PTAB

IPR2016-00036

Costco Wholesale Corp v. Robert Bosch LLC

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Key Events
Petition

1. Case Identification

2. Patent Overview

  • Title: Windshield Wiper Blade
  • Brief Description: The ’905 patent discloses a windshield wiper assembly featuring a flexible spring support element, a rubber wiper strip, and a wind deflector. The patent purports to solve problems of cost, weight, and stiffness associated with prior art solid wind deflectors by claiming an assembly with a hollow wind deflector strip.

3. Grounds for Unpatentability

Ground 1: Claims 13, 17, and 18 are obvious over Prohaska in view of Hoyler.

  • Prior Art Relied Upon: Prohaska (U.K. Patent No. G.B. 2,106,775) and Hoyler (German Patent No. DE1028896).
  • Core Argument for this Ground:
    • Prior Art Mapping: Petitioner argued that the combination of Prohaska and Hoyler teaches every limitation of the challenged claims. Prohaska was asserted to disclose the core inventive concept: a lightweight, hollow wind deflector (spoiler) with a generally triangular cross-section, designed to counteract aerodynamic lift at high speeds. Prohaska also discloses spoilers with curved concave ("fluted") surfaces. Hoyler was presented as disclosing the underlying modern "beam blade" structure, including elongated, spring-elastic support elements, end caps, and a central wiper arm connector. For dependent claims 17 and 18, Petitioner contended that Hoyler further discloses end caps and a central connector with curved concave surfaces that are functionally and aesthetically equivalent to the claimed "flute." Therefore, combining Prohaska's spoiler with Hoyler's blade structure allegedly renders the claims obvious.
    • Motivation to Combine: Petitioner asserted that a person of ordinary skill in the art (POSITA), aware of the known problem of wind-lift and the established desire for lightweight components, would combine the references. A POSITA would logically select Prohaska's lightweight, hollow spoiler to improve the aerodynamic performance of a known blade design like Hoyler's. This motivation was argued to be explicit, as Prohaska teaches that its spoilers can be easily retrofitted onto existing wiper blades by clipping them onto a flexible strip. Applying this teaching to the spring support element of Hoyler was presented as an obvious design choice. For the "flute" limitations, a POSITA would be motivated to align the fluted surfaces on Prohaska's spoiler with the corresponding curved surfaces on Hoyler's end caps and connector for predictable aerodynamic continuity and improved aesthetics.
    • Expectation of Success: Petitioner contended that a POSITA would have had a high expectation of success. Combining the components would predictably result in a lightweight wiper blade with improved resistance to wind-lift, as each element would perform its known function without any change to its operating principles. The result was argued to be a simple aggregation of old elements with predictable results.
    • Key Aspects: Petitioner emphasized that neither Prohaska nor Hoyler was considered by the Examiner during the original prosecution of the ’905 patent.

4. Relief Requested

  • Petitioner requests the institution of an inter partes review and the cancellation of claims 13, 17, and 18 of the ’905 patent as unpatentable under 35 U.S.C. §103.