the computing unit" in line 8. It is not clear what computing unit this is referring to. In addition, there is insufficient antecedent basis for this limitation in the claim.
Claims 15-20 depend on this claim and suffer from the same issues.
All dependent claims of these claims are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, by virtue of their dependency.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 1-9 allowed.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
Closest prior art is Yamazaki et al. (US 20050233477) discussed substrate processing, processing time, determine reliably. Wang et al. (US 12276972) discussed wafer processing and scheduling. No prior arts teach all claim limitations of the claims.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to BAO LONG T NGUYEN whose telephone number is (571)270-7768. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8:30-4:30.
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BAO LONG T. NGUYEN
Examiner
Art Unit 3656
/BAO LONG T NGUYEN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3656
