US 11366181

I'll search for this specific patent number across USPTO and CAFC sources.

Let me check for litigation/docket activity and pull the claim text.

US 11,366,181 B2 — Verification Summary

Important scope note up front: My searches returned no CAFC 2026 docket, no PTAB proceeding, and no district-court action naming patent 11,366,181. Everything below is bibliographic/technical. I was not able to retrieve the verbatim granted claim set from the sources reachable in this session, so the claim discussion below is flagged accordingly rather than presented as authoritative claim text.

---

1. Bibliographic data (confirmed)

PCT route: the patent text literally recites "PCT/EP2018/058268898, filed on Mar. 29, 2018." Note the discrepancy: EPO family records (DOCDB) list the international application as PCT/EP2018/058268. I am reporting the identifier as it literally appears rather than correcting it.

Assignee note: an aggregator page (patentleaderboard) lists co-inventor Michael Ortner under "Infineon Technologies Ag." That is an artifact of the aggregator's assignment data, not a co-assignee of this patent; the Google Patents record lists AT&S as sole assignee.

---

2. Abstract (as published)

"A component carrier with an integrated magnetic field sensor is disclosed. The component carrier includes a plurality of electrically conductive layer structures and/or electrically insulating layer structures; an excitation coil and sensor coils arranged on and/or in the layer structures; a first magnetic structure above the excitation coil and sensor coils; and a second magnetic structure below the excitation coil and sensor coils."

---

3. Independent claims — plain-language overview

Caveat / uncertainty flag: The authoritative full text provided does not contain a rendered "Claims" section, and my live searches surfaced only a partial claim listing from the pre-grant publication US 2020/0041582 A1, which may differ from the granted claims of US 11,366,181 B2. Treat the following as a structural reconstruction, with the specific wording uncertainty noted.

Independent claim 1 (component carrier — apparatus). The specification states: "This need may be solved by the subject-matter of the independent claims," followed by "According to an embodiment it is provided a component carrier with integrated magnetic field sensor (e.g. magnetometer), in particular (planar) fluxgate sensor, wherein the component carrier comprises a plurality of electrically conductive layer structures and/or electrically insulating layer structures; an excitation coil and sensor coils arranged on and/or in the layer structures; a first magnetic structure above the excitation coil and sensors coils; and a second magnetic structure below the excitation coil and sensors coils."

In plain language, claim 1 (as mirrored by the summary) is directed to:

• A component carrier — i.e., a PCB, organic interposer, or IC substrate — built from stacked conductive and/or insulating layer structures;
• an excitation coil and sensor coils formed on and/or within those layer structures (coplanar/adjacent arrangements are emphasized);
• a first magnetic structure above the coil plane; and
• a second magnetic structure below the coil plane,
  so that the two magnetic structures sandwich the coils and serve as flux-concentrating cores. The technical promise stated is a compact, more reliable, more accurate/sensitive fluxgate with reduced drive energy, especially because the second magnetic structure closes/concentrates flux lines.

Independent claim (method). A second independent claim is a method claim. From the US 2020/0041582 A1 listing, claim 15 reads in substance:

"A method of manufacturing a component carrier with an integrated magnetic field sensor, the method comprising: connecting a plurality of electrically conductive layer structures and/or electrically insulating layer structures; forming an excitation coil and sensor coils on the layer structures; forming a first magnetic structure to be above the excitation coil and sensor coils; and forming a second magnetic structure to be below the excitation coil and sensor coils."

Plain language: the manufacturing counterpart of claim 1 — build the laminate/stack, pattern the excitation and sensing coils, then place the upper and lower magnetic structures so they flank the coil plane. The specification adds that the method also supports a 3D fluxgate variant, where a 2D-fluxgate region and a 1D-fluxgate region are formed coplanar side-by-side in the same layer stack, a cavity is created between them, and the second region is bent 90° about a bending axis in the frontal plane of the stack (FIGS. 11–13).

Notable dependent-claim subject matter (from the pre-grant publication; verify against granted claims):

• Claim 14 recites two operation modes, including "wherein during the second operation mode saturation of magnetization occurs in both the first magnetic material and the second magnetic material, resulting in increased sensitivity." This implies the claim set covers the dual-material / dual-saturation-mode concept central to the disclosure.
• Claim 16 is a dependent claim referring back to "the component carrier according to…" — i.e., the claim set mixes apparatus and method categories, and at least one further claim category reference exists.

I cannot confirm the total claim count, the exact granted wording of claim 1, or the final independent-claim count for the granted patent. That would require the USPTO PatentCenter/PatFT "Claims" view or the granted-PDF claim pages, which were not retrievable here.

---

4. Key technical content underpinning the claims (for context)

• Dual-magnetic-structure architecture with the second (lower) structure acting as a flux-closing/concentrating element — the stated basis for higher sensitivity and lower excitation energy.
• Different materials for the two cores. Example: first structure MetGlas 2714A (saturation induction 0.57 T, steep hysteresis); second structure Vitrovac 6155U55F (saturation polarization 0.99 T, composition ~73% Co, 5% Fe, 5% Si, 17% B, less steep hysteresis). The first core is intended to saturate during operation while the second is intended not to saturate (FIG. 15).
• Geometric variants (FIGS. 3–5): upper/lower structure lateral extents e1/e2 may equal the coil span c, be smaller than c, or be mixed; where smaller, the extents are preferably between the distance d_m between sensing-coil midpoints and the distance d_o between sensing-coil outer ends.
• Coil architecture: multi-layer spiral windings (e.g., 4 dielectric layers × ~10–20 windings each, ~75 µm line/space technology in the 1D examples; 18 mm × 6 mm and 15 mm × 6 mm coil footprints), coplanar excitation/sensing windings with vias.
• 3D fluxgate via bending (FIGS. 11–13), and FIG. 14 variant where the second magnetic structure is a thick element inserted into a 2.5D cavity.
• Experimental results (FIGS. 16–17): superior induced-voltage vs. external field versus a conventional no-second-structure fluxgate; linearity with sensitivity ~4.5 mV/µT at 100 kHz excitation, ~100 mA excitation current, external field swept ±110 µT.

---

5. Litigation / docket check (CAFC and district courts)

• No CAFC 2026 (or other) appeal involving US 11,366,181 was found.
• No USPTO PTAB proceeding (IPR/PGR) involving US 11,366,181 was found.
• Searches for the number returned unrelated CAFC materials (e.g., Neister v. Eden Park Illumination, No. 2024-1374, Rule 36 judgment entered Jan. 13, 2026, on appeal from IPR2022-00381; and a Nintendo v. American GNC appeal concerning U.S. 6,671,648). Neither concerns this patent.
• This is a negative finding based on the searches performed, not a certified litigation clearance. A definitive check would require PACER/Docket Navigator and the USPTO PTAB docket for this exact number.

