US 10094772

I'll first check for any live docket/litigation or assignment information, then summarize from the authoritative patent text.

Docket / litigation check (searched 2026-04-26)

• USPTO PatentCenter / assignment data: I could not reach PatentCenter directly; the authoritative record I have is the Google Patents mirror of the official text plus the assignment/legal-events entries it reproduces. Those entries show only prosecution and assignment events — no inter partes review, reexam, or terminal disclaimer.
• CAFC 2026 dockets: I searched and found no Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit docket for US 10094772. No district-court action naming Coatmaster AG or Coatchecker GmbH involving this patent surfaced either. The searches returned mostly unrelated noise (unrelated patents, Coatmaster product PDFs), so treat "no litigation found" as absence of evidence, not verified negative — a PACER/Docket Navigator query would be needed to confirm.
• One substantively relevant hit did surface: the EP family member EP 3255421 B1, whose granted claim 1 differs from the US claim set (see note below). That is context, not US prosecution history.

Bibliographic summary — US 10094772

Abstract (as issued)

A device (100) for the contactless non-destructive testing of a surface (106) by measuring its infrared radiation includes an electromagnetic radiation source (1) emitting excitation radiation which is directed onto the surface (106) to be tested (26), a detector (9) arranged in a direction towards said surface (106) and a first IR filter medium (2) provided between the radiation source (1) and the surface (106). In response to radiation impinging onto the surface (106), detection radiation is emitted by the surface (106) and fed to the detector (9). At least a second filter medium (3) is provided between the first filter medium (2) and the surface (106) to be tested (26), wherein a space (24) is provided between the first and the second filter medium (2, 3) creating a coolant channel and being connected to a coolant drive for actively exchanging the fluid for the cooling fluid circulation (4).

Plain-language overview of the independent claim

Claim 1 is the only independent claim. It is a device claim (an apparatus), and it requires all of the following elements in combination:

1. One or more electromagnetic radiation sources arranged to emit excitation radiation that can be aimed at the surface under test. (The description notes these emit outside the IR range — e.g. flash/xenon-type lamps — and that "incoherent" sources are contemplated.)
2. A detector on a detection axis pointed at the surface under test (the IR sensor that measures the returning heat radiation).
3. A first IR filter medium between each radiation source and the surface — i.e. the excitation beam passes through an IR-blocking/spectrally selective window before reaching the part.
4. At least a second filter medium between the first filter medium and the surface — so two filter media lie in the excitation path, the second one closest to the part.
5. A first coolant channel formed as the space between the two filter media, with the caveat that the channel is connected to a coolant drive that actively exchanges the fluid (not a passive/sealed gap).
6. First and second insulation walls between the source(s) and the detector, with a second coolant channel formed by the space between those two insulation walls.

Operative logic recited: excitation radiation impinges on the surface; the surface emits detection radiation in response; that radiation is collected by the detector.

Practical reading: The invention is a photothermal/active-thermography coating-thickness gauge whose novelty over the cited prior art (principally US 2013/0037720, Winterthur Instruments) is not the measurement principle itself but the thermal management architecture — a double-glazed, actively cooled filter stack in front of the lamp, plus a matching cooled double-wall shield between the lamp and the IR detector. This lets the instrument run high-energy excitation for long exposures (specification: 0.1–1000 s, preferably 1–100 s) sufficient to heat coatings up to several mm thick on thick substrates like concrete/cement, in a handheld form factor, without the lamps, filters, or shielding walls becoming spurious IR emitters that corrupt the detector reading.

Dependent claims 2–12 narrow that base: direct connection of the filter-media channel to the insulation-wall channel to form one continuous path (2); closed coolant circuit (3); gas + blower (4); liquid + pump (5); housing walls whose free ends bear on the test surface, creating a third coolant channel between the surface and the second filter medium (6); inert gas (7); nitrogen (8); imaging device on the detection axis to map the test surface onto the detector (9); excitation delivered at an inclination to the detection axis (10); imaging device between source and surface (11); and a control unit deriving thickness, thermal diffusivity, effusivity, conductivity, heat capacity, density, adhesion, porosity, composition, degree of hardening, or phase of coatings on a substrate (12).

