Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca13-15-01305/USCOURTS-ca13-15-01305-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Hill-Rom Services, Inc.
Appellant

Document Text:

NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

United States Court of Appeals 

for the Federal Circuit ______________________ 

IN RE: HILL-ROM SERVICES, INC.,

Appellant

______________________ 

2015-1305

______________________ 

Appeal from the United States Patent and Trademark 

Office, Patent Trial and Appeal Board in No. 90/012,399.

______________________ 

Decided: December 2, 2015

______________________ 

 GARRET A. LEACH, Kirkland & Ellis LLP, Chicago, IL, 

argued for appellant. Also represented by PAUL DANIEL 

BOND, BRIAN VERBUS. 

 KAKOLI CAPRIHAN, Office of the Solicitor, United 

States Patent and Trademark Office, Alexandria, VA, 

argued for appellee Michelle K. Lee. Also represented by 

NATHAN K. KELLEY, STACY BETH MARGOLIES. 

______________________ 

Before O’MALLEY, PLAGER, and BRYSON, Circuit Judges.

BRYSON, Circuit Judge.

This is an appeal from a decision of the Patent Trial 

and Appeal Board in an ex parte reexamination proceeding. The Board held various claims of a patent owned by 

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appellant Hill-Rom Services, Inc., to be invalid for obviousness. We affirm.

I 

The patent in suit, Hill-Rom’s U.S. Patent No. 

5,771,511 (“the ’511 patent”) is entitled “Communication 

Network for a Hospital Bed.” The patent is directed to a 

hospital bed featuring a peer-to-peer communication 

network with a plurality of connection points and modules. Each module is electrically coupled to a selected 

connection point of the communication network, and each 

module is configured to communicate over the network 

with selected other modules. Each module performs a 

specific function relating to the operation of the bed. For 

example, different modules can move different portions of 

the bed deck in various directions, deflate or inflate the 

mattress, calculate the patient’s weight, and detect when 

the patient exits the bed. 

Following the reexamination proceeding, the examiner rejected various claims of the ’511 patent. The examiner rejected each of the claims as obvious in view of certain 

combinations of prior art references. Two of the examiner’s rejections are at issue on this appeal—the combination of PCT Application No. WO 94/27544 (“Travis”) and 

U.S. Patent No. 5,596,437 (“Heins”); and the combination 

of Heins and a 1993 manual published by the Hill-Rom 

Company, Inc. (“the Hill-Rom Manual”). The Patent Trial 

and Appeal Board affirmed both of those rejections. 

Claim 1 of the ’511 patent is representative. It recites 

the following:

1. A bed comprising:

a base frame;

a deck coupled to the base frame for supporting a 

body;

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a peer-to-peer communication network having a 

plurality of connection points;

a plurality of modules, each module being electrically coupled to a selected connection point of the 

peer-to-peer communication network, each module 

being configured to perform a dedicated function 

during operation of the bed, and each module being configured to communicate over the peer-topeer communication network with selected other 

modules, and each module including a processor 

circuit configured to transmit information to any 

other module and to receive information from any 

other module over the peer-to-peer communication 

network. 

The Travis reference is directed to an adjustable hospital bed having various modules connected to a serial 

communication network. Each module is electrically 

coupled to a connection point on the network. The various 

modules connect to computers that coordinate the various 

functions of the modules, such as measuring the weight of 

the patient and determining whether the patient has left 

the bed. Travis uses a “master-slave” configuration, in 

which a single “master controller” controls the operation 

of the various modules.

The Heins reference is directed to an X-ray device 

with a moveable patient table. Heins employs a peer-topeer communication network known as the Controller 

Area Network (“CAN”) protocol to control the modules, or 

“nodes,” on the X-ray device. One of the functions disclosed in Heins is moving the patient table, which is done 

by sending a command over the network from one node to 

another. The command allows the patient table to be 

moved in multiple directions. Another function of the 

system is to transmit information about the patient table 

position so that it can be displayed. The nodes in Heins 

are stated to be in mutual communication with other 

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nodes, so that each node can transmit data to the other 

nodes at any time, without having to wait for authorization to transmit. Heins states that systems using the 

CAN protocol are capable of high transmission speed and 

reliability, and that they allow individual components to 

be easily added, substituted, or removed. 