---

6. Uncertainty / data-quality flags

1. Granted claim text not verified. The claim reconstruction above rests on the patent's Summary section plus a partial claim listing from the pre-grant publication; granted claims can and often do differ from published application claims.
2. PCT number mismatch. The patent text says "PCT/EP2018/058268898"; EPO family data says "PCT/EP2018/058268." Reported literally, not corrected.
3. Priority date of 2017-03-31 is confirmed by both the patent text (EP 17164386.9) and the EPO register, but Google Patents labels priority dates as "an assumption and not a legal conclusion."
4. Legal status / expiration (2038-08-30) is Google's listed adjusted expiration and carries its own disclaimer; it is not a legal conclusion.
5. Date note: your prompt states "Current Date: April 26, 2026," while the system date supplied to me is 2026-09-29. I searched the live index without date filtering; this does not affect the bibliographic data above, which is all pre-2022 except for the unrelated 2026 CAFC item.

I'll search for litigation involving US patent 11366181 across patent litigation databases.

Initial searches returned unrelated cases. Let me search litigation-specific databases more precisely.

No matches yet. Let me query litigation databases directly.

Litigation Search Report — U.S. Patent No. 11,366,181

Patent identified: US 11,366,181 B2 — "Component carrier with integrated flux gate sensor"; Assignee: AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik AG; Application No. 16/499,426; Priority date 2017-03-31; Granted 2022-06-21; Status: Active (adjusted expiration 2038-08-30).

Finding: No litigation located

Based on my searches of patent-litigation resources (Unified Patents litigation portal, RPX Insight, USPTO/PTAB materials, CourtListener/RECAP, and general web searches), I found no U.S. district court litigation, ITC investigation, PTAB proceeding (IPR/PGR/CBM), or Federal Circuit appeal involving U.S. Patent No. 11,366,181.

Searches returned only:

• Patent-office / bibliographic records (Google Patents, Justia Patents, EPO, PatentLeaderboard) confirming the patent's ownership and family.
• Unrelated cases matching fragments of the number (e.g., U.S. Pat. 9,366,181 asserted by Resonant Systems against Sony/Samsung; U.S. Pat. 7,454,002; Uniloc matters). These involve different patent numbers and are not relevant.

Case table

Important caveats

1. Coverage limitation. No comprehensive, authoritative litigation database was directly queryable in this session (the Unified Patents case-list page, PACER, and Docket Navigator were not successfully retrieved). My conclusion rests on indirect searches that surfaced only patent-office and unrelated records.
2. This should not be treated as a definitive negative clearance. Patent litigation that is recent, sealed, or not yet indexed in the sources searched could exist without appearing in these results.
3. Purpose context. The patent covers a component-carrier–integrated flux gate sensor (a PCB/substrate-embedded magnetic field sensor). It is a manufacturing/technology patent held by an operating supplier (AT&S), which is consistent with the absence of assertion activity — but this is contextual observation, not evidence.

Recommendation to verify definitively

Because the strict instruction was to confirm against litigation-specific sources, the following should be checked directly before relying on this "no litigation" conclusion:

• Unified Patents litigation caselist — https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/caselist
• RPX Insight — https://insight.rpxcorp.com (search the patent number)
• USPTO Patent Trial and Appeal Board — https://ptacts.uspto.gov (search "11366181")
• CourtListener / PACER — https://www.courtlistener.com and https://pacer.uscourts.gov (search the patent number in complaint text)
• USPTO Patent Assignment / PatentCenter for any transfer that might signal assertion.

I did not auto-correct or normalize the number; all results above were checked against the literal digits 11366181, and no matching litigation was found.

If you can provide access to a specific docket source (Docket Navigator, Lex Machina, or a PACER docket ID), I can re-run the search against that source to confirm.

I'll verify the structured-data finding against live sources before writing anything up.

Initial searches returned only noise. Let me run targeted queries on the patent owner and the technology.

Let me try a couple more angles — the patent family's European counterpart and any litigation that could generate an IPR.

Proceedings overview

Zero AIA trial proceedings are on file against US 11366181. The structured USPTO Open Data Portal block reports no IPR, PGR, or CBM for this patent, and my independent web searches — run against the patent number, the application number (16/499,426), the pre-grant publication (US20200041582A1), the title, and the assignee name — surfaced no petition, institution decision, Final Written Decision, or appeal for this patent. Breakdown: 0 active / 0 claims invalidated / 0 claims sustained / 0 settled / 0 institution denials. The defensive read is therefore not "hardened by surviving PTAB" — it is "never stress-tested at the Board." Every claim that issued on 2022-06-21 remains live ab initio, and no petitioner has been estopped from anything.

Because there are no proceedings, there are no per-proceeding entries to populate. What follows is what I verified, what I could not verify, and how a defendant should use the blank record.

Searches performed (all returned no AIA-trial hits)

Cross-checked against the authoritative patent text supplied in the prompt (https://patents.google.com/patent/US11366181/en): assignee AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik AG, filed 2018-03-29, priority 2017-03-31, granted 2022-06-21, adjusted expiration 2038-08-30, status Active.

---

Strategic summary

Claim posture: fully intact, because nothing has ever been challenged. No claim of US 11366181 is canceled, disclaimed, or held unpatentable by the Board — the file is empty. There is consequently no set of "surviving claims" to enumerate: the entire issued claim set stands as granted. I did not reproduce claim text here because the authoritative source provided in this prompt contains the abstract and the specification but not the claim listing, and I will not characterize claim numbers or scope from memory. Before relying on any claim-level theory, pull the granted claims directly from the patent document rather than from this memo.

Estoppel landscape: wide open. IPR estoppel under 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(2) attaches only to a petitioner that obtains a Final Written Decision. No FWD exists, so no party — and no privy of any party — is barred from raising any prior-art ground, including grounds that "reasonably could have been raised." A defendant today may assert § 102 and § 103 combinations without any estoppel shadow, and retains the full runway of printed publications and patents as § 311(b) art. Equally, the patent owner has never had to defend its claims in an adversarial forum, so its claim-construction positions and secondary-considerations story are untested. That cuts both ways: it means greater freedom of action for a challenger, but also no roadmap of a previous petitioner's mistakes to build on.

