US 10186979

I'll verify the patent details and check for any litigation or CAFC activity.

Verification status

I searched for US 10,186,979 specifically. The authoritative full text (Google Patents, fetched 2026-09-30 via the provided dump) and secondary corroboration from a patent aggregator (wiki.golden.com) agree on the bibliographic data. No CAFC 2026 docket activity, district-court suit, or IPR involving US 10,186,979 was found. A caution on the search: several hits reference an "'879 Patent" (e.g., Neonode Smartphone LLC v. Apple Inc., N.D. Cal. 3:21-cv-08872-EMC) and an ITC/N.D. Cal. matter involving a "10,217,523" patent — neither is this patent; the Neonode '879 is a touch-screen patent with a different number. I did not find a match, so I treat those as unrelated. I cannot rule out litigation that is not indexed in the sources I can reach.

US 10,186,979 B2 — Electric power converter

Abstract (verbatim): "An electric power converter includes a semiconductor module and a DC bus bar. The semiconductor module includes a main body portion having a built-in semiconductor element therein and a DC terminal to which a DC voltage is applied projecting from the main body portion. A DC bus bar is connected to the DC terminal. The DC bus bar is disposed such that a thickness direction of the DC bus bar matches a projecting direction of the DC terminal. The penetrating portion penetrating the projecting direction is formed in the DC bus bar. The DC terminal is connected to the DC bus bar in a state where at least a part of the DC terminal is disposed in a position that can be seen from the penetrating portion when viewed from the projection direction. The penetrating portion is formed in a hole shape."

Independent claim 1 — plain-language overview

What it covers: A vehicle-type power converter (e.g., an inverter) in which a semiconductor module's DC terminal is joined to a DC bus bar whose thickness axis points the same way the terminal projects (the Z direction). The bus bar has a hole ("penetrating portion") through it, and the terminal is attached to the bus bar at a spot where the two "overlap" the hole's inner wall when viewed down the projection axis. Because the hole is a closed hole (not a notch open at one side), metal surrounds the joint, so current can flow around both sides of the terminal — more parallel current paths, hence lower parasitic inductance and less switching surge (versus the open-sided comparator of FIG. 28).

Specific structural limitations added by claim 1 (all required):

• A stacked body of multiple semiconductor modules and cooling pipes, stacked along the terminal body portion's thickness direction (X).
• The DC terminal has a terminal body portion projecting from the main-body portion, plus a bent portion formed by bending the distal end of the terminal body portion toward one side in that thickness direction.
• The bent portion (not the terminal body portion) is what is welded to the DC bus bar.

Narrowing points to note: claim 1 is not limited to a single terminal/hole; it requires the stacked module-plus-cooling-pipe assembly; and it requires the bent-terminal geometry and welding at the bent portion.

Dependent claims (2–7) — brief orientation

These are not independent claims, but they define the fallback positions and are worth knowing:

• Claim 2 — defines a non-welded area (within a set distance of the bent portion's distal end face) that still overlaps the bus bar, and requires welding at a position overlapping the proximal inner surface of the hole nearest that non-welded area. This is the laser-weld-location tolerance feature.
• Claim 3 — bent portion has a first portion and a second portion; the non-welded area is in the second portion; and the intersecting portion where the two portions meet must be able to abut the bus bar.
• Claim 4 — multiple penetrating portions, one per DC terminal.
• Claim 5 — hole length (X) shorter than DC terminal length (X), which enlarges the interposed metal between adjacent holes (claimed benefit: flux cancellation, lower inductance).
• Claim 6 — one elongated single hole through which multiple DC terminals are visible, with hole length (Y/width) shorter than terminal length.
• Claim 7 — the bus bar completely surrounds the penetrating portion in a plane perpendicular to the bus bar's thickness direction (a pure "closed hole" limitation).

Uncertainty / caveats

• I relied principally on the supplied authoritative Google Patents text; the aggregation source agrees on all bibliographic fields, so the bibliographic data is high-confidence.
• No CAFC 2026 docket or litigation for US 10,186,979 was found. I can only state that my searches did not surface one — I cannot certify a negative, and litigation databases are not exhaustively indexed by open web search.
• The recorded maintenance-fee event (4th year, 2022-07-13) and "Active" status come from the Google Patents legal-events table and are consistent with the listed 2036-05-14 adjusted expiration, but the tool itself flags legal-status entries as assumptions rather than legal conclusions.

I'll search litigation databases for US patent 10186979.

Let me check specific litigation databases.

Let me try a few more targeted searches to be thorough.

Litigation Search Results — US Patent No. 10186979

Bottom line

I found no record of any litigation involving U.S. Patent No. 10186979. Based on the searches conducted, the patent does not appear to have been asserted in any U.S. district court, before the ITC, or in any PTAB proceeding (IPR/PGR) as of the current date.

