Court Opinion

ID: 9450866
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 16:59:54.995809+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:32:28.994905
License: Public Domain

*867SMITH, Judge
(concurring).
The result reached by the majority follows, I think, by applying to the record here the analysis we relied upon in In re Lohr, 317 F.2d 388, 50 CCPA 1274:
Considering all of the evidence in the record: the close structural similarity, the similar method of making the compounds, the similar properties, the same use, and the inconclusive showing of the affidavit, we are constrained to agree with the Board of Appeals that the claimed compounds and compositions are obvious in view of the prior art.
In cases dealing with complex technical subject matter, it is particularly incumbent on the applicant to establish in the record the significance of the technical differences upon which he relies in seeking reversal of a finding of obviousness. There is no question but both the process and the product here claimed are different from the processes and products of the cited prior art. Under 35 U.S.C. § 103 we must determine whether such a process and product as a whole would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the related art at the time the invention was made. I do not agree with the analysis of the majority in which the relationship of the structures of the claimed and prior art products is considered as giving “rise to an inference that the claimed compound is obvious.” We must endeavor to ascertain the pertinent technical and scientific facts rather than to place so large a reliance on inferences in making this difficult determination. We cannot overcome our failure so to do by paying lip service to such decisions as In re Papesch, 315 F.2d 381, 50 CCPA 1084.
Here, it seems to me that because it is the claimed subject matter “as a whole” which we are required to pass upon, we are necessarily required to pass upon all the general relationships shown in the record which existed at the time the invention was made. Thus I do not agree with the majority that the process claimed can be found to be obvious in view of King et al. alone “with the desired end product esters in mind.” Instead, the analysis must be made on the basis of the knowledge of one skilled in the art without having a knowledge of appellant’s claimed invention before him.
Upon such an analysis I find differences between the prior art and the invention of the appealed claims. However, since I find nothing in the specification or in the evidence of record from which to find patentable significance in these differences, I have no choice but to find with the board that the invention as a whole would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in this art at the time the invention was made. I would affirm en-
tirely on this specific ground.