Pattern signals: none, and the absence is explainable rather than merely accidental. The same-petitioner-multiple-IPR pattern, serial-filing pattern, and defensive-aggregator (Unified Patents, RPX, etc.) pattern are all absent — there is no petitioner at all. This is consistent with the patent owner's identity: AT&S is a PCB and IC-substrate manufacturer (a supplier into the electronics supply chain), not a patent-assertion entity. Suppliers-directed patents tend to draw IPRs only when the supplier asserts them against customers or competitors, or when a competitor wants design freedom. Neither appears to have happened here. Note also the family: the European counterpart EP 3382409 B1 shows a grant date of 2022-04-27 in the search results I retrieved; if accurate, the nine-month EPO opposition window would have closed around 2023-01-27, but I did not verify whether any opposition was filed, and I flag that as unconfirmed.

One housekeeping observation: the cross-reference in the patent text recites the international application as "PCT/EP2018/058268898" — an unusually long serial. I am quoting it literally rather than correcting it, per the interpretive rules I work under, but if you are relying on the priority chain for a § 102(b) or § 102(a)(2) date argument, pull the actual PCT publication from WIPO/Patentscope rather than trusting that string.

---

Recommended next steps

If you are a defendant weighing a validity challenge, the absence of PTAB activity is the whole story. There is no FWD to link to and no disposition to quote — I will not manufacture one. The practical consequences:

1. Your § 315(b) clock is the controlling deadline. If you have been served with a complaint alleging infringement of US 11366181, you have one year from service to file an IPR. That deadline is jurisdictional and cannot be extended. Set it the day you're served.

2. There is no estoppel to worry about, and no free ride either. You cannot piggyback on a prior petitioner's institution decision or FWD — there isn't one. You'll bear the full cost of your own petition, but you also face no § 315(e)(2) trap and no risk that a prior petitioner's ground-identity arguments bind you.

3. Where to look for the real prior art. The patent's own specification frames the field for you and hands you candidate starting references: EP 2 194 391 A1 (broad-range magnetic sensor combining flux gate and Hall sensor, post-machined magnetic region on metallization layers), DE 10 2004 052 909 A1 (PCB weak-magnetic-field sensor with soft-magnetic cores laminated above and below a base plate), and U.S. Pat. No. 6,270,686 B1 (etched-circuit-coil weak-field sensor, amorphous core with epoxy bases stacked on top and bottom surfaces). The novelty hook the applicant emphasized over that art is the dual magnetic structure — a first magnetic structure above the excitation and sensor coils and a second magnetic structure below, with the dependent claims adding the material-property and geometry limitations (differential hysteresis steepness, differing saturation fields, differing magnetic reversal loss, lateral-extension ratios relative to the coil footprint). Those limitations are where an obviousness attack will be won or lost, because the two-cover-layer sandwich is squarely suggested by DE 10 2004 052 909 A1's above-and-below laminated cores.

4. Check the non-PTAB invalidation routes. With no IPR and no reexam activity surfaced, ex parte reexamination under 35 U.S.C. § 302 (which has no § 315(b)-style bar and no estoppel) remains fully available at any time, and is often the cheaper first bite for a printed-publication-only attack. Confirm independently whether any reexam or reissue has been filed, since ODP's grant-file data and the PTAB API are separate systems and this memo's check was PTAB-focused.

5. Monitor rather than assume. The USPTO Open Data Portal PTAB ingest can lag newly filed petitions, and a petition filed in the last few weeks may not yet appear. Before you finalize a budget or rely on "no proceedings exist," re-run the check directly at PTAB E2E (https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptabweb) and the PTAB decisions library (https://www.uspto.gov/patents/ptab/decisions), and search CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com) for any appeal or parallel litigation under this patent number.

The candid bottom line: the defensive posture here is unknown, not strong and not weak. The patent has never been adjudicated by the Board, so its claims carry whatever validity presumption they earned at issuance and nothing more — but a challenger also has no precedent, no estoppel-bound prior petitioner, and no PTAB record to lean on. Treat the clean slate as an invitation to investigate the two-cover-layer obviousness position and the § 102 art the applicant itself distinguished, and treat the one-year § 315(b) date as the single most important item on your calendar.

Verification note: I could not complete all intended searches — my final queries on CourtListener, the EP counterpart opposition status, and any AT&S district-court assertion campaign were cut off by a tool usage limit. Those three remain unverified, and the conclusions above should be read subject to that gap. Nothing in this memo is legal advice, and I have not performed a validity analysis on the claims themselves.

I'll research the assignment record for US patent 11366181 and cross-reference various sources.

Let me search for the specific assignment records and inventor employment details.

Let me search for the specific reel/frame and any post-issuance transfers, plus inventor affiliations.

Assignment & Ownership Analysis — U.S. Patent No. 11,366,181

Patent: US 11,366,181 B2 — "Component carrier with integrated flux gate sensor"
Application: 16/499,426 (national phase of PCT/EP2018/058268; EP priority EP 17164386.9, filed 2017-03-31)
Granted: 2022-06-21
Original/current assignee: AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik Aktiengesellschaft (Leoben, Austria)

Source-access note (important). I was unable to retrieve the raw USPTO Assignment Center record (https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/) or the legacy Assignment Search index directly in this session — those database pages did not resolve to retrievable content, and I hit the tool-call limit before exhausting alternate queries. The assignment facts below are drawn from the Google Patents legal-events record for US 11,366,181 (which mirrors the USPTO assignment data) plus EPO/Justia/PatentLeaderboard bibliographic records. I could not confirm the reel/frame number or the recorded correspondent in this session. Treat the reel/frame field as unverified, not as "none." This is flagged explicitly rather than filled in.

---

Inventors

Pattern observations (moderate confidence):

• Mixed-affiliation inventorship. Justia and the EPO register list all five under AT&S, but the inventors appear in Silicon Austria Labs / "Advanced Sensor & Electronics Technologies (ASET)" publication records as the inventors of this exact family (EP 3 382 409 A1 / US 2020/0041582 A1). A 2020 FFG/COMET "success story" describes the work as a competence-center (ASSIC) collaboration with AT&S as the customer, naming Lenzhofer and Ortner as the research-side contributors. This is consistent with a research-institute + industrial-partner joint development, where AT&S took the assignment of record.
• Inventor attrition to third parties. Michael Ortner now carries patents at Infineon Technologies AG (4 of his 6 recorded patents), and Gavagnin also surfaces in Infineon-linked listings. This is normal career mobility in the sensor-magnetics field, not the "all inventors departed within 12 months → fire-sale" pattern the prompt flags. There is no evidence the departures coincided with a portfolio sale — the patent never left AT&S.

---

Original assignee

AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik Aktiengesellschaft
Fabriksgasse 13, 8700 Leoben, Austria.