What I searched and what I found

Important caveat on coverage

I was unable to query PACER or Docket Navigator directly, and the Unified Patents Portal case list could not be retrieved in a way that returned a case-specific record for this patent. My search is therefore not a certified exhaustive litigation clearance search. A definitive negative would require:

• PACER (all district courts) and CourtListener/RECAP for "10,186,979" / "10186979";
• Unified Patents Portal (https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/caselist) direct case-list lookups;
• USPTO PTAB (IPR/PGR/CBM) and USITC EDIS (Section 337) searches; and
• CAFC docket search (https://cafc.uscourts.gov).

Context that supports (but does not prove) the negative

• US10186979B2 is owned by DENSO Corporation (original assignee DENSO; assignment recorded 2016‑06‑28; inventors Naohisa Harada, Akira Nakasaka, Tsuyoshi Kurauchi). Denso is an operating automotive Tier‑One supplier that generally does not run an active patent-assertion/litigation-licensing campaign — it is, notably, a paying member of Unified Patents' "transport zone" (per the declaration in IPR2019‑00505), i.e., a defensive-aggregation subscriber rather than a serial plaintiff.
• The patent's status is Active, with an adjusted expiration of 2036‑05‑14, and maintenance fees paid (4th-year fee, 2022‑07‑13). No litigation-driven transfer or reissue is indicated in the record.
• The closest Denso involvements my searches surfaced are not about this patent:
  • In re Denso‑Manufactured Toyota Fuel Pump Marketing, Sales Practices, and Products Liability Litigation, MDL No. 2956 (fuel-pump defect class actions; settled) — product liability, not patent.
  • Automotive Parts Antitrust Litigation (E.D. Mich.) — Denso as a defendant in oxygen-sensor/spark-plug price-fixing classes.
  • Certain Infotainment Systems (ITC Inv. No. 337‑TA‑1119) — Broadcom as complainant; Denso/DENSO TEN as respondents (patents U.S. 6,937,187; 8,902,104; 7,512,752; 7,530,027; 8,284,844; 7,437,583) — none of which is US10186979.

Summary table

Recommendation

If a court-ready, defensible "no litigation" opinion is needed, run the patent number through Docket Navigator, Lex Machina, PACER/RECAP (CourtListener), the PTAB API, and ITC EDIS directly, limited strictly to the literal string "10,186,979" / "10186979," and confirm no auto-correction to similarly numbered patents (e.g., the unrelated 10186979.0 EP application noted above). I have deliberately not substituted any similar-looking number.

I'll verify the structured "no proceedings on file" baseline against the available public sources before writing the assessment.

The first pass surfaced nothing on point. Let me run a few more targeted checks before concluding.

One more focused check to see whether any docket aggregator indexes a proceeding on this number.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on US 10,186,979: zero. The USPTO Open Data Portal (ODP) structured block contains no IPR, PGR, or CBM for this patent, and my independent web checks surfaced no petition, institution decision, Final Written Decision, or Federal Circuit appeal touching this number. There is therefore no breakdown to give — nothing is active, nothing has been invalidated, nothing has been sustained, nothing has settled, and no institution has been denied because no petition was ever filed. Defensive posture: the patent is completely untested at the PTAB. A defendant gets neither the upside of a canceled claim nor the downside of a hardened one — it faces a clean, unlitigated 7-claim patent whose validity has never been adjudicated by the Board.

No proceedings to report

There is no proceeding to list here. Per the canonical structured data and confirmed by search, US 10,186,979 has no AIA trial history.

For completeness on the negative findings — these are negative results, and I want to be explicit about what I checked and what I did not find:

• No IPR / PGR / CBM indexed by the USPTO ODP for US 10,186,979 (structured block: "no AIA trial proceedings ... as of the most recent ingest").
• No PTAB E2E / PTAB Center docket reachable by web search for this patent number. My queries kept returning unrelated matters with superficially similar identifiers — e.g., IPR2022-00979 (Apple/Samsung v. Smart Mobile Technologies, U.S. 9,049,119) and an ITC/N.D. Cal. matter involving a "10,217,523" patent. Per the operating rules, I do not auto-correct identifiers: IPR2022-00979 is not an IPR of US 10,186,979, and I have not treated it as one. It matches only on the coincidental digit string "979."
• No related Federal Circuit appeal — consistent with the earlier-generated verification section of this analysis, which likewise found no CAFC 2026 docket activity for this patent.
• No defensive-aggregator proceeding (Unified Patents, RPX, et al.) surfaced in the chain.

Caveat on the negative: I can state only that my searches did not find a proceeding. Open web search is not an exhaustive index of PTAB filings, and the ODP block reflects the state at its last ingest. I cannot certify the absence of a very recently-filed petition that the ODP has not yet ingested. If this matters to a live matter, confirm directly against PTAB E2E (https://e2e.uspto.gov/) and the ODP API (https://developer.uspto.gov) before relying on it.

Strategic summary

Claim status: every claim of US 10,186,979 is UNTESTED. All seven claims — independent claim 1 and dependent claims 2–7 — stand exactly as issued on 2019-01-22. No claim has been canceled, disclaimed, amended by a motion to amend, or narrowed by a Board or court construction. The patent remains active with an adjusted expiration of 2036-05-14, which is a long runway for a defendant to contend with.

