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 .
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.
Specification
The title of the invention is not descriptive. A new title is required that is clearly indicative of the invention to which the claims are directed.
The lengthy specification has not been checked to the extent necessary to determine the presence of all possible minor errors. Applicant’s cooperation is requested in correcting any errors of which applicant may become aware in the specification.
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.
Claims 1-5 and 7 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Goto (JP 2017-197597) as evidenced by Septon® data sheet and Noryl® SA9000 data sheet.
Goto is directed to an adhesive composition used in copper clad laminates (paragraph 0001). The laminate comprises a copper foil and prepreg laminated together by an adhesive layer formed of a composition comprising an unmodified styrene elastomer (paragraph 0009).
In the embodiment of Example 1, an adhesive composition comprising the unmodified styrene elastomer Septon® 4055 is applied to a copper foil having a roughness of 1.2 mm (paragraph 0031 and Table 1). A copper clad laminate is then formed by laminating copper foils with the adhesive coating on either side of a stack of five prepregs laminated together (paragraph 0031). The prepregs comprising fiberglass cloth impregnated with 5.0 kg of the polyphenylene ether resin Noryl® SA9000, 2.5 g of triallyl isocyanurate crosslinking agent, and 5.0 g of peroxide (paragraph 0031 and Table 1). Septon® 4055 has a styrene content of 30 mass% (see Septon® data sheet).
Regarding claim 2, one of the prepregs reads on the intermediate layer while another reads on the adhesive layer of this claim.
Regarding the limitation in claim 3 that the adhesive layer is "for bonding the laminate to a polyimide resin," this represents an intended use of the adhesive layer and it has been held that a recitation with respect to the manner in which a claimed product is intended to be employed does not differentiate the claimed product from a prior art product satisfying the claimed structural limitations. See MPEP 2114.
Regarding claim 4, the triallyl isocyanurate crosslinking agent reads on a resin having a glass transition temperature of 50 oC or lower and the peroxide reads on a thermal radical initiator.
Regarding claim 5 and 7, Noryl® SA9000 reads on a polyphenylene-based oligomer having reactive terminal groups and the peroxide reads on a thermal radical initiator (see page 1 of the Noryl® SA9000 data sheet).
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 1-3 and 5 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as obvious over Inoue (KR 2021-0070310).
Inoue is directed to a copper clad laminate comprising an insulating layer and a copper foil on both surface of the insulating layer (paragraph 0021 and Figure 1). The insulating layer is a cured product of a composition comprising a modified polyphenylene ester with terminal groups having carbon-carbon unsaturated double bond (paragraph 0022). The weight average molecular weight of the modified polyphenylene ether is preferably 1,000 to 3,000 and has 1 to 50 repeating units (paragraph 0051). The composition may further contain an initiator (paragraph 0103). The copper foil may be subjected to a silane coupling agent treatment (paragraph 0118). The silane coupling agent may have a carbon-carbon double bond (paragraph 0129), such as a styryl group (paragraph 0131). The copper foil preferably has a roughness of 0.2 to 1.5 mm (paragraph 0134), with copper foil having a roughness of 1.1 mm used in the embodiments of the Examples (Table 1).
The copper foil on one side of the insulating layer reads on the copper foil of the claims; the silane coupling agent applied to the surface of the copper foil reads on the primer layer of the claims; the insulating layer reads on the intermediate layer of claims 2 and 5; the silane coupling agent layer on the surface of the copper foil on the other side of the insulating layer reads on the adhesive layer of claims 2 and 3.
While Inoue does not illustrate an embodiment wherein the copper foil is treated with a styryl group containing silane, it would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art based on the explicit teaching in Inoue that the silane may be a styryl group containing silane.
Regarding the limitation in claim 3 that the adhesive layer is "for bonding the laminate to a polyimide resin," this represents an intended use of the adhesive layer and it has been held that a recitation with respect to the manner in which a claimed product is intended to be employed does not differentiate the claimed product from a prior art product satisfying the claimed structural limitations. See MPEP 2114.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 8 is 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.
The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter.
The invention of claim 8 is directed to a laminate obtained by laminating two laminates according to claim 3 on both surfaces of a polyimide layer via the adhesive layers of the laminates according to claim 3.
Goto and Inoue represent the closest prior art. However, neither reference teaches or fairly suggests the configuration recited in claim 8 wherein both surfaces of a polyimide layer are adhesively laminated with primed copper foils as recited in claim 1 by way of adhesive layers with intermediate layers between the primer and adhesive layers.
Conclusion
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to RAMSEY E ZACHARIA whose telephone number is (571)272-1518. The best time to reach the examiner is weekday mornings, Eastern time.
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/RAMSEY ZACHARIA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 1787
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