 The Hill-Rom Manual discloses an adjustable hospital 

bed having a frame and a deck coupled to the frame. The 

bed has several modules, each configured to perform a 

particular function, such as positioning various portions 

of the bed, inflating or deflating the mattress, and weighing the patient. The Hill-Rom Manual further discloses 

that the adjustable features are governed by circuit board 

logic and controlled by a control console. 

In rejecting the disputed claims of the ’511 patent as

obvious in view of Travis and Heins, the examiner determined that it would have been obvious to one of ordinary 

skill in the art to substitute the peer-to-peer communication network taught by Heins for the master-slave network used in Travis. The motivation for such a 

substitution, the examiner explained, would be to obtain 

faster processing speeds and reliable transmission of 

data, while retaining the ability to add or delete subsystems easily. 

The Board upheld the examiner’s rejection in view of 

Travis and Heins. In so doing, the Board upheld without 

comment the examiner’s conclusion that Travis was prior 

art to the ’511 patent, although that issue was sharply 

contested by the parties. See 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(a)(1) (“The 

affirmance of the rejection of a claim on any of the 

grounds specified constitutes a general affirmance of the 

decision of the examiner on that claim, except as to any 

ground specifically reversed.”). The examiner found 

unpersuasive Hill-Rom’s evidence that its inventors 

conceived of the invention prior to the filing date of Travis 

and that the inventors exhibited diligence from that time 

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until they constructively reduced the invention to practice.

The Board analyzed Travis and Heins, and it concluded that the disputed claims would have been obvious in 

light of the combination of those references. The Board 

then moved to the examiner’s second ground of rejection, 

which was that the disputed claims would have been 

obvious in light of Heins and the Hill-Rom Manual. On 

that issue, the Board held that the examiner was correct 

in finding that the Hill-Rom Manual discloses a communication network in connection with a hospital bed. The 

combination of the Hill-Rom Manual and the peer-to-peer 

network of Heins, the Board held, rendered the disputed 

claims of the ’511 patent obvious.

The Board further ruled that, even if the Hill-Rom 

Manual were not regarded as having disclosed a communication network, the claims would still be rendered 

obvious by combining Heins’s peer-to-peer network with 

the Hill-Rom Manual’s teachings of a user-controlled bed. 

The Board found that, like the X-ray device described in 

Heins, the bed disclosed in the Hill-Rom Manual requires 

user input to be adjusted. The Board then concluded that 

it would have been obvious to implement Heins’s communication network in the bed described in the Hill-Rom 

Manual so as to control the bed in the manner described 

in the ’511 patent.

II

On appeal, Hill-Rom focuses much of its attention on 

the examiner’s finding that Travis was prior art to the 

’511 patent. Hill-Rom argues that the examiner was 

incorrect in finding that Hill-Rom had failed to show both 

prior conception and diligence from before the filing date 

of Travis until the filing of the application for the ’511

patent.

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We find it unnecessary to reach that question, because the Board’s second ground for decision, based on the 

combination of Heins and the Hill-Rom Manual, provides 

a sufficient basis for upholding the Board’s decision.

With respect to the combination of Heins and the HillRom Manual, Hill-Rom first contends that the Board 

erred in finding a motivation to combine the two references. In particular, Hill-Rom challenges the Board’s 

reliance on the disclosure that the peer-to-peer communication network in Heins offered “greater processing 

speeds” than conventional communication networks. HillRom’s argument is that Heins does not expressly disclose 

that the processing speeds in its peer-to-peer system are 

greater than the processing speeds in, for example, a 

master-slave network such as Travis.