• Primary line of business: One of Europe's largest manufacturers of high-end printed circuit boards and IC substrates (including IC substrate / "component carrier" technology). Publicly listed (Vienna Stock Exchange; AT&S is not SEC-registered, so no 10-K/8-K — it publishes annual reports under Austrian/EEA disclosure rules).
• Product embodying the claims: AT&S is a component-carrier (PCB/substrate) supplier and the patent is squarely in its core technology space (embedding a flux gate sensor in a PCB/substrate). AT&S's own annual report (FY2025/26) cites ~631 patent families / 1,008 granted rights and active embedding-technology licensing. Whether a commercial product actually practices claims 1–17 is not established here — no evidence either way.
• Current status: Operating, solvent, publicly traded. No bankruptcy, no dissolution, no acquisition of AT&S. (Distinguish from the inventor-attrition observation above — that concerns individuals, not the assignee.)

---

Assignment timeline

Chronological list of the assignment(s) of record located:

• executed n/a (not retrieved) / recorded 2020-02-19 — Reel not confirmed in this session (reel/frame field could not be pulled from Assignment Center; see source-access note)
  • Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest (USPTO code AS — Assignment)
  • Assignor: KASPER, ALEXANDER; LENZHOFER, MARTIN; ORTNER, MICHAEL; GAVAGNIN, MARCO; SCHULZ, GERNOT (the five named inventors)
  • Assignee: AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik Aktiengesellschaft
  • Correspondent: not retrieved — cannot be reported. No post-issuance recordings exist to cross-check for a recurring correspondent, so no repeat-correspondent flag can be raised.
  • Context: Initial inventor-to-company assignment (in-house/employment-type transfer) accompanying national-phase entry — the ordinary "assign to the industrial partner" step, not a reorg, securitization, or transfer-to-asserter.

No further assignments located. No change of name, no security agreement, no merger, no license recordation, no release, and no post-issuance transfer of any kind appears in the Google Patents legal-events stream for US 11,366,181. The USPTO Patent Assignment Search was not directly retrievable (see note), so this is stated as "none located," not as a certified negative.

---

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 11366181
    2017 : Priority filed in Europe
    2018 : PCT filed by AT&S
    2020 : Assignors transfer interest to AT&S
    2022 : Patent granted to AT&S

---

NPE / troll-pattern signals

---

Verdict

Insufficient data (only the original assignment — per the prompt's own definition of this category).

Justification: the only ownership event located is the inventor-to-AT&S assignment recorded 2020-02-19 (Google Patents legal events; reel/frame and correspondent not confirmed because the USPTO Assignment Center and legacy Assignment Search pages were not retrievable in this session). There is no post-issuance transfer, no shell-entity hop, no known asserter, and no litigation, so this is not NPE activity — but because the Assignment Center itself could not be read directly and the single recording's reel/frame/correspondent remain unverified, the honest classification is "insufficient data" rather than a clean "defensive/non-asserting" or "operating-company assertion" call (the latter would require an actual assertion, which the prior litigation search did not find). Practical read: US 11,366,181 sits where the vast majority of operating-supplier patents sit — owned end-to-end by its original corporate assignee, AT&S, with no NPE footprint.

Verify directly at:

• USPTO Assignment Center — https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search patent number 11366181; confirm reel/frame + correspondent)
• Legacy Assignment Search — https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html
• Google Patents legal events — https://patents.google.com/patent/US11366181/en
• RPX Insight / Unified Patents caselist / PTAB — to confirm the "no assertion" negative.

---

Contradiction / continuity flags vs. earlier sections

• The earlier Litigation summary found no suits and characterized AT&S as an operating supplier. That is consistent with this ownership analysis — no conflict.
• One caution: the patent's front-matter text as fetched renders the PCT number as "PCT/EP2018/058268898," which is malformed (an extra "898"). The correct identifier is PCT/EP2018/058268. I flag this as a likely transcription/OCR artifact in the source, not a second application — but per the operating rule I did not silently normalize it in the record above.
• The EPO/Justia records list all five inventors as AT&S-affiliated, while the Silicon Austria Labs/ASET publication records and the COMET success story place Lenzhofer and Ortner (and by extension the magnetics work) at the research center. This is a discrepancy worth noting; it does not change the assignment conclusion (AT&S is assignee of record) but it does mean inventor "employer at filing" for those two is research-center, not AT&S, and should be confirmed against the assignment instrument itself.

I'll search the USPTO records and prior-art references for US 11,366,181. Let me run several searches in parallel.

Let me retrieve the full claim set and the patent's citation list, plus verify the key cited references.

Prior-Art Analysis — US Patent No. 11,366,181 B2 ("11366181")

Note on the identifier: The number was searched literally as 11366181 and resolves to US 11,366,181 B2 (Appl. No. 16/499,426; granted 2022‑06‑21; AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik AG). No auto-correction was applied; no similar-numbered patents are reported below.

Important scope limitation (stated up front): I was not able to retrieve the complete "References Cited" list printed on the face of the granted patent (the USPTO PatentCenter/PatFT and the granted‑PDF front page were not reachable in this session). The references below are those actually cited within the patent's own specification (the "Technological Background" section, which names three documents) plus the one examination citation recorded on the EP family member EP 3 382 409 B1. There may be additional U.S. references on the printed front page that I could not verify. I flag that rather than fabricate a citation list.

---

1. References cited in the patent's specification / EP family

All four predate the 2017‑03‑31 priority date, so each qualifies as prior art under 35 U.S.C. § 102(a)(1) (printed publication) and, for B and C, also § 102(a)(2).

---

2. Element-by-element § 102 analysis against granted claim 1

Claim 1 (granted, reproduced from the record):

"A component carrier with an integrated magnetic field sensor, the component carrier comprising: layer structures comprising a plurality of electrically conductive layer structures and/or electrically insulating layer structures; an excitation coil and sensor coils arranged on the layer structures; a first magnetic structure above the excitation coil and the sensor coils; a second magnetic structure below the excitation coil and the sensor coils."

The four elements are: (a) stacked conductive/insulating layer structures; (b) excitation coil + sensor coils on the layer structures; (c) a first magnetic structure above the coils; (d) a second magnetic structure below the coils.

B. DE 10 2004 052 909 A1 — the most serious § 102 reference

This is the only one of the four that discloses two soft‑magnetic structures on opposite sides of a set of excitation/detection circuit patterns:

• (a) ✔ base plate (110) + outer layers = a laminate layer structure;
• (b) ✔ "a first trace portion (20, 20′) for excitation and a first trace portion (40, 40′) for detection on each of the sides," plus second excitation/detection circuits on the outer layers, interconnected by through‑holes;
• (c) ✔ soft‑magnetic‑core bodies "laminated on top … of the base plate (110)";
• (d) ✔ the same core bodies "laminated on … the bottom of the base plate (110)."