Estoppel landscape: none exists yet, and that cuts both ways. Because there are no prior petitioners, 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(2) estoppel is inapplicable — nobody is barred, and no prior-art ground has been "used up" by anyone. For a defendant weighing an IPR today, this means the full universe of patents and printed publications under § 102/§ 103 is available. But two clock issues dominate: (i) any IPR must be filed within one year of service of an infringement complaint on the defendant or its real party in interest / privy, per § 315(b) — miss it and the IPR door closes permanently; and (ii) the PGR window is long gone, having run nine months from grant (closed 2019-10-22), so the broader PGR grounds (including § 101 and § 112) are unavailable as an AIA-trial vehicle. CBM is also unavailable — this is a power-converter hardware patent, not a financial-services method, and the CBM program sunset for petitions filed on or after 2020-09-16.

Pattern signals: absence is itself a signal. This is an OEM component patent owned by DENSO Corporation, not an NPE/troll asset. Well-asserted patents attract IPRs; this one has never drawn a petition, which is consistent with the earlier finding of no district-court suit and suggests the patent has not been commercially asserted in a way that provoked a competitive validity challenge. Practically, that means (a) there is no petitioner-funded invalidity record to free-ride on, and (b) the prior art has never been stress-tested against these claims by an adversarial expert. The corollary is that the claim scope is also uninterpreted — the "hole shape" / "penetrating portion" limitations of claim 1 and the closed-hole limitation of claim 7 have never been construed by a court or the Board, so a defendant has room to argue narrow constructions without fighting a prior adverse ruling.

Recommended next steps

• No PTAB activity exists — say so plainly. There is no Final Written Decision to link and no disposition to quote, because there is no proceeding. Any client-facing memo should state: no IPR, PGR, or CBM has ever been filed against US 10,186,979.
• Confirm against the primary sources before relying on the negative. Check PTAB E2E (https://e2e.uspto.gov/) and the USPTO ODP API (https://developer.uspto.gov) for US 10,186,979, and the Federal Circuit docket / CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com/?q=%2210186979%22) for any appeal. This analysis is a search-based negative, not a certified one.
• If you have just been served with a complaint asserting this patent, diarize the § 315(b) one-year bar immediately. That is the binding deadline that governs whether an IPR remains available at all.
• If you are pre-suit, the practical posture is that you would be filing a first-generation IPR on an unlitigated patent — no § 315(e) estoppel baggage, but also no Board precedent on claim construction and no existing record to leverage. Budget for a full prior-art search against the "closed-hole bus bar / bent DC terminal / welded at the bent portion" combination, since claims 1 and 7 are the load-bearing limitations and claim 1 already carries significant structural narrowing (stacked module-plus-cooling-pipe body, terminal body portion, bent portion, and welding specifically at the bent portion).
• Settled expectations matter under current practice. With the patent in force since 2019 and now past six years, expect a patent owner to press settled-expectations and discretionary-denial arguments if an IPR is ever filed; factor that into any pre-filing strategy.

I'll verify the assignment record and check the correspondent of record, then cross-reference against NPE databases.

Let me try to pull the actual assignment cover sheet for reel 039028/0676 to identify the correspondent of record.

Let me check for any post-DENSO transfers and NPE-directory matches.

Inventors

Pattern check — no unusual departure signal. All three inventors are Denso in-house engineers; the application was filed on 2016-04-25 with a JP priority (JP 2015-089725, 2015-04-24). The inventors assigned to DENSO within ~3–4 weeks of the US filing (signing dates 2016-05-12 to 2016-05-17), which is the ordinary in-house inventor-to-employer assignment cadence. I found no evidence any inventor left Denso within 12 months of filing — I cannot positively confirm continued employment, but nothing in the record suggests a departure/fire-sale pattern. Later Denso filings in the same technical family continue to list the same assignee (see Families Citing this family in the Google Patents record, e.g. JP 6708190 B2, JP 7031521 B2).

Original assignee

DENSO Corporation (Kariya City, Aichi-pref., Japan) — named as assignee on the issued patent and confirmed by the sole recorded assignment, reel 039028/0676 (reassignment) and the original assignment cover sheet dated 2016-06-28, Reel/Frame 039028/0676.

• Line of business: Tier-1 automotive components/systems supplier — thermal, powertrain, electrification, and semiconductor/inverter modules. The patent itself is directed to a vehicle-mounted inverter/power converter (see the specification: "vehicle-mounted electric power converter … hybrid vehicle or an electric vehicle"; inverter circuit 100 driving three-phase AC loads).
• Does Denso ship a product embodying the claims? Effectively yes as a practical matter — the claims are drawn to Denso's own inverter module architecture (semiconductor module + stacked cooling pipes + bent DC terminal welded to a hole-type bus bar). Denso is a mass-production supplier of such inverter/power modules. I have not independently verified a specific catalog part number mapping to these exact claim limitations, so treat "ships an embodying product" as high-likelihood but not documentary-proven in this record.
• Current status: Operating, publicly traded (TSE: 6902), financially healthy. Not acquired/dissolved/in bankruptcy. Confirmed continuing activity by the July 13, 2022 4th-year maintenance-fee payment (Google Patents legal events) and Denso's ongoing prosecution of related family members.