Notes, discrepancies and stated uncertainty

• Only one independent claim. If you were expecting two or more independent claims (e.g. a device claim plus a method claim), that is not what this grant contains. The brief's figure descriptions reference seventh/eighth embodiments and a control unit, but those are all folded into dependent claim 12.
• US vs. EP claim scope differ — do not conflate. From the surfaced EP 3255421 B1 text, the European granted claim 1 appears to require the radiation axis and detection axis to be parallel with a collimating mirror between source and surface — the FIG. 6 configuration. US claim 1 contains no such requirement; it instead recites the two insulation walls and second coolant channel directly in claim 1. So the US independent claim is not simply a translation of the EP independent claim.
• Claim terminology quirks (quoted literally, not corrected): claim 1 says "measuring its infrared radiation thereof"; claim 1 is drafted as "at least a second filter medium"; and in the specification the figures are variously numbered/described (e.g. FIG. 3 is described as having "the absence of dedicated coolant channels," which sits in tension with claim 1's mandatory first coolant channel + coolant drive). A validity/claim-construction analysis should treat those as claim-drafting artifacts rather than substantive limits.
• What I could not verify authoritatively: live USPTO PatentCenter fee/status entries, the actual recorded assignment documents (REEL/FRAME 044283/0696 and 052260/0139 are cited in the provided text but not independently confirmed by me), and any litigation or CAFC activity. My searches for the docket returned no relevant results, which may reflect search coverage limits rather than true absence.

I'll search for litigation involving US patent 10094772 across litigation-tracking sources.

Let me try more targeted searches on litigation-specific databases.

Summary

No litigation involving US Patent 10,094,772 is known based on my searches. I was unable to identify any district court litigation, ITC action, or PTAB proceeding asserting or challenging this patent.

What I searched and what I found

Key context from the patent record itself

The Google Patents record for US 10,094,772 B2 shows:

• Current assignee: Coatmaster AG (Switzerland); originally CoatChecker GmbH (reassignment Sept. 5, 2019, change of name effective June 5, 2019)
• Application no.: US 15/618,841; granted Oct. 9, 2018
• Priority: EP application 16 001 320.7, filed June 10, 2016 (EP equivalent: EP3255421B1)
• Legal status: Active; maintenance fees paid (4th yr. 2022; 8th yr. 2026); anticipated expiration June 9, 2037
• The only third-party patent references cited are ordinary prior-art citations (e.g., US 2013/0037720 to Winterthur Instruments AG; DE 102012103975B3), not litigation parties.

Notably, the Google Patents page contains no litigation data whatsoever — no "Litigation" panel, no asserted-patent flags, and no related case entries. Combined with the absence of any hits in the litigation trackers I queried, the best-supported conclusion is that this patent has not been involved in any known patent lawsuit as of the current date.

Important caveats

1. This is a negative finding, not proof of absence. Litigation databases (Unified Patents, Docket Navigator, Lex Machina, RPX, PACER) are the definitive sources, and my web searches did not return direct database records for this patent number. A direct docket query on PACER (all districts) or a subscription database would be required to confirm definitively.
2. Because the patent's field is a fairly specialized instrument niche (contactless IR photothermal coating-thickness measurement) and the owner is a small Swiss entity, it is plausible no enforcement action has ever been filed — but that is an inference, not a verified fact.
3. If you need a definitive answer, I'd recommend a direct search of PACER (all district courts), the ITC EDIS system, the PTAB (P-TACTS), and a commercial litigation database by patent number, which I cannot fully interrogate with the tools available here.

Per your instruction, I have not substituted or auto-corrected the patent number — US 10,094,772 was searched literally, and no litigation matches were returned for it.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file for US 10,094,772: 0. The USPTO Open Data Portal (ODP) structured feed in this prompt returns no IPR, PGR, or CBM proceeding naming the '772 patent, and my web searches (PTAB/PTACTS petition documents, Federal Circuit blog coverage, Docket Alarm PTAB dockets, and Coatmaster/patent-owner enforcement coverage) surfaced no AIA trial, no Final Written Decision, no institution decision, and no Federal Circuit appeal involving this patent. Breakdown by status is therefore: active 0 / claims invalidated 0 / claims sustained 0 / settled 0 / institution denied 0.