Assessment: Reference B discloses every element of claim 1 in substance and is the strongest § 102 candidate. Distinguishing features that a patentee would rely on are: (i) DE'909 winds the coils around the cores (solenoidal, via through‑holes) rather than laying the coils between two plate‑like cores; (ii) DE'909's two axes are perpendicular to one another (not the coplanar excitation/sensor‑coil arrangement emphasized in the specification at claims 2 and 11); and (iii) DE'909's cores are a plurality of bars/rectangular rings rather than the continuous single‑material foil/plate recited in claims 3–4. These differences are enough that a § 103 rejection (optionally in view of reference A) is more likely than a clean § 102 anticipation, but on the bare text of claim 1, reference B comes close to anticipation.

A. EP 2 194 391 A1 — anticipates only if "second magnetic structure" is ignored

• (a) ~ semiconductor substrate with metallization layers (arguably a "layer structure," but not a component carrier in the PCB/substrate sense);
• (b) ✔ square‑shaped energizing coil underlying four sensing coils (a 2D/3D flux‑gate);
• (c) ✔ a single cross‑shaped magnetic core above the coils;
• (d) ✘ no second magnetic structure below the coils is disclosed.

Assessment: Reference A does not anticipate claim 1 — element (d) is missing. It is directly relevant to dependent claim 2 (coplanar excitation/sensor coils), claim 11 (spiral‑square windings, straight line through mid‑points), and the 2D/3D flux‑gate subject matter. Expect it as a § 103 secondary reference rather than a § 102 reference.

C. U.S. Pat. No. 6,270,686 B1 — different topology; does not anticipate claim 1

Discloses an amorphous core (two amorphous thin boards on opposite sides of an epoxy base) with etched coil X, coil Y and circular patterns on epoxy bases stacked on the top and bottom of the core. There is one magnetic core with coil layers on both of its faces — the inverse of claim 1's "core above / core below the coils" sandwich. Element (d) as claimed is not disclosed; and the reference is directed to a sensor manufactured on etched epoxy base boards, not a component carrier in the recited sense. No § 102 anticipation of claim 1. Relevant at most as background under § 103.

D. US 2012/0126799 A1 (Schatz et al.) — § 103 reference

Raised during prosecution of the EP family member. It was not re‑evidenced here; it is a magnetic‑field‑sensor document and is best treated as a § 103 combination reference, not a standalone § 102 anticipation of claim 1. I could not retrieve its full text in this session, so the claim mapping is flagged as unverified.

---

3. Forward citations observed (context only, NOT prior art)

While searching, I saw US 11,366,181 B2 appearing in the citation graphs of US 10018687 B2 (Texas Instruments, "Integrated fluxgate magnetic sensor and excitation circuitry," filed 2013‑08‑15) and US 6,429,651 (differential spiral magnetic field sensing device). These are later/parallel documents citing or being cross‑linked to 11366181, not references it cites, and are therefore not § 102 art against it. I did not verify the direction of each citation and flag them as unconfirmed.

---

4. Bottom line

The claimed point of novelty — two magnetic structures respectively above and below a common plane of excitation and sensor coils, with deliberately different materials/hysteresis so the upper core saturates while the lower core does not (claims 3–6, spec ¶ on MetGlas 2714A vs. Vitrovac 6155U55F) — is what separates this patent over the cited art. None of the four references above is shown to disclose the different‑material / selective‑saturation limitation.

---

5. Caveats and verification gaps

1. The face‑of‑patent "References Cited" list was not retrieved. The four documents above are those named in the specification and in the EP family prosecution record. Additional U.S./foreign references ("U.S. Patent Documents" on the front page) may exist and are not covered here.
2. Granted claims. Claims 1 and 2–13 were retrieved from a secondary (Justia) rendering and matched the specification's Summary; a method claim (spec ¶ "a method of manufacturing a component carrier with integrated fluxgate sensor…") is likewise present, but I could not read the granted method claim's exact wording or confirm the total claim count.
3. § 102 vs. § 103. The mapping above is a legal‑style sketch, not a validity opinion. Reference B's disclosure, while close, turns on claim construction of "above/below the … coils" versus DE'909's "coils wound around cores."
4. Reference D was identified only via the EPO register annotation ("Citation (examination) US 2012126799 A1 … SCHATZ FRANK [DE]"); its full text and the examiner's mapping were not retrieved.
5. PCT‑number discrepancy noted previously still stands: the patent text literally reads "PCT/EP2018/058268898," while EPO DOCDB lists "EP 2018058268 W." Reported literally; not corrected.

If you can supply the granted‑PDF front page (the "References Cited" block) or a PatentCenter claims view, I can complete the citation list and re‑run the § 102 element mapping against the exact granted language.

I'll pull details on each prior-art reference cited on the patent's face/page, since the § 103 analysis must be grounded in what those references actually teach.

Let me try to retrieve the granted claim set, which the earlier sections flagged as unverified, since § 103 must be analyzed against actual claim language.

Obviousness Analysis Under 35 U.S.C. § 103 — U.S. Patent No. 11,366,181 B2

Patent: US 11,366,181 B2, "Component carrier with integrated flux gate sensor" (AT&S Austria Technologie & Systemtechnik AG; app. 16/499,426; effective filing 2018-03-29; priority EP 17164386.9, 2017-03-31; granted 2022-06-21).

Sources used: the three references discussed in the patent's own Technological Background / prior-art section (the "Prior Art" content on the Google Patents page at https://patents.google.com/patent/US11366181/en), plus the family/publication records for those references. Where I reached beyond the page's own prior-art section, I say so.

---

0. Threshold corrections and caveats (flagging contradictions with the earlier sections)

1. Claim text — now obtained, and it corrects the earlier sections. The prior "Patent summary" section could only offer a structural reconstruction of claim 1 and could not confirm the claim count; the "Litigation summary" carried the same limitation forward. I have now retrieved a rendered claim set from Justia's page for this patent (https://patents.justia.com/patent/11366181). It shows 15 claims, with independent claims 1 (apparatus) and 15 (method). Two specific corrections to the earlier sections:

   • The earlier summary speculated that "Claim 14 recites two operation modes…" — confirmed in the listing.
   • The earlier summary stated "Claim 16 is a dependent claim referring back to 'the component carrier according to…' — i.e., the claim set mixes apparatus and method categories, and at least one further claim category reference exists." This is contradicted. The listing contains no claim 16; the set ends at claim 15 (method). Treat the claim-16 statement as an error.
   • Caveat: Justia is a secondary source, and my retrieval of claim 14/15 was truncated mid-sentence. The claim text below should be verified against the USPTO granted-claims record before being relied on formally. Nothing in the analysis turns on the truncated portions.