Assignment timeline

Only one assignment is recorded against US 10,186,979. The authoritative record (Google Patents legal events, matching the USPTO assignment index) shows a single assignment event:

• 2016-05-12 to 2016-05-17 (executed) / recorded 2016-06-28 — Reel 039028/0676
  • Conveyance: Assignment (inventor → employer)
  • Assignor: Naohisa Harada; Akira Nakasaka; Tsuyoshi Kurauchi (individually)
  • Assignee: DENSO CORPORATION, 1-1 Showa-cho, Kariya-city, Aichi-pref. 448-8661, Japan
  • Correspondent: Not determinable from the sources I could reach. The reel/frame text in the fetched record gives the recording data but not the correspondent block. For context (not a finding for this reel), Denso's US assignment recordings that I could retrieve — reels 055473/0508 (2021-03-03) and 044599/0499 (2018-01-11) — both list HARNESS DICKEY / HARNESS, DICKEY & PIERCE, P.L.C. (submitter Michael P. Doerr; Bloomfield Hills / Troy, MI) as correspondent. That is a general Denso-household pattern, not verified against 039028/0676; a single-firm recurrence on other Denso patents is not enough to attribute it to this one.
  • Context: Ordinary in-house inventor assignment capturing rights in the JP-priority-based US application filed 2016-04-25. No consideration to a third party, no licensing entity. This is an internal/origination assignment, not a transfer-to-asserter, reorg, securitization, or fire-sale.

Post-issuance: None. No assignment, security interest, license, merger, change-of-name, or release has been recorded after grant (2019-01-22). The only post-issuance legal events on file are the grant itself (2019-01-01 STCF) and the 4th-year maintenance-fee payment (2022-07-13 MAFP). DENSO Corporation is still the owner of record.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 10186979
    2015 : Priority JP application filed by Denso
    2016 : US application filed
         : Inventors assign to DENSO Corp
         : Assignment recorded at reel 039028 frame 0676
    2019 : Patent issued to DENSO Corp
    2022 : Fourth year maintenance fee paid

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — not present. The only recorded conveyance is inventors → DENSO (reel 039028/0676, recorded 2016-06-28). No "IP/Holdings/Licensing/Ventures" entity appears anywhere in the chain. The assignee is the original operating manufacturer itself.

2. Known asserter in the chain — not present. Neither the current owner (DENSO Corporation) nor any prior assignee matches the Acacia / Marathon / IV / Wi-LAN / Conversant / Pendrell / Innovatio / Round Rock / Spangenberg sets, and no such entity appears on the reel 039028/0676 cover sheet. The prior art-analysis section likewise found no litigation or IPR involving US 10,186,979.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — not assessable / not present. There is only one link, so "recurrence within the chain" cannot occur. The correspondent for reel 039028/0676 is not visible in the sources retrieved, so I cannot tie an attorney of record to it. Noting the Denso household's recurring correspondent (Harness Dickey & Pierce / Michael P. Doerr on reels 055473/0508 and 044599/0499) is a pattern observation about the assignee's outside counsel, not evidence of NPE conduct — Harness Dickey is a large general-practice prosecution firm doing operating-company work.

4. Cascading transfers — not present. One assignment total, executed within a month of the 2016 filing; no chained LLCs, no shared-address assignees, no serial re-recordings.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — not present. No infringement suit naming this patent was found (consistent with the earlier verification section); therefore there is no pre-suit assignment within 6 months of any complaint. The sole assignment predates grant by ~3 years.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. DENSO Corporation is solvent and operating; no Chapter 7/11, no IP auction, no reorganized-estate transfer.

7. Privateering — not present. No transfer from Denso to a third-party assertion vehicle; Denso retains ownership and no NPE asserts on its behalf in this record.

8. Defensive aggregator — not present. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT Network, Unified Patents, or OIN. It terminates at the original operating company, which is the opposite of a defensive-aggregation finding (the patent remains an operating-company asset, neither asserted nor neutralized by a defensive pool).

Verdict

Insufficient data — meaning here that the chain consists only of the original assignment, so no NPE analysis can be triggered.

The entire recorded chain is a single inventor-to-employer assignment: Naohisa Harada, Akira Nakasaka, and Tsuyoshi Kurauchi to DENSO Corporation, executed 2016-05-12 to 2016-05-17 and recorded 2016-06-28 at reel 039028/0676. No post-issuance assignment, security interest, license, merger, change of name, or release exists on the record, and the current assignee of record is the original operating Tier-1 automotive supplier, which remains active (4th-year maintenance fee paid 2022-07-13; adjusted expiration 2036-05-14). Zero of the eight NPE signals are present, and the earlier verification found no litigation or CAFC activity, so there is no evidence of any asserter or troll pattern.

Verify at: USPTO Assignment Center search for patent 10,186,979 — https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (legacy interface: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html). The key confirmation to pull there is the correspondent block on reel 039028/0676, which the sources I reached did not expose.