Hill-Rom acknowledges that Heins touts the high 

transmission speed of its peer-to-peer controller area 

network and the “high transmission reliability” of that 

system. See Heins abstract (CAN protocol results in “fast 

and reliable data transmission”); col. 1, ll. 30-35 (“According to the CAN protocol, each node can transmit data to 

each of the other nodes at any time (Multimaster principle) without having to wait for an authorization to transmit. The exchange of information accordingly takes place 

very quickly . . . .”); id., ll. 36-54 (“data nodes working in 

accordance with the CAN protocol have a high transmission speed as well as a high transmission reliability”); col. 

2, ll. 6-11 (“individual components can be changed in a 

simple manner while a high data speed is maintained”); 

id., ll. 24-25 (“high access speed to other nodes [is] provided by systems according to the CAN protocol”). Hill-Rom 

argues, however, that the references in Hein to “high 

transmission speed” do not provide a motivation to combine Heins with prior art systems not involving peer-topeer networks, because Heins did not say that the “high” 

transmission speeds were “higher” than the speeds 

achieved in other systems. 

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We do not find Hill-Rom’s argument persuasive. 

From context, it is clear that the statements in Heins 

about the system’s high transmission speed were meant 

to make the point that the system was faster than conventional systems, as the examiner found. At minimum, 

that inference was a fair one for the examiner to draw 

from Heins.1 Moreover, the Board did not rely solely on 

the greater speed of the peer-to-peer network as giving 

rise to a motivation to use the Heins network to control a

hospital bed. It noted that in addition to increased speed, 

the examiner had found that a skilled worker would have 

had reason to use the peer-to-peer network because of its 

greater reliability and its ability to easily add or delete 

subsystems or modules.

Hill-Rom next contends that there was no evidence in 

the reexamination proceeding that a person of ordinary 

skill in the art in 1994 had the ability to implement 

Heins’s network on a hospital bed. In support of its 

argument, Hill-Rom points to the declaration of Michael 

J. Hayes, an engineer for Stryker Corporation, the thirdparty requester of the reexamination. In particular, HillRom notes that although Mr. Hayes said that his company chose the CAN network protocol because of the various 

advantages of that system, he stated that the company 

had “worked with a third-party design firm to assist in 

the design and implementation of the CAN network on 

our hospital beds.” According to Hill-Rom, that statement 

belies Mr. Hayes’s declaration that a person of skill in the 

art had the capacity to adapt the CAN network to a 

hospital bed.

1 The examiner also cited U.S. Patent No. 4,992,926 

(“Janke”) to show that a peer-to-peer communication 

network could be substituted for a master-slave network 

in order to provide greater processing speeds. See Janke, 

col. 1, ll. 58-64; col. 2, ll. 6-12.

 

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The Board noted that Mr. Hayes testified that he had 

engaged a third-party firm to implement the CAN design 

because it was more cost effective than implementing the 

design in-house, not because implementing the design 

was beyond the skill of an ordinary artisan. That explanation is reasonable, and the Board was not required to 

conclude that Mr. Hayes’s decision to work with a thirdparty design firm indicates that a person of skill in the art 

could not have adapted the CAN network to a hospital 

bed.

In finding that a person of ordinary skill would have 

been able to adapt the Heins peer-to-peer network to the 

Hill-Rom bed, the examiner and the Board were entitled 

to consider the similarity between the Heins X-ray system 

and the Hill-Rom hospital bed. As Heins explains, the 

various modules in the Heins network move the X-ray 

table in various ways, including tilting it, moving it 

laterally, and moving it longitudinally. Besides the fact 

that both the X-ray table and the hospital bed are adjustable medical devices designed to support a patient’s body, 

the functions performed by the modules in Heins are very 

similar to the functions performed by the modules in the 

Hill-Rom system, which includes moving the bed frame in 

various directions and angles. Given the similarity in the 

roles played by the modules in the two systems, it was 

reasonable for the examiner and the Board to conclude 

that adapting the Heins peer-to-peer network to the HillRom bed was within the capacity of a person of ordinary 

skill at the time of the invention.2

2 In addition to Heins, the examiner noted that a 

1994 article by van Woerden taught that the use of a CAN 

communication system as a peer-to-peer network was 

known to be well suited for medical rehabilitation applications, such as a wheelchair. 