Bottom-line defensive posture: all 12 claims of the '772 patent are UNTESTED at the PTAB. This is not a "hardened" patent that has survived review — it is an untested patent. Nothing in the record prevents a defendant from filing a first IPR. But the flip side matters too: because no claim has ever been canceled and no estoppel exists against anyone, the patent owner can assert all 12 claims without any adverse PTAB record, and a defendant gets no free "IPR-ready" roadmap from a prior petitioner. The absence is best read as "no one has bothered/chosen to challenge it yet," which is common for patents asserted in a narrow, low-volume commercial space (industrial coating-thickness gauges) rather than in high-volume consumer litigation where Unified Patents or a Big-Tech petitioner typically files.

(No per-proceeding sections follow, because there are no proceedings. Everything below is grounded in the patent text and file history, not in any FWD.)

Strategic summary

Claim status. All claims are UNTESTED. The patent issued 2018-10-09 with 12 claims. Claim 1 is the only independent claim in the printed claim set; claims 2–12 all depend from claim 1. Claim 1 requires, in combination: (a) one or more electromagnetic radiation sources; (b) a detector on a detection axis toward the surface; (c) a first IR filter medium between each source and the surface; (d) at least a second filter medium between the first filter medium and the surface; (e) a first coolant channel created as the space between the first and second filter media, connected to a coolant drive for active fluid exchange; and (f) first and second insulation walls between the source(s) and the detector with a second coolant channel in the space between them. The narrower dependent claims worth noting for damages/validity purposes are claim 6 (housing walls creating a further coolant channel between the surface and the second filter medium), claim 7/8 (inert gas / nitrogen), claim 9 (imaging device on the detection axis), and claim 12 (control unit for thickness/diffusivity/etc. determination). Claims 2–5 are pure coolant-plumbing variations (directly connected channels; closed circuit; gas+blower; liquid+pump) and are the most vulnerable to a § 103 attack grounded in any cooling-system reference.

Estoppel landscape. There is no § 315(e)(2) estoppel against anyone, because estoppel attaches only after a final written decision in an instituted IPR/PGR. No petitioner, real party in interest, or privy is estopped. That cuts both ways: a new defendant has a clean slate to raise any § 102/§ 103 ground on any claim, and no prior petitioner's § 112 or art-based admissions have locked in a construction or a disclaimer of claim scope. It also means there is no prior petitioner's claim-construction record to mine in district court. If a defendant files and loses, it will be the one that creates the estoppel bar.

Pattern signals. No repeat-petitioner pattern, no PTAB-appeal history, no defensive-aggregator (Unified Patents, RPX, etc.) involvement that I could find. The patent owner chain is Coatchecker GmbH → renamed Coatmaster AG (Swiss entity, reassignment effective 2019-06-05), a small-entity owner paying 4th-year (2022-03-30) and 8th-year (2026-04-01) maintenance fees, with an anticipated expiration of 2037-06-09. A small-entity Swiss industrial vendor with a product line (coatmaster Flex/Inline/3D gauges) is the classic patent owner that asserts in a handful of district-court suits or ITC actions against competitors rather than one that generates a thick PTAB record. Family counterpart EP3255421B1 granted 2020-01-01; I found no evidence of EPO opposition, but I did not confirm that independently and you should not treat the absence as verified.