Caveat on the negative findings: I could not retrieve the full assignment cover sheet PDF for reel 039028/0676, so the correspondent of record for the one recorded assignment remains unconfirmed. All other statements are grounded in the recorded reel/frame, the execution/recording dates, and the Google Patents legal-events table reproduced in the patent text.

I'll research the prior-art citations for US 10,186,979 against the USPTO and Google Patents records, then analyze anticipation under § 102.

Let me research the remaining cited references.

Prior-Art Analysis — US 10,186,979 B2 ("Electric power converter")

Status of this analysis: I confirmed the patent's identity and citation set against the authoritative full text (Google Patents, fetched 2026‑09‑30) and corroborating aggregator data. My earlier sections (verification, claims overview, litigation search) remain valid and are not repeated. Below I map the eight examiner‑cited references plus the background reference to the claims. My web‑search budget was exhausted before I could retrieve full text for three of the Japanese/older references, so those entries are flagged as partial‑confidence.

1. The reference set (from the authoritative record)

US 10,186,979 lists 8 cited patent documents ("Patent Citations (8)"):

Background reference (discussed in the specification, not in the citation list): Japanese Patent No. 5263334 — the "FIG. 28" open‑sided comparator against which the patent distinguishes itself.

2. Critical date analysis — which statutory category applies

The '979 patent has a priority date of 2015‑04‑24 (JP 2015‑089725) and is an AIA patent (filed 2016‑04‑25). A reference is § 102(a)(1) art if published/granted before 2015‑04‑24; it is § 102(a)(2) art if it is a US patent/application that was effectively filed before that date even if published later.

Takeaway: References 1–6 are ordinary printed‑publication prior art. References 7 and 8 are "secret prior art" — usable only under § 102(a)(2) (i.e., for anticipation as filed, not for obviousness combinations in the ordinary way, and subject to the common‑ownership/§ 102(b)(2)(C) exception since 7 and 8 are also Denso/Nippon Soken — a Denso subsidiary). This materially weakens refs. 7–8 as standalone § 102 threats.

3. Reference‑by‑reference § 102 mapping

Claim 1 requires ALL of: (A) module with main body + built‑in element + projecting DC terminal; (B) DC bus bar connected to the terminal; (C) bus‑bar thickness axis aligned with terminal projecting axis; (D) penetrating portion through the bus bar in the projecting direction; (E) connection at a location overlapping the hole's inner surface when viewed along the projecting direction; (F) the penetrating portion is a closed hole ("hole shape"); (G) a stacked body of multiple modules and cooling pipes stacked along the terminal‑body thickness direction; (H) a terminal body portion + bent portion; (I) the bent portion welded to the bus bar.

Ref. 1 — US 6,870,253 B1 (Mitsubishi Denki), "Power semiconductor device"

• Disclosure: 1‑in‑1 resin‑sealed power modules (elements 101–104) connected to a multilayer bus bar (301) having stacked conductive layers (P, N, intermediate) with bus electrodes (311–318); modules arranged on both sides of the bus bar to shorten the bus bar.
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate any claim. It shows power modules joined to a laminated bus bar, but there is no closed hole in the bus bar through which a projecting DC terminal passes, no "overlap with an inner surface of a penetrating portion," and no bent‑terminal geometry. Relevant only as general background on bus‑bar/module interconnection.
• Potentially anticipates: None.

Ref. 2 — US 2009/0231811 A1 (Hitachi), "Electric Power Conversion Apparatus"

• Disclosure: Inverter with improved cooling; a semiconductor module is inserted into a hole formed in a cooler (heat‑dissipation structure), with soft‑metal layers.
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate any claim. The "hole" here is a cooler module‑insertion hole, not a penetrating portion in a DC bus bar. No teaching of a closed bus‑bar hole, inner‑surface overlap, stacked body of modules + cooling pipes for the claimed purpose, or welded bent terminal.
• Potentially anticipates: None. (Marginal § 103 interest only for the module‑in‑hole stacking concept.)

Ref. 3 — US 2012/0006595 A1 (Denso), "Bus bar module"

• Disclosure: Bus bar module with bus bars (3) partly sealed in resin (10); welded plates (4) with welded parts (40) welded to power terminals (20); a slit (6) is formed between the welded plate and the held plate, with the plates joined at a position away from the sealed part to keep weld heat off the sealing resin. It expressly notes that a prior proposal placed a notch (99) at that location.
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate claim 1. It is directed to a thermal problem (sealing‑member melting), and its bus‑bar feature is a slit/notch (open‑sided) — the very open‑sided geometry the '979 patent identifies as the problem. No closed penetrating portion, no inner‑surface‑overlap connection, no bent terminal welded at the overlap, no stacked module+cooling‑pipe body as claimed.
• Potentially anticipates: None. Notably it is counter‑art to claim 7 (which requires the bus bar to completely surround the penetrating portion) — ref. 3 shows the open/notched alternative, not the closed hole.

