BPatG 9th Senate (Technical Appeal)
Decision date November 15, 2023
File number 9 W (pat) 14/22

If a mechanical engineering solution, as a general means to be considered for a large number of applications, belongs by its nature to general technical knowledge, there may already be reason to use it if the use of its functionality in the context to be assessed is objectively appropriate and no special circumstances can be identified which make its use appear impossible, difficult or otherwise impractical from a technical point of view.

The application 10 2004 003 516.4 "Covered interior component for vehicles" was received by the German Patent and Trade Mark Office on December 20, 2004 and was rejected by the examining section for class B60R by decision of April 7, 2022.

The patent applicant filed an appeal against this decision, which was notified to it on April 28, 2022, and was received by the German Patent and Trade Mark Office on May 5, 2022. In its grounds of appeal dated August 24, 2020, the appellant contradicts the statements of the examining section in the rejection decision.

The applicant considers the subject-matter of the patent claims in the current version to be novel and based on an inventive step. The applicant states that the reasoning of the examining division, according to which the skilled person would obviously consider sewing or gluing based on his knowledge of the art, is not comprehensible.

Patent claim 1 is directed to an interior component which is suitable for use in a vehicle. Such an interior component may, for example, be part of an instrument panel or a door panel of the vehicle. The interior component comprises a carrier element which is covered with a decorative layer, wherein an elastic intermediate layer is inserted between the decorative layer and the carrier element. The intermediate layer is either sewn to the decorative layer or alternatively glued to the decorative layer, whereby it is fixed to the decorative layer, thus fixing the position of the intermediate layer relative to the decorative layer.

The decorative layer, including the intermediate layer fixed to it, is applied to the carrier layer via the decorative layer. For this purpose, the decorative layer is attached to the carrier element either positively by a latching device or alternatively non-positively by a clamping device, whereby the decorative layer is only fixed to the carrier element at individual attachment points. It also follows from these specifications that the covering is realized via the decorative layer and not via the intermediate layer. The application mentions a clip element or a clip strip as a corresponding latching device.

Furthermore, by covering the carrier element with the decorative layer and fixing it as described above, the success described in claim 1 is realized, according to which this results in a soft feel of the decorative layer. However, the disclosure of the application does not reveal any special measures beyond the features already mentioned in claim 1 which are necessary for this, so that the mere provision of the features mentioned in the claim, according to which the decorative layer is fixed at individual fixing points on the carrier element, already leads to this success. The claimed intermediate layer and its fixation to the decorative layer is not absolutely necessary for the realization of this success, because according to the disclosure, the intermediate layer causes a "particularly shear-soft" surface that goes beyond this.

The interior component claimed in the present case thus differs from the invention disclosed in publication E1, since this invention does not require the intermediate layer to be bonded to the decorative layer and does not specify any alternative method of sewing it.

Publication E1 also states that the carrier element of such interior components often has a curved or bent shape. However, since the intermediate layer is attached to the decorative layer in the disclosed invention only by mounting the decorative layer on the carrier element at the moment of latching or clamping the corresponding fastening elements, the person skilled in the art will immediately recognize when studying document E1 that it is difficult to achieve a satisfactory result when mounting the intermediate layer on such curved shapes. This is because, since the intermediate layer is not separately fastened or at least pre-fixed to either the carrier element or the decorative layer before assembly, it is virtually loose, so that it is not possible to pre-position the intermediate layer in a targeted manner on the curved or bent surface of the carrier element before covering the decorative layer on the curved carrier element and there is a risk of the intermediate layer slipping.

If, in this context - here the pre-fixing of material layers - a mechanical engineering solution as a general means to be considered for a large number of applications belongs by its nature to the general technical knowledge of the engineer addressed, there may already be reason to use it if the use of its functionality in the context to be assessed is objectively appropriate and no special circumstances can be identified which make its application appear impossible, difficult or otherwise impractical from a technical point of view (cf. BGH GRUR 2014, 646 - paint supply system).

The Senate is convinced that the mutual bonding or sewing at least for the pre-fixing of different layers of an interior component represent such mechanical engineering solutions which, by their nature, are part of the general technical knowledge of the engineer addressed, even for an alternative, i.e. substitutive application, as is already demonstrated by the publication E1 itself.

An additional pre-fixing of the intermediate layer to the decorative layer by means of sewing or gluing can therefore not justify the inventive step of the subject-matter according to patent claim 1 of the main request on the basis of the teaching of document E1.

The appeal was therefore dismissed.