 

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III

Hill-Rom next contends that the Board relied on an 

unreasonable construction of the term “communication 

network” when it affirmed the examiner’s finding that it 

would have been obvious for one of ordinary skill in the 

art to substitute the peer-to-peer communication network 

taught by Heins for the network in the Hill-Rom Manual.

Importantly, the Board regarded the combination of 

Heins and the Hill-Rom Manual to render the disputed 

claims obvious regardless of whether the electrical network described in the Hill-Rom Manual is considered a 

“communication network.” The electrical network disclosed in the Hill-Rom Manual has to be assessed for what 

it is, not for what it is called. The question whether the 

Board was correct to call it a “communication network” 

therefore does not affect the Board’s analysis. What the 

Hill-Rom Manual discloses is a hospital bed with a number of modules that are controlled by an electrical system. 

Hill-Rom complains that the electrical control system 

described in the Hill-Rom Manual is too remote from the 

control system recited in the disputed claims, because the 

control system of the Hill-Rom Manual operates through 

simple changes in logical states, not more complex signals 

that Hill-Rom refers to as “communications.” 

While it may be reasonable to regard a system that 

communicates directions to its various modules though 

changes in logical states as a simple form of communication network, it is not necessary to characterize the disclosure of the Hill-Rom Manual in that manner. What 

matters is whether it was reasonable for the Board to find 

that it would have been obvious for a person of skill in the 

art to implement the peer-to-peer network of Heins to 

perform the control functions on the multi-module electrically controlled hospital bed described in the Hill-Rom 

Manual. For the reasons given by the Board, we conclude 

that it was.

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The Board noted that a Hill-Rom engineer described 

in some detail the electrical control system disclosed in 

the Hill-Rom Manual. He explained that the logic control 

board of the system receives signals “indicative of user 

inputs from the siderails and the footboard [of the hospital bed] and according to predefined logic, determines 

whether to operate the various motors on the bed.” The 

logic control board ultimately operates the various motors 

on the bed that perform the designed functions or detect 

particular conditions on the bed. 

The Board concluded that even if that electrical control system is not regarded as a “communication network,” the bed of the Hill-Rom Manual “still requires user 

input to be adjusted as does the X-ray device in Heins.” 

Based on its extensive analysis of Heins at an earlier 

point in its opinion, the Board upheld the examiner’s 

finding “that it would have been obvious to implement 

Heins’s communication network in the bed described in 

the Hill-Rom Manual for its known and expected functions in controlling a medical device.”3

We sustain the Board’s decision on that ground. The 

evidence regarding Heins showed that it satisfied the 

3 In particular, the examiner found that “using 

known methods of engineering, a person of ordinary skill 

in the art could have added a prior art communication 

network to a hospital bed, and the results of such a combination would have been predictable. Those results 

would have been predictable because communication 

networks were known to operate in predictable, wellunderstood ways in a variety of different fields, including 

the medical field.” Moreover, the examiner noted that the 

claims of the ’511 patent were broadly directed a peer-topeer network and that the specification “does not describe 

any significant modifications required to allow a peer-topeer network to work in a hospital bed.”

 

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limitations of the disputed claims regarding the peer-topeer communication network and the “plurality of modules . . . electrically coupled to a selected connection point 

of the peer-to-peer communication network.” ’511 patent, 

col. 22, ll. 20-23. The evidence regarding the Hill-Rom 

Manual showed that it satisfied the limitations of the 

disputed claims regarding the bed with an articulating 

deck coupled to the frame having discrete movable sections.