Ref. 4 — JP 2013‑046468 A (Denso), "Bus bar module and power conversion apparatus"

• Disclosure (partial confidence): Japanese application in the Denso "bus bar module" family (contemporaneous with ref. 3); concerns bus bar(s) welded to semiconductor‑module power terminals in a power conversion apparatus.
• § 102 assessment: No anticipation of claim 1 identified. (Full text not retrieved.) On the available characterization it addresses bus‑bar/terminal welding within a power conversion apparatus, but the closed‑hole penetrating portion with inner‑surface overlap is not indicated.
• Potentially anticipates: None identified — flagged partial confidence; recommend full‑text verification.

Ref. 5 — JP 2013‑115952 A (Denso), "Power conversion apparatus"

• Disclosure (partial confidence): Japanese "power conversion apparatus" application (filed 2011‑11‑30), apparently in the same Denso family as ref. 6.
• § 102 assessment: No anticipation of claim 1 identified. (Full text not retrieved.)
• Potentially anticipates: None identified — flagged partial confidence; recommend full‑text verification.

Ref. 6 — US 2013/0264891 A1 (Denso), "Power conversion apparatus"

• Disclosure: Power conversion apparatus with power module (10), capacitor (3), and a pair of DC bus bars (2a, 2b) formed by stacking plate conductors through an insulator; a bus bar extension section (20) runs along a capacitor surface to reduce inductance; a bus bar terminal (21) is formed by projecting a middle portion of the bus bar in the height direction Z and bending the end toward the power module; current paths are arranged so opposing currents cancel inductance.
• § 102 assessment: Closest thematic prior art, but does not anticipate claim 1. It shares the objective (lowering DC‑bus‑bar/loop inductance), the DC bus bar connected to module main‑electrode terminals, and a bent/projected bus‑bar terminal. However it lacks all of: a closed‑hole penetrating portion in the bus bar (D, F); connection at an inner‑surface overlap viewed along the terminal's projecting axis (E); and the bent portion of the DC terminal welded at that overlap (H, I). Its bus‑bar terminal is a formed projection of the bus bar itself, not a bent DC terminal.
• Potentially anticipates: None. Highly relevant as a § 103 starting point (same field, same inductance‑reduction goal, Denso).

Ref. 7 — US 2015/0195957 A1 (Nippon Soken), "Electric power convertor"

• Disclosure (partial confidence): Apparently a bus‑bar/terminal interconnection vehicle‑converter application filed 2014‑01‑09.
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate (and is § 102(a)(2)‑only). Beyond the date limitation, no closed‑hole bus bar with inner‑surface overlap / bent welded terminal has been shown. Partial confidence — full text not retrieved.
• Potentially anticipates: None identified.

Ref. 8 — US 2016/0128216 A1 (Denso), "Electric power converter"

• Disclosure (partial confidence): Denso "electric power converter" application filed 2014‑10‑31 (published after the '979 priority date).
• § 102 assessment: Does not anticipate (and is § 102(a)(2)‑only; likely common‑ownership‑excepted). As a Denso application with the same generic title and a filing date only months after the '979 conception, it could be a family/related disclosure, but the record gives no closed‑hole + bent‑welded‑terminal teaching. Partial confidence — full text not retrieved.
• Potentially anticipates: None identified.

Background Ref. — JP 5263334 (the FIG. 28 comparator)

• Disclosure (per the '979 specification itself): A DC bus bar with a penetrating portion that is open on one side in the terminal width direction; the DC terminal is welded with the bus bar's hole side‑surface contacting the terminal's principal surface. Because one side is open, metal is absent there, the bus bar is effectively divided, current paths are limited, and parasitic inductance is large.
• § 102 assessment: This is the most substantively on‑point reference — but it discloses the opposite of limitation (F). It teaches away from the closed hole and therefore does not anticipate claim 1 or claim 7; it actually supports the patent's asserted novelty.
• Potentially anticipates: None (it is the distinguished prior art).

4. Ranking — most relevant prior art for US 10,186,979

1. US 2013/0264891 A1 (Denso) — same field and same inductance‑reduction purpose; DC bus bar connected to module terminals with a formed/bent bus‑bar terminal. Best § 103 springboard, but no closed hole and no welded bent terminal at an inner‑surface overlap.
2. JP 5263334 (background comparator) — directly addresses the very bus‑bar/terminal weld and the "open side" geometry; the patent is expressly drafted to distinguish it. Not § 102 art (teaches the opposite of the closed hole).
3. US 2012/0006595 A1 (Denso bus bar module) — bus bar welded to module power terminals; but its slit/notch theme is the open‑sided alternative and it targets weld‑heat, not inductance.
4. US 2015/0195957 A1 / US 2016/0128216 A1 — same field, but § 102(a)(2)‑only (and likely common‑ownership‑excepted); lower § 102 weight.
   5–8. US 6,870,253 B1; US 2009/0231811 A1; JP 2013‑046468 A; JP 2013‑115952 A — general background on bus‑bar interconnection and module cooling; no closed‑hole inner‑surface‑overlap teaching.