2. Difference between the granted claim and the pre-grant publication. Granted claim 1 recites the coils "arranged on the layer structures," whereas the specification and abstract speak of "on and/or in" the layer structures. The narrower "on" wording slightly reduces the claim's coverage of fully-embedded coil designs but does not affect the analysis below.

3. The prior-art universe used here is the one the patent itself identifies. The Background (a) quotes a conventional planar flux gate sensor having "a magnetic core of a generally elongated shape overlying an energizing coil," with sensing coils "underneath the ends of the magnetic core," and (b) discusses three specific documents: EP 2 194 391 A1, DE 10 2004 052 909 A1, and U.S. Pat. No. 6,270,686 B1. The single-core "core-over-coil" planar flux gate is therefore an admission of prior art / applicant-admitted prior art and can be used against the claims. In re Frye, 418 F.2d 384 (CCPA 1969); Riverwood Int'l Corp. v. R.A. Jones & Co., 324 F.3d 1346 (Fed. Cir. 2003); MPEP § 2129.

4. AIA applies. The earliest effective filing date (2017-03-31) is after 2013-03-16, so AIA §§ 102/103 govern. All three references are printed publications / granted patents published well before 2017 and thus qualify as § 102(a)(1) art.

---

1. The three references and what they actually teach

A. DE 10 2004 052 909 A1 (published 2006-03-16; PC — "Gedruckte Leiterplatte mit einem Sensor für ein schwaches Magnetfeld")

https://patents.google.com/patent/DE102004052909A1/en · https://patents.google.com/patent/DE102004052909B4/en

• This is the most material reference, because it is a PCB-integrated weak-magnetic-field sensor with soft-magnetic cores laminated on both sides of the coil-bearing base plate. The claim-1-equivalent product claim recites: "eine Basisplatte (110), auf welcher ein erster Leiterbahnabschnitt (20, 20′) für eine Anregung und ein erster Leiterbahnabschnitt (40, 40′) für eine Detektion auf jeder der Seiten gebildet ist, Körper mit einem Weichmagnetkern, die jeweils oben und unten an der Basisplatte (110) laminiert sind … äußere Schichten … auf welchen ein zweiter Leiterbahnabschnitt (30, 30′) für eine Anregung und ein zweiter Leiterbahnabschnitt (50, 50′) für eine Detektion … mittels Durchgangslöchern verbunden sind, gebildet sind, um jeweils die Weichmagnetkerne zu umgeben." (DE102004052909B4 claim 1.)
• Method claim 6(?) teaches the process: (A) provide a base plate with first excitation/detection traces; (B) "sequentielles Laminieren eines Isolators, der … Körper mit einem Weichmagnetkern, eines Isolators und einer Kupferfolie auf die erste Seite … und … auf die zweite Seite"; (C) form second excitation/detection traces in the copper foil connected to the first ones to be wound around the soft-magnetic cores.
• Stated motivation to add core material and reduce drive energy: "[Betreffend] einen hoch miniaturisierten Sensor für ein schwaches Magnetfeld … sowie ein Verfahren zur Herstellung derselben"; and the solution is "die Querschnittsfläche des Weichmagnetkerns erhöht ist, so dass ein schwaches Magnetfeld, wie z. B. ein Erdmagnetfeld, präzise detektiert werden kann," and "das schwache Magnetfeld mit einer exzellenten Sensitivität zu erfassen, selbst wenn die Anzahl der Windungen des Schaltkreises für eine Anregung und des Schaltkreises für eine Detektion reduziert ist, da die Querschnittsfläche des Weichmagnetkerns erhöht ist" ([0116]–[0118]).
• The board is explicitly a PCB fabricated by lamination of insulator and copper foil ([0026] step B) — i.e., a laminate-type component carrier with insulating and conductive layer structures.
• Family includes the English-language US 7,394,249 B2 and US 2006/0001422 A1 (Justia: https://patents.justia.com/patent/[7394249](/patent/7394249)) and JP 2006-041466 A — useful, because a § 103 analysis should tie teachings to a reference in a language/record that is easy to evidence.

Net: DE '909 discloses elements (a)–(d) of claim 1: conductive/insulating layer structures of a PCB; excitation traces and detection traces formed on those layers; and a soft-magnetic core body laminated above and another below the coil-bearing plate. Its own object is the same object as the '181 patent (miniaturization + sensitivity + reduced winding count/energy).

B. EP 2 194 391 A1 / US 2010/0134101 A1 (published 2010-06-09) — "Broad range magnetic sensor and manufacturing process thereof" (STMicroelectronics)

https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/99/fc/d5/435a80e04a3476/EP2194391A1.pdf · https://patents.google.com/patent/US20100134101

• Discloses a planar flux gate with "an energizing coil overlying four sensing coils and underlying a magnetic core"; the energizing coil "is generally square-shaped and the magnetic core is cross-shaped and includes a first arm and a second arm, perpendicular to one another"; sensing coils "set in pairs with vertical axes passing in the proximity of the ends of the arms of the magnetic core."
• Discloses the flux-gate operating principle invoked verbatim by the '181 patent: excitation current saturates the core; the two halves of an arm magnetize oppositely; the pair of sensing coils differentially reads the external field; the differential voltage "is non-zero and is amplitude-modulated by the intensity of the external field." A second perpendicular arm gives a second axis (2D).
• Discloses dual use of the magnetic region: it is "the magnetic core of the fluxgate sensor [and] forms also a concentrator for the Hall sensor" — i.e., the art already recognizes that a magnetic structure can be added purely to concentrate/guide flux, distinct from the readout transducer.
• Discloses that the magnetic region "is manufactured in a post-machining stage on the metallization layers wherein the energizing coil and sensing coil of the fluxgate sensor are formed."

Net: EP '391 supplies the flux-gate coil geometry (square/rectangular spirals; sensor coils flanking a central excitation coil; midpoint axis; cross-shaped magnetic region) and the flux-concentration rationale — but its coils are not coplanar (the energizing coil overlies the sensing coils) and it has only one magnetic structure (above).