The issue for the examiner and the Board was whether it would have been obvious for a person of skill at the 

time of the invention to combine those references. We 

hold that the Board properly sustained the examiner’s 

conclusion that the disputed claims would have been 

obvious in light of the Hill-Rom Manual and Heins. The 

Board’s decision was justified in light of the examiner’s 

findings that (1) the bed of the Hill-Rom Manual already 

had an electrical control system controlling its various 

functions, such as moving the sections of the bed and 

weighing the patient; (2) the X-ray device of Heins had a 

peer-to-peer communication network that controlled the 

functions of the system, including moving the patient 

table in various ways; and (3) the peer-to-peer communication network had known advantages over other communication networks, such as master-slave networks. 

IV

Hill-Rom raises a separate legal argument with respect to the Board’s decision that the disputed claims 

would have been obvious in light of the Hill-Rom Manual 

and Heins even if the electrical control system of the HillRom Manual were not considered a “communication 

network.” Hill-Rom argues that the Board’s decision in 

that regard constituted a new ground of rejection and for 

that reason the Board’s decision cannot be sustained on 

that ground.

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In response, the Director of the Patent and Trademark Office (“PTO”) points out that, by regulation, a 

party that wishes to raise the claim that the Board has 

adopted a new ground of rejection must do so by filing a 

request for rehearing before the Board. Failure to file a 

timely request for rehearing, according to the regulation, 

“will constitute a waiver of any arguments that a decision 

contains an undesignated new ground of rejection.” 37 

C.F.R. § 41.50(c).4

Hill-Rom admits that it did not file a request for rehearing on the “new ground of rejection” issue. Moreover, 

it does not argue that the regulation is somehow inapplicable to the facts of this case. Rather, it argues that the 

regulation is invalid “because it restricts this Court’s 

ability to review a final decision over which the Court has 

jurisdiction.”

We reject Hill-Rom’s legal challenge to the regulation. 

Under well-settled principles of administrative law, 

parties who seek to raise issues on judicial review of 

administrative action ordinarily must first exhaust their 

administrative remedies by raising those issues before the 

agency in accordance with the prescribed administrative 

procedures. See Woodford v. Ngo, 548 U.S. 81, 88-90 

(2006); McKart v. United States, 395 U.S. 185, 193 (1969);

United States v. L.A. Tucker Truck Lines, 344 U.S. 33, 37 

(1952). Congress has authorized the PTO to promulgate 

regulations governing “the conduct of proceedings in the 

Office,” 35 U.S.C. § 2(b)(2)(A). Pursuant to that authority, 

the PTO issued its regulation requiring parties to raise 

“new ground of rejection” arguments through petitions for 

4 The current version of 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(c) was 

promulgated after this court’s decision in In re Stepan Co., 

660 F.3d 1341 (Fed. Cir. 2011). As Hill-Rom acknowledges, the current version of the regulation applies to this 

case.

 

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rehearing. 37 C.F.R. § 41.50(c). That regulation imposes 

a binding exhaustion requirement on parties seeking to 

raise such arguments on judicial review. See Sims v. 

Apfel, 530 U.S. 103, 108 (2000) (“[I]t is common for an 

agency’s regulations to require issue exhaustion in administrative appeals.”). And when regulations do so, “courts 

reviewing agency action regularly ensure against the 

bypassing of that requirement by refusing to consider 

unexhausted issues.” Id. Applying those principles, this 

court has declined to address issues that were not raised 

on a timely basis before the Board of Patent Appeals and 

Interferences (now the Patent Trial and Appeal Board). 

In re DBC, 545 F.3d 1373, 1378-79 (Fed. Cir. 2008).

Both the Supreme Court and this court have explained that the exhaustion requirement serves two 

important policies. First, it protects administrative 

agency authority by giving the agency “an opportunity to 

correct its own mistakes with respect to the programs it 

administers before it is haled into federal court,” and by 

discouraging “disregard of [the agency’s] procedures.” 

McCarthy v. Madigan, 503 U.S. 140, 145 (1992). Second, 

it promotes efficiency because it allows claims to be resolved more quickly and economically before the agency, 

rather than through litigation in federal court. Id.; see 

also Palladian Partners, Inc. v. United States, 783 F.3d 

1243, 1254-55 (Fed. Cir. 2015). 