5. Bottom line on § 102

No single cited reference appears to anticipate claim 1 (or dependent claims 2–7) under 35 U.S.C. § 102. The distinguishing combination — a closed ("hole‑shape") penetrating portion in a DC bus bar whose thickness axis matches the terminal's projecting axis, connection at the hole's inner surface viewed along that axis, together with the stacked module + cooling‑pipe body and a bent DC‑terminal portion welded at the overlap — is not disclosed by any one of the eight cited documents as characterized above. The references are consistent with an allowance over § 102, with the real contest (if any) being § 103 over US 2013/0264891 A1 in view of a bus‑bar‑hole/terminal art.

Caveats and confidence:

• High confidence on the citation set, dates, and statutory categories (taken from the authoritative full text).
• Medium/high confidence on refs. 1–3, 6–8 substance; medium confidence on refs. 4 and 5 (Japanese texts not retrieved) and on refs. 7–8 details.
• A definitive § 102 opinion requires full‑text element‑by‑element comparison of each reference against claim 1's limitations (A)–(I); I could not complete full‑text retrieval for refs. 4, 5, 7, and 8 within this pass. I have not auto‑corrected any identifier, and I explicitly did not substitute any similarly numbered document (e.g., the unrelated EP application 10186979.0 owned by TRUMPF noted in my earlier litigation search).

I'll pull what I can on the cited prior art before drafting the § 103 analysis.

Let me pull the two JP references and the background comparator to ground the analysis.

Obviousness Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 10,186,979 B2

Under 35 U.S.C. § 103 (AIA), as of April 26, 2026

0. Sources, and how confident I am in each

⚠ Key inferential caveat (flagging explicitly, per the cross-reference instruction): I could not retrieve the text of JP 5263334, JP 2013-046468, JP 2013-115952, US 6,870,253, or US 2009/0231811. My characterizations of those are limited to (a) their titles/assignees/dates from the patent's own citation table, and (b) the '979 background's admission of what JP 5263334 discloses. Anything below marked [inference] is my reasoning, not verified disclosure.

⚠ Family-identity inference: JP 5263334 B2 (Denso, "Busbar module," 2010‑07‑06) is very likely the JP family member of US 2012/0006595 A1 (Denso, "Bus bar module," priority 2010‑07‑06) — same title, assignee, and priority date, and the U.S. counterpart is the one actually listed in the '979 citation table (JP 5263334 is not separately listed, only discussed in the specification). If that inference holds, the primary reference and the "stacked body" secondary reference are the same family, and cannot be combined with each other. That materially shapes the grounds below.

1. Claim 1 element map

Claim 1 is the only independent claim; claims 2–7 depend from it.

Bottom line: claim 1 differs from the admitted closest art (JP 5263334) essentially by two features — (G) closing the side of the aperture, and (I/J) bending the terminal's distal end and welding at the bend. Everything else is admitted or conventional.

2. Grounds of rejection

Ground 1 — Claim 1: JP 5263334 (≡ US 2012/0006595 A1) in view of US 2013/0264891 A1

Art status. US 2012/0006595 A1 published 2012‑01‑12 and US 2013/0264891 A1 published 2013‑10‑10 — each more than one year before the earliest effective filing date (JP priority 2015‑04‑24; U.S. filing 2016‑04‑25). Both are therefore § 102(a)(1) prior art, and the § 102(b)(2)(C) common-ownership exception (both are Denso) does not reach them.

Feature G (hole shape). The '979 gives away the motivation in its own background: the open notch means "no metallic material constituting the DC bus bar exists in this portion of one side in the width direction," so "a current path around the DC terminal is limited." Once the POSITA appreciates that the ribbon of metal left by the notch is the only return path, closing the aperture is the one and only obvious way to add a second path. The options are finite and identified (open notch vs. closed perimeter), and the result — two parallel current paths with parallel inductances summing to a lower combined inductance — is exactly the arithmetic the specification itself recites. This is a textbook KSR "design choice with predictable results" / "finite number of identified, predictable solutions" modification.

Why US 2013/0264891 supplies the missing reason. That reference is directed to the same problem in the same field: "a surge voltage occurs … when the switching elements are turned on and off due to inductance arising from the wiring of its internal circuit. Accordingly, it is necessary to reduce such inductance." It teaches the accepted mechanism — routing the current in opposite directions through adjacent conductor sections to cancel flux and reduce loop inductance (bus bar extension section 20 vs. capacitor body 30). A POSITA seeking to reduce bus-bar inductance would therefore be led, as a matter of ordinary design, to multiply and oppose current paths around the joint — precisely what closing the notch accomplishes.

Feature I/J (bent terminal). US 2013/0264891 expressly teaches forming a connection terminal "by causing a middle portion … to project in the height direction Z, and bending the end of the resultant projected portion in the arranging direction X to thereby form an end portion 23." Bending the distal end of a projecting conductor to create an X-facing weld surface is thus a known technique in this exact art unit. Applying it to the module's DC terminal (rather than the bus bar's terminal) is a substitution of one known equivalent part for another with no change in function — the terminal still presents a surface for welding, and the bend additionally provides elastic compliance and a shorter current path to the weld. [inference — the reference's bend is on the bus-bar side, not the module terminal]

Result: claim 1 would have been obvious.

