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 .
Acknowledgement of Foreign Priority
Acknowledgment is made of the applicant's claim for foreign priority based on Korean Design Application No. 30-2025-0035297 filed on September 2, 2025. Receipt is acknowledged of the certified copies of papers required by 37 CFR 1.55.
Claim Rejection - 35 USC § 112
The claim is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112, (a) and (b), as the claimed invention is not described in such full, clear, concise and exact terms as to enable any person skilled in the art to make and use the same, and fails to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which applicant regards as the invention.
The claim is indefinite and not enabling because the precise appearance of the claim cannot be determined for the following reasons:
1. The drawings depict a plurality of circular features on the article; however, the structural configuration of the circular features cannot be determined from the disclosure. The drawings fail to adequately show whether the circular features are recessed into the surface, protrude from the surface, extend completely through the surface as openings, or merely represent surface ornamentation or etching. As a result, the disclosure does not clearly convey the three-dimensional appearance of the claimed design or establish the surface relationship between the circular features and the surrounding portions of the article. Accordingly, the claim is neither definite nor enabled because the appearance and scope of the circular features cannot be determined from the disclosure.
Refer to the annotated detail of reproduction 1.1 on the following page.
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2. The structural configuration of the solid line features pointed to below, in the detail of reproduction 1.5 (also appearing in 1.6), is neither definite nor enabled by the disclosure. The disclosure does not clearly convey the three-dimensional appearance of the claimed design or establish the surface relationship between the solid line features and the surrounding portions of the article, therefore one skilled in the art is left to conjecture.
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In order to overcome the above issue, the applicant may consider changing the indefinite and non-enabled circular features to broken line (throughout the drawing disclosure).
All amendments to the drawings should be made consistently from view to view. If portions of the article are changed to broken line, these changes should be made throughout the drawing set. Solid line parts should not be “erased” if they are no longer claimed because removal rather than changing to broken line would likely introduce new matter.
Any amendment to the drawings and/or specification, must have antecedent basis in the original filing to support any changes made to the disclosure. It must be apparent that applicant was in possession of the amended design at the time of original filing.
When preparing new or replacement drawings, avoid introducing new matter prohibited by 35 U.S.C. 132 and 37 CFR 1.121(f).
If corrected drawings are submitted in response to this Office action, they must be in compliance with 37 CFR 1.121(d). Each drawing sheet submitted after the filing dale of an application must be labeled in the top margin as either "Replacement Sheet" or "New Sheet" pursuant to 37 CFR 1.121(d).
Any amended replacement drawing sheet should include all of the figures appearing on the immediate prior version of the sheet, even if only one figure is being amended. The figure or figure number of an amended drawing should not be labeled as amended.
If a drawing figure is to be canceled, the appropriate figure must be removed from the replacement sheet, and where necessary, the remaining figures must be renumbered and appropriate changes made to the brief description of the several views of the drawings for consistency. Additional replacement sheets may be necessary to show the renumbering of the remaining figures.
If all the figures on a drawing sheet are canceled, a replacement sheet is not required. A marked-up copy of the drawing sheet (labeled as "Annotated Sheet") including an annotation showing that all the figures on that drawing sheet have been canceled must be presented in the amendment or remarks section that includes an explanation of the change to the drawings.
Conclusion
The claim is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112 (a) and (b). A response is required in reply to the Office action to avoid abandonment of the application.
Applicant is reminded that any reply to this communication must be signed either by a patent practitioner (i.e., a patent attorney or agent registered to practice before the United States Patent and Trademark Office) or by the applicant. If the applicant is a juristic entity, the reply must be signed by a patent practitioner. See 37 CFR 1.33(b).
All discussions between the applicant and the examiner regarding the merits of a pending application will be considered an interview and are to be made of record. See MPEP § 713. The examiner will not discuss the merits of the application with applicant's representative if the representative is not registered to practice before the USPTO. Appointment as applicant’s representative before the International Bureau pursuant to Rule 3 of the Common Regulations under the Hague Agreement does NOT entitle such representative to represent the applicant before the USPTO. Furthermore, an applicant that is a juristic entity must be represented by a patent attorney or agent registered to practice before the USPTO. Additional information regarding interviews is set forth below.
Telephonic or in person interviews
A telephonic or in person interview may only be conducted with an attorney or agent registered to practice before the USPTO ("registered practitioner") or with a pro se applicant (an applicant who is the inventor and who is not represented by a registered practitioner).
The registered practitioner may either be of record or not of record. To become "of record," a power of attorney (POA) in accordance with 37 CFR 1.32 must be filed in the application. Form PTO/AIA /80 "Power of Attorney to Prosecute Applications Before the USPTO," available at www.uspto.gov/ patent/forms/forms-patent-applications-filed-or-after-september-16-2012, may be used for this purpose. See MPEP § 402.02(a) for further information. Interviews may also be conducted with a registered practitioner not of record provided the registered practitioner can show authorization to conduct an interview by completing, signing and filing an "Applicant Initiated Interview Request Form" (PTOL-413A) (available at the USPTO web page indicated above). See MPEP § 405. For acceptable ways to submit forms to the USPTO, see "When Responding to Official USPTO Correspondence" below.
Contact Information
Direct any inquiry concerning any communication from the examiner to Andrea M. McKay whose telephone number is 571-272-8376. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. ET.
Patent Center
Visit https://www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/patent-center for more information about Patent Center and https://www.uspto.gov/patents/docx for information about filing in DOCX format. For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free).
Information regarding the status of published or unpublished applications may be obtained from Patent Center. Unpublished application information in Patent Center is available to registered users. To file and manage patent submissions in Patent Center, visit: https://patentcenter.uspto.gov.
For additional questions, contact the Electronic Business Center (EBC) at 866-217-9197 (toll-free). For assistance from a USPTO Customer Service Representative, call 800-786-9199 (IN USA OR CANADA) or 571-272-1000.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, contact the examiner’s supervisor, Eric Goodman whose telephone number is 571-272-4734. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
/ANDREA MARIE MCKAY/Examiner, Art Unit 2974
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