The PTO’s rule requiring “new ground of rejection” 

claims to be first raised before the Board rather than this 

court serves both of those purposes. First, it gives the 

Board an opportunity to address the claim and provide a 

response to the assertion that the ground of rejection is 

new. Second, it allows for the efficient disposition of that 

issue before the agency; the agency might either sustain 

the objection or explain, perhaps to the satisfaction of the 

patentee, that the ground of rejection was not, in fact, 

new. And even if court review follows, “exhaustion of the 

administrative procedure may narrow the issues and 

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14 IN RE: HILL-ROM SERVICES, INC. 

‘produce a useful record for subsequent judicial consideration.’” Palladian Partners, 783 F.3d at 1255, quoting 

Woodford, 548 U.S. at 89.

In its brief, Hill-Rom does not cite any of this authority. Instead, relying on Adams Fruit Co. v. Barrett, 494 

U.S. 638 (1990), and Nagahi v. INS, 219 F.3d 1168 (10th 

Cir. 2000), Hill-Rom contends that the PTO’s regulation 

requiring exhaustion of “new ground of rejection” claims 

is unlawful because it imposes an impermissible restriction on the court’s jurisdiction.

Those cases provide no support for Hill-Rom’s position. In Adams Fruit, the Supreme Court declined to 

defer to the views of the Department of Labor as to 

whether a federal statute creating a private right of 

action preempted a state statute creating an exclusive 

administrative remedy. The Court explained that “Congress has expressly established the Judiciary and not the 

Department of Labor as the adjudicator of private rights 

of action arising under the statute,” and that it would be 

“inappropriate to consult executive interpretations of [the 

statute] to resolve ambiguities surrounding the scope of 

[the statute’s] judicially enforceable remedy. 494 U.S. at 

649-50. That decision does nothing to change the wellsettled principle that a party must exhaust its administrative remedies before raising a particular issue on 

judicial review of an agency’s decision. 

The Nagahi case is likewise inapposite. In that case, 

the Tenth Circuit held that the Immigration and Naturalization Service could not impose a statute of limitations 

on judicial review that was shorter than the limitations 

period provided by the Administrative Procedure Act. 

Thus, the Nagahi case stands for the unsurprising principle that an agency rule cannot override a statutory provision. Nothing in that case suggests that the requirement 

of exhausting administrative remedies impermissibly 

intrudes on the jurisdiction of the reviewing court. SubCase: 15-1305 Document: 42-2 Page: 14 Filed: 12/02/2015
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sequent decisions by the Tenth Circuit make clear that 

exhaustion requirements are fully applicable to proceedings before the Immigration and Naturalization Service. 

See Garcia-Carbajal v. Holder, 625 F.3d 1233, 1236-38 

(10th Cir. 2010) (“It is a fundamental principle of administrative law that an agency must have the opportunity to 

rule on a challenger’s arguments before the challenger 

may bring those arguments to court.”); Torres de la Cruz 

v. Maurer, 483 F.3d 1013, 1022 (10th Cir. 2007) (“On a 

petition for review to this court, we will not permit the 

petitioner to circumvent proper procedural requirements 

of the [Board of Immigration Appeals] by presenting 

contentions that were procedurally barred by the Board.”); 

Galvez Pineda v. Gonzalez, 427 F.3d 833, 837 (10th Cir. 

2005) (“Failure to exhaust administrative remedies by not 

first presenting a claim to the [Board of Immigration 

Appeals] deprives this court of jurisdiction to hear it.”). 

There is nothing unreasonable about the PTO’s rule 

requiring that “new ground of rejection” claims be raised 

in a request for rehearing. It is far more efficient to 

proceed in that manner than to have the case proceed to 

judicial review and then have the “new ground of rejection” issue decided without input from the Board. Accordingly, we hold that by failing to file a petition for 

rehearing, Hill-Rom has waived its “new ground of rejection” claim. 

AFFIRMED

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