Ground 2 — Claim 1: JP 5263334 in view of US 2015/0195957 A1 (and/or US 2009/0231811 A1)

US 2015/0195957 A1 (Nippon Soken; effective filing 2014‑01‑09) is § 102(a)(2) art and is not commonly owned with Denso, so no § 102(b)(2)(C) disqualification. It supplies the stacked-module + cooler + DC-bus-bar-as-current-path architecture and an express teaching that the parasitic inductance in the bus bar/terminal loop is the quantity to be minimized (it builds the entire disclosure around impedance Z = 2πfL + 1/(2πfC)). If the primary reference is read as lacking the stacked body (limitation H), this reference cures it and reinforces the inductance-minimization motivation.

⚠ Do not use US 2016/0128216 A1 as the lead secondary reference. It is Denso-owned, was filed 2014‑10‑31 and published 2016‑05‑05 (after the '979 priority date), so it is § 102(a)(2)-only art — and it is disqualified by the common-ownership exception of § 102(b)(2)(C) ("owned by the same person … not later than the effective filing date"). Its convenient teaching (splitting the current into "two paths," with the bus-bar current and terminal current "opposite to each other" to reduce parasitic inductance; patents-review.com/a/20160128216) is not available against this patent. This is an important trap.

Ground 3 — Dependent claims

3. Motivation to combine — the KSR rationales to plead

1. Same field, same problem, same assignee lineage. Seven of the eight cited references are Denso; all address inverter DC-bus-bar geometry and welding. Where the references come from a single entity's development line addressing one problem (parasitic inductance + weldable module-to-bus-bar joints), the legal "motivation" hurdle is low.
2. Predictable result. Adding metal on the missing side of the aperture necessarily creates a second, parallel current path around the terminal; parallel inductances combine to a lower value by the arithmetic the specification itself uses. No new principle of operation is invoked.
3. Known technique / substitution of equivalents. Bending the distal end of a projecting conductor to create a weld pad is disclosed in US 2013/0264891 for the same purpose in the same assembly.
4. Finite, identified options. The geometry choice between an open-sided notch and a closed aperture is a two-option field, which is the classic "obvious to try" posture — with a reasonable expectation of success because the second path is conductive by construction.
5. Manufacturing simplification (claim 6) and weld-access optimization (claim 2/3) supply independent, secondary motivations grounded in the applicant's own stated problems.

4. Where the challenger is weak — arguments the patent owner will make

• Teaching away / assembly constraint. The open notch in JP 5263334 may exist precisely to permit lateral (side) entry of the terminal during assembly, or to permit a stamped/pierced part without a closed aperture. If the primary reference's assembly sequence requires the terminal to slide in from the side, closing the hole frustrates the disclosed method — a genuine teaching-away argument that must be answered with evidence about the reference's assembly sequence. (The '979 background's own statement that the terminal is "inserted into this penetrating portion" cuts against this, since insertion is described as axial — worth pressing.)
• Claim 2's specific weld-placement rule is not mapped to any of the eight references. Absent new art (e.g., a laser-welding process reference teaching weld placement relative to a terminal's free end), claim 2 is the best candidate for survival.
• No secondary-considerations record found. My earlier verification found no litigation and no IPR/PGR for this patent, so there is no adjudicated nexus evidence; but absence of litigation is not evidence of non-obviousness, and the absence of objective indicia in the record favors the challenger.
• Claim 1's "hole shape" must be construed as a closed perimeter, else it reads on JP 5263334's notch and the claim would be invalid under § 102. Claim 7 (complete surround) supplies the applicant's own construction confirming a closed perimeter is intended. Note the residual possibility — unverified, and worth a figure check — that the primary reference's sixth/seventh embodiment (AC terminal 20c "located in the slit 6," with welded plate and held plate "connected to each other at a predetermined position" on both sides) actually forms an aperture closed at both ends; if so, a § 102 anticipation argument becomes available for claim 1 and claim 7.

5. Conclusion

• Claims 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7: would have been obvious over JP 5263334 / US 2012/0006595 A1 in view of US 2013/0264891 A1, with the motivation supplied by the admitted inductance problem and the reference's express inductance-reduction teaching. Confidence: moderate-to-high for claims 4–7; moderate for claims 1 and 3 (the bent-terminal limitation rests on an analogous-art substitution I could not verify verbatim).
• Claim 2: the weld-placement/non-welded-area rule is not adequately mapped to the cited art; I would not assert obviousness on this record without additional art. Confidence in non-obviousness of claim 2 on the present record: moderate.
• Do not rely on US 2016/0128216 A1 (Denso, 2016‑05‑05 publication) — § 102(b)(2)(C) common-ownership disqualification.
• Verification still required: full texts/figures of JP 5263334, JP 2013-046468, JP 2013-115952, US 6,870,253, and US 2009/0231811; confirmation of the JP 5263334 ↔ US 2012/0006595 family identity (from the JPO register or Google Patents "Also Published As"); and the '979 file wrapper (USPTO PatentCenter) to see how the examiner distinguished US 2012/0006595. I cannot verify the substance of the non-retrieved references, and I have not auto-corrected or substituted any patent number.