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 .
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
(a)(2) the claimed invention was described in a patent issued under section 151, or in an application for patent published or deemed published under section 122(b), in which the patent or application, as the case may be, names another inventor and was effectively filed before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1 and 6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Li et al. (US2023/0327643 A1).
In regards to claim 1, Li et al. teaches in annotated Fig. 5 below an acoustic device comprising:
A first acoustic resonator comprising: a first electrode (321);
A first piezoelectric layer (421); and
A second electrode (521), wherein the first piezoelectric layer is sandwiched between the first electrode and the second electrode;
A second acoustic resonator positioned on top of the first acoustic resonator with an air cavity (921) between the first acoustic resonator and the second acoustic resonator, the second acoustic resonator comprising:
A third electrode (Annotated Electrode A);
A second piezoelectric layer (Annotated Element B); and
A fourth electrode (Annotated Element C), wherein the second piezoelectric layer is sandwiched between the third electrode and the fourth electrode; and
Conductive vias (upper and lower portion of 821) coupling the second electrode (521) to the third electrode (Annotated Element A) proximate exterior edges of both the second electrode and the third electrode, the conductive vias further help delimit one side of the air cavity (921).
In regards to claim 6, based on paragraph [0019], the acoustic wave device is integrated into a filter.
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Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 2-5 and 7 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim, but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Claims 8-20 are allowed.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter:
The most relevant prior art reference is Li et al. as discussed above. However, Li et al. does not teach: in regards to claims 8 and 14, a conductive bridge coupling a first end of the first electrode to a second end of the first electrode. Therefore, the applicants’ claimed inventions have been determined to be novel and non-obvious. By virtue of dependency from either claims 8 or 14, claims 9-13 and 15-20 have also been determined to be novel and non-obvious.
Conclusion
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
Choy et al. (US2020/0099365 A1) teaches in Fig. 1A a stacked bulk acoustic wave device comprising a bottom and top bulk acoustic wave resonators which are separated by a cavity (124).
Sakurai et al. (US2017/0353173 A1) teaches in Fig. 7 a stacked acoustic wave device comprising a bottom and top acoustic wave resonators which are connected to each other by conductive vias (30).
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/JORGE L SALAZAR JR/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2843
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