Court Opinion

ID: 9452435
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 17:40:46.693737+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:33:13.080221
License: Public Domain

RICH, Judge
(concurring).
It seems to me that the crux of this case lies in the board’s view that to satisfy § 112 the claim must set forth the “other structural relationships” (my *512emphasis) which produce the function of downward urging which is specified in the claim.
The examiner held this view because he deemed the functional language insufficient to distinguish the invention from Schneider.' He did not say why. He appears to have felt the only proper way to distinguish from the prior art is by structural limitations in spite of the permissive language of § 112, last paragraph.
In my view, since the statute permits a combination invention to be defined in terms of means-plus-function definitions of the elements constituting the combination, all that the statute requires is that the combination so defined is disinguish-ed from the reference in being new and unobvious. It does not matter whether the distinction appears in one element or all elements nor which element is functionally defined.
Appellant here has defined his invention as the statute permits and, so defined, it is not suggested by Schneider. Rather the contrary, as Schneider produces the opposite result from that obtained by appellant.
I am unable to ascertain from the board’s opinions why it believed the claims fail to comply with § 112, except the board’s insistence the distinction from the prior art must be in structural terms, a notion for which I find no supporting authority. That was about the notion appearing in Halliburton Oil Well Cementing Co. v. Walker, 329 U.S. 1, 67 S.Ct. 6, 91 L.Ed. 3 (1946), which § 112 was designed to eliminate. See Federico, Commentary on the New Patent Act, 35 U.S.C.A. 1, 25 (1954).