C. U.S. Pat. No. 6,270,686 B1 (granted 2001-08-07; AP One System) — "Method of making a weak-field magnetic field sensor having etched circuit coils"

https://patents.google.com/patent/[US6270686B1](/patent/US6270686B1)/en (parent US 5,936,403, 1999-08-10)

• Discloses a laminate-compatible, mass-producible weak-field sensor in which etched coils replace wire coils: "a certain pattern is etched on an epoxy base thin board with the capacity for vertical conductivity. Circular patterns are etched on the front and on the back surface of the amorphous thin boards. These amorphous thin boards are stacked on both sides of the above mentioned epoxy base to form an amorphous core."
• The coil/core stack: "A coil Y is etched on one epoxy base while a coil X is etched on the other epoxy base … These two epoxy bases and the amorphous epoxy base are stacked relative to one another on the top surface and on the bottom surface of the aforesaid amorphous core." (US 5,936,403 claims 1–3.)
• The amorphous core "is formed from at least two amorphous thin boards" — i.e., foils/sheets of high-permeability amorphous magnetic material sandwiched in a laminated dielectric stack.
• Stated purpose: "Coil positioning technology is not required… It is possible to make a thin and small sensor… It is also capable of being mass produced."

Net: US '686 teaches (i) the use of etched (PCB) coils rather than wound coils, (ii) thin amorphous magnetic foils/sheets as the core in a laminated stack, and (iii) a magnetic structure and coil layers on opposite sides of one another ("coil/core/coil", the mirror image of the '181 "core/coil/core" stack) — i.e., the same flux-sandwich concept, arranged symmetrically about a plane.

---

2. The governing standard

Under Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1 (1966), and KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007), the question is whether the differences between the claimed subject matter and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious to a person having ordinary skill at the time of the invention (here, 2017). The POSITA is a sensor/packaging engineer with a degree in EE or materials science plus several years of experience in magnetic field sensors and/or PCB laminate processes, and is presumed to know all the pertinent prior art. In re Winslow, 365 F.2d 1017 (CCPA 1966).

A motivation to combine can come from the references themselves, from the knowledge of the POSITA, from the nature of the problem to be solved, or from market demand. KSR, 550 U.S. at 418–21. Where a claim recites a structure assembled from known elements according to known methods and yields only predictable results, the claim is obvious. Id. at 417, 426. A teaching that any one of several enumerated ways of performing a step will suffice, or a "finite number of identified, predictable solutions," is strong evidence of obviousness. Id. at 421. MPEP §§ 2141–2144.03.

---

3. Claim 1 — element-by-element

Claim 1: "A component carrier with an integrated magnetic field sensor, the component carrier comprising: layer structures comprising a plurality of electrically conductive layer structures and/or electrically insulating layer structures; an excitation coil and sensor coils arranged on the layer structures; a first magnetic structure above the excitation coil and the sensor coils; a second magnetic structure below the excitation coil and the sensor coils."

Conclusion on claim 1: DE '909 discloses every limitation. If "above"/"below" is construed purely as relative orientation of magnetic structure(s) with respect to the coil plane, DE '909 is a § 102 anticipation, and at minimum renders claim 1 obvious under § 103. If one construes the claim to require both magnetic structures to be outside a common plane in which the excitation and sensor coils both lie (i.e., a true sandwich of a single coplanar coil plane), DE '909 still renders it obvious — the only "difference" is the ordering of laminations, which is (a) disclosed in the alternative by US '686 ("coil/core/coil" sandwich), and (b) at most a rearrangement of layers, a predictable design choice with no new result. In re Japikse, 181 F.2d 1011 (CCPA 1950) (rearrangement of parts); MPEP § 2144.04.

---

4. The obviousness grounds

Ground 1 — § 103 over DE 10 2004 052 909 A1 alone

Rationale: same field (weak-field magnetic sensors integrated into PCBs by lamination), same problem (miniaturized, sensitive, low-power), and the reference expressly discloses soft-magnetic cores on both sides of the coil-bearing plate with excitation and detection traces on the layer structures. Nothing in claim 1 requires more. Even if the examiner viewed the "above/below" recitations as a difference, the result (flux guiding/concentration on both sides of the coils) is a predictable consequence of a symmetric core arrangement the reference already motivates to increase sensitivity.

Ground 2 — § 103 over DE '909 in view of EP 2 194 391 A1

• From DE '909: the component-carrier architecture and the two-sided soft-magnetic structure (as above).
• From EP '391: the flux-gate transducer topology — central square/rectangular spiral excitation coil flanked by sensing coil pairs whose lateral mid-points lie on a straight line through the excitation coil midpoint, with a cross-shaped magnetic region serving simultaneously as core and flux concentrator.
• Motivation: DE '909 seeks greater sensitivity at reduced winding count/energy; EP '391 teaches that a magnetic region can be deliberately shaped and sized to concentrate flux into the sensing locations. Combining them — i.e., shaping/duplicating the magnetic structure around a flux-gate coil set rather than a biaxial bar-core set — is the application of a known technique to a known structure to obtain the predictable improvement each reference separately promises. KSR, 550 U.S. at 417; MPEP § 2144.03.
• This ground is the strongest for dependent claims 2, 3, 10 and 11, because EP '391 supplies (i) coplanar-adjacent coil topology (in the side-by-side "corner-to-corner" and "side-edge-to-side-edge" variants described in the specification's FIGS. 6 and 7), (ii) cross-shaped magnetic structure matching the covered coil region, and (iii) square spirals with a midpoint axis.

Ground 3 — § 103 over DE '909 in view of U.S. Pat. No. 6,270,686 B1

• From US '686: etched PCB coils in a laminated dielectric stack; amorphous magnetic foils/sheets as core material; and a symmetric arrangement in which magnetic material and coil layers lie on opposite sides of a common plane, on "both the top surface and the bottom surface."
• Motivation: US '686's express purpose — thin, small, mass-producible, no wire-winding positioning — is the same objective DE '909 pursues, and both are PCB-compatible. A POSITA seeking a compact, manufacturable flux gate for a component carrier would plainly look to US '686 for both the coil-patterning approach and the amorphous-foil core, and would adopt cores on both sides for symmetry/flux closure.
• This ground is the strongest for dependent claims 3 and 4 (foil/sheet high-permeability amorphous core material; differing materials on the two sides).

Ground 4 — § 103 over EP 2 194 391 A1 in view of U.S. Pat. No. 6,270,686 B1 (fallback, if DE '909 is distinguished)

EP '391 supplies the flux gate (excitation coil + at least two sensor coils + magnetic core above), and US '686 supplies the second magnetic body below the coil plane plus the PCB-lamination implementation. Motivation: (i) EP '391 itself uses a magnetic region as a concentrator, establishing the desirability of additional flux-guiding bodies; (ii) US '686's symmetric two-sided arrangement is disclosed as improving the sensor; (iii) both address miniaturized weak-field sensing. Whether EP '391's CMOS/semiconductor embodiment is a "component carrier" within the specification's definition (PCB, organic interposer, IC substrate) is a fact question, but the combination is properly used to show the subject matter was known and would have been combined; the component carrier itself comes from DE '909 or US '686's laminate context.

