Obviousness

Obviousness Analysis of US Patent 9250758 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

This analysis identifies combinations of prior art references that would render the independent claims of US Patent 9250758 obvious to a person having ordinary skill in the art (PHOSITA) at the time of the invention's priority date (January 13, 2009). The primary objective of US9250758 is to address the issue of "unevenness" felt by a user when interacting with a touch panel that employs metal lines for coordinate detection, by adhering a resin film (which can be a polarizing plate) to the touch panel's outer surface [cite: "However, according to such a related art, since a plurality of lines are formed on a touch panel and hence, when a user moves a pen on an operation surface in a sliding manner, the user feels the surface unevenness. To overcome this drawback, the inventors of the present invention have made extensive studies to improve such a touch panel and have made a touch panel display device which gives further excellent touch feeling to a user."].

Independent Claim 1 Breakdown:

Claim 1 describes a display device comprising:

1. A touch panel including a first substrate with a detection area and an outside area for external terminals, a plurality of first lines, and a plurality of second lines to detect coordinates, where the first lines traverse the second lines.
2. An organic emitting display panel (OLED) under the touch panel.
3. A circular polarizing plate arranged at a side of the touch panel opposite to the OLED.
4. The organic emitting display panel, the touch panel, and the circular polarizing plate are arranged in this specific order.

Combination of Prior Art References and Motivation to Combine:

A combination of the following prior art references would render Claim 1 obvious:

• Reference A: Japanese Patent Application 2007-149884 (or its US equivalent, e.g., US 8,519,969, which claims priority to a Japanese application filed Jan 13, 2009): This reference, explicitly incorporated by reference into US9250758, discloses the fundamental "touch panel" structure. US9250758 states: "The detail of the touch panel 10 is described in the specification and drawings of Japanese Patent Application 2007-149884, and the content of the touch panel 10 is described later." [cite: "The detail of the touch panel 10 is described in the specification and drawings of Japanese Patent Application 2007-149884, and the content of the touch panel 10 is described later."]. This touch panel includes a first substrate and a second substrate with a plurality of metal lines forming the first and second electrodes, which traverse each other to detect coordinates. This reference provides a touch panel that addresses drawbacks of conventional transparent electrodes, offering benefits such as lower resistance, scalability to larger sizes (e.g., 40 inches or more), higher resolution (e.g., 300 lpi or more), increased durability, and multi-point detection [cite: "The metal lines exhibits low resistance and hence, it is possible to increase a size of the touch panel to 40 inches or more (diagonally 1 meter or more) thus expanding an application of the display device with a touch panel to an area where mounting of a touch panel on a display device is difficult conventionally.", "it is sufficiently possible for the metal wiring to have a definition of 300 lpi or more and hence, the resolution can be increased 10 times or more compared to the current resolution of approximately 10 ppi.", "The coordinate detection is performed using the metal lines (each line having a thickness of 10 ⁇ m) and hence, the reliability in lifetime such as the number of detection times is increased 10 times or more compared to the conventional transparent electrode (having a thickness of several hundred nm)."].

• Reference B: US 2010/0214266 A1 (Seiko Epson Corporation), "Organic electroluminescence device having input function and electronic apparatus" (Priority Date: March 2, 2007): This patent application, with a priority date preceding that of US9250758, discloses an "Organic electroluminescence device having input function". This directly teaches the combination of an organic emitting display panel (OLED) with an input function (touch panel). This reference would motivate a PHOSITA to combine a touch panel, such as the improved metal-line touch panel of Reference A, with an OLED display to create a touch-enabled OLED device. The advantages of the metal-line touch panel (Reference A) would provide a strong motivation to integrate it with a modern display technology like OLEDs, as generally suggested by Reference B, to achieve a superior user experience.

• Reference C: General knowledge in the art regarding circular polarizing plates for glare reduction, exemplified by "Electroluminescent Illumination System" (Digital Commons @ Cal Poly, September 24, 1996): Circular polarizing plates were a well-known optical component for reducing glare and reflection in various display technologies, including electroluminescent systems, long before the priority date of US9250758. The purpose of a circular polarizing plate, as stated in US9250758 itself, is to "enhance the visibility by preventing the reflection of light" [cite: "The resin film 126 is a circular polarizing plate and hence, the resin film 126 can enhance the visibility by preventing the reflection of light."]. A PHOSITA would readily understand the benefit of applying such a known anti-reflective solution to any display device, including an OLED with an integrated touch panel, to improve overall viewing quality, especially in ambient light conditions. The arrangement of such a plate as the outermost layer is a logical design choice for maximum glare reduction. Furthermore, the resin film mentioned in US9250758 (which constitutes the circular polarizing plate) is described as absorbing the unevenness of the metal lines [cite: "However, the resin film 26 is adhered to the touch panel 10 and hence, the unevenness attributed to the first electrode 16 (also attributed to the second electrode 18 ) can be absorbed whereby the user can enjoy excellent touch feeling."]. Given that polarizing films are commonly made of flexible resin materials, adhering such a film to a slightly textured surface and achieving some degree of surface smoothing would be an inherent and expected outcome for a PHOSITA.

Obviousness Conclusion for Claim 1:

A PHOSITA, at the time of the invention, would have been motivated to combine the elements taught by Reference A, Reference B, and general knowledge (Reference C) to arrive at the invention of Claim 1. The motivation stems from:

1. Desire for Improved Touch Panel Performance: The metal-line touch panel of Reference A offered clear advantages over conventional transparent electrode touch panels.
2. Advancement in Display Technology: The integration of touch functionality with cutting-edge display technologies like OLEDs, as taught by Reference B, was a natural progression in display device design.
3. Enhancement of User Experience and Display Quality: It would have been obvious to a PHOSITA to incorporate a known glare-reducing element, such as a circular polarizing plate, as an outermost layer on any display device (including touch-enabled OLEDs) to improve visibility and overall user experience. The order of components (OLED, then touch panel, then circular polarizing plate) is a logical and common structural arrangement for achieving both touch input and optimal optical performance. The added benefit of the resin film (polarizing plate) smoothing out surface unevenness would be an expected and desirable outcome for a PHOSITA looking to enhance the user's tactile experience.