Ground 5 — all three references for the full dependent-claim set

The three references collectively account for (i) the laminate component-carrier context, (ii) the flux-gate coil/core topology, (iii) two-sided magnetic structures, (iv) etched coils, (v) amorphous foil cores, and (vi) core shapes matched to the coil footprint (cross/bars/rings). Combination of more than two references is proper where, as here, each reference is in the same field and each addresses a distinct, complementary aspect. In re Mouttet, 686 F.3d 1322 (Fed. Cir. 2012); In re Keller, 642 F.2d 413 (CCPA 1981).

---

5. Motivation to combine, in the form an office action would state it

1. Same field of endeavor: all three references are directed to planar/flux-gate weak-magnetic-field sensors realizable in laminated, etched-conductor technology.
2. Same problem: each identifies, in substance, the same deficiencies of conventional (wound-coil, single-core, bulky) flux gates — size, sensitivity, and power — that the '181 patent's Background recites.
3. Explicit suggestion in DE '909 to enlarge/duplicate magnetic core material to obtain high sensitivity at reduced winding count and reduced power — i.e., a stated reason to add magnetic structure.
4. Explicit use of a magnetic body as a flux concentrator (EP '391) — a stated reason to add a magnetic structure whose function is flux concentration rather than readout.
5. Symmetry and flux closure — a POSITA would expect a symmetric magnetic structure on the opposite side of a coil plane to improve flux capture/completion, which is precisely what US '686's "top and bottom" arrangement already does.
6. Predictability / reasonable expectation of success: combining laminated PCB processes with two-sided soft-magnetic foils and spiral coils was routine by 2017 (DE '909 already laminates soft-magnetic cores and copper foils; US '686 already presses etched coils with amorphous thin boards). The results claimed (greater sensitivity, lower drive energy) are the expected consequences.
7. Design incentives and market pressure: mobile/e-compass and geomagnetic-sensing applications demanded smaller, lower-power magnetometers (stated in both EP '391 and DE '909), supplying a "market demand" motivation recognized in KSR, 550 U.S. at 418, 421.

---

6. Dependent claims

---

7. Rebuttal of the objective indicia that figure to be asserted

The specification offers experimental results in FIGS. 16–17 (comparative induced-voltage curves; ~4.5 mV/µT at 100 kHz excitation and ~100 mA drive; linearity over ±110 µT). Expect these to be pressed as evidence of non-obviousness. They are weak for three reasons:

1. Wrong baseline / no nexus. FIG. 16's comparative curves are against "a wound magnetic core" and "a conventional flux gate sensor having no second magnetic structure." But the closest prior art (DE '909) has a second magnetic structure, on both sides. Under MPEP § 716.02 and In re Ethicon, Inc., 208 F. App'x 838 (Fed. Cir. 2006), an asserted unexpected result must be measured against the closest prior art. Comparison against a bare single-core flux gate (AAPA) shows only what the admitted prior art and DE '909 already show.
2. The data themselves show routine material substitution. FIG. 16 plots separate curves for a "transformer sheet" second structure and a "closed iron" second structure — demonstrating that the POSITA was already varying the second structure's material as a matter of course, which undercuts any claim to non-obviousness in dependent claims 4 and 5.
3. The claim covers the exact arrangement that produced the data. Where a patent asserts an advantage attributable to a claimed element the reference does not disclose, there must be a nexus; where the advantage flows from a feature already in the art, the evidence is not probative. In re Kao, 639 F.3d 1057 (Fed. Cir. 2011).

No evidence of commercial success, licensing, copying, industry praise, long-felt but unmet need, or failure of others appears in the material available to me; if such evidence exists it would need to be evaluated separately for nexus.

---

8. Bottom line

• Claim 1 and method claim 15 are, on the face of the patent's own prior-art section, invalid under § 103 — and claim 1 is arguably anticipated by DE 10 2004 052 909 A1 under § 102(a)(1) — because DE '909 discloses a PCB-integrated weak-field sensor having excitation/detection coil traces on its layer structures and soft-magnetic core bodies laminated both above and below the coil-bearing plate. EP 2 194 391 A1 and U.S. Pat. No. 6,270,686 B1 supply, respectively, the flux-gate coil/core topology and the etched-coil / amorphous-foil laminate implementation, and each supplies an independent motivation to add and shape magnetic structure (flux concentration; symmetric flux guiding) with a reasonable expectation of success.
• Dependent claims 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 15 are readily obvious over the identified combinations; claims 4 and 5 are the most defensible subject to a strong § 103 challenge built on the routine-substitution reasoning and the patent's own FIG. 16 disclosure of alternative second-structure materials; claim 13 (the 90°-bend 3D flux gate) is the least likely to fall on the three references on this page alone.
• Caveats that should travel with this analysis: (i) the claim text used is from a secondary rendering (Justia), and the granted-claims record at USPTO should be confirmed before formal reliance — this resolves, but does not fully discharge, the verification gap flagged in the earlier "Patent summary" section, and it contradicts that section's statement that the set contains a "claim 16" mixing apparatus and method categories; (ii) I did not obtain the prosecution history (e.g., any examiner's § 103 rejections and applicant's remarks), which is where the actual record-based obviousness posture of each claim would be established; (iii) I did not obtain the full "Patent Citations"/"Cited By" listing for US 11,366,181, so additional art cited during prosecution (and its file-wrapper treatment) is not reflected here.

Key URLs

• Patent: https://patents.google.com/patent/US11366181/en ; claims via https://patents.justia.com/patent/11366181 ; EP counterpart: http://data.epo.org/pise-server/rest/collections/lgpi/EP3382409B1.pdf
• EP 2 194 391 A1: https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/99/fc/d5/435a80e04a3476/EP2194391A1.pdf ; US 2010/0134101: https://patents.google.com/patent/US20100134101
• DE 10 2004 052 909 A1/B4: https://patents.google.com/patent/DE102004052909A1/en ; https://patents.google.com/patent/DE102004052909B4/en ; US family member: https://patents.justia.com/patent/7394249
• US 6,270,686 B1: https://patents.google.com/patent/US6270686B1/en ; parent US 5,936,403: https://patents.justia.com/patent/[5936403](/patent/5936403)