Note on the closest art already on the face of the patent. If you are considering a first IPR, the cited references in the "Patent Citations" table are the natural starting set, and two stand out: US 2013/0037720 A1 (Winterthur Instruments AG) — which is also the patent's own admitted prior art in the Background, so it is § 102(b)/§ 103-citable characterizable as prior art by the patent owner's own admission — and DE 102012103975 B3 (BAM), an active-thermography device in which a dichroic filter sits between the IR camera and the test element to block/pass two wavelength ranges (i.e., a filtered separation between excitation and IR detection). US 2006/0096677 A1 (Camm, temperature measurement and heat-treating) and US 4,708,482 (Armco, furnace lining measurement) are also on the face of the patent. I have not performed an element-by-element mapping of these references against claim 1's two-filter-medium / dual-coolant-channel architecture, and I do not know whether any of them discloses or suggests active coolant exchange in the inter-filter space — that is exactly the limitation that distinguishes claim 1 from US 2013/0037720. Do a proper § 102/§ 103 novelty and motivation-to-combine analysis before relying on any of this.

Recommended next steps

• If you are a defendant being asserted today: there is no FWD to cite and no canceled claim to point to. You cannot tell the patent owner its asserted claims are dead. Your defenses are (i) non-infringement, since claim 1 requires two physically distinct filter media with an actively driven coolant channel between them and two insulation walls with a second coolant channel — a device lacking active fluid exchange in the inter-filter space or lacking the insulation-wall pair likely falls outside claim 1; (ii) invalidity, either in district court or in a first-filed IPR.
• Timing/§ 315(b): because no prior IPR exists, the one-year § 315(b) clock runs only from service of a complaint on you. Calendar it immediately; do not let the year lapse while evaluating the cooling-channel art.
• IPR posture if you file: you would be the first petitioner, so there is no risk of a § 325(d) "same or substantially the same art previously presented to the Office" rejection based on an earlier petition — but note that US 2013/0037720 was already before the examiner during prosecution and is in the cited-art table, so expect the panel to scrutinize that reference under § 325(d) and to require you to articulate what the examiner did not consider (principally, the coolant-channel and dual-filter architecture). Anchor the petition on art the examiner did not have, and on the specific structural coupling of the second coolant channel between the insulation walls.
• If you are the patent owner side: the absence of PTAB activity is a modest positive, but the '772 patent's claim 1 architecture is narrow and the specification's own statements (radiation sources running 0.1–1000 s, preferably 1–100 s, to heat layers "up to several millimeters") create a documented, patent-owner-authored motivation to cool the filters and walls — which is precisely the rationale a petitioner will use to supply a motivation to combine a cooling reference with the admitted prior art. Consider whether continuation practice or claim-scope review is warranted before broad assertion.
• Monitoring: if you want a definitive negative, run a PTAB E2E / PTACTS party-name search for "Coatmaster AG" and "Coatchecker GmbH" on a recurring basis, plus a CourtListener docket search for those entities, since a first IPR on a patent this narrow typically follows a first infringement suit by only a few months.

Confidence statement: I have high confidence there is no PTAB activity on US 10,094,772 as of today's date based on the ODP structured feed provided and multiple web searches returning nothing. If a petition was filed within roughly the last several weeks it may not yet be indexed anywhere I can see; treat the count as "zero known" rather than a certified negative.

I'll verify the assignment chain and check for litigation, NPE listings, and corporate status before writing up.

Ownership-chain reconstruction — US 10094772 B2

Primary-source status (read this first). I could not query assignmentcenter.uspto.gov / assignment.uspto.gov directly with the tools available, and the authoritative text supplied for this patent reproduces the USPTO assignment/legal-events entries without the correspondent-of-record field. The two reel/frame entries below are therefore taken verbatim from the USPTO-derived legal events in the supplied record; correspondent names, execution dates finer than "signing dates from 2017-08-15 to 2017-08-26," and the recorded addresses could not be retrieved. I flag that gap rather than fill it. Everything marked "external" below comes from Swiss commercial-register publications (SHAB via moneyhouse.ch / lixt.ch) and company press releases, which I cite.

Inventors

Four named inventors. Three are traceable to the CoatChecker GmbH shareholder/management register; the fourth is a principal of the acquirer.

Unusual patterns — one flag, one non-flag:

• Flag (mild): the priority filing predates the original assignee's incorporation. EP 16001320.7 was filed 2016-06-10; CoatChecker GmbH was entered in the Zürich register on 2016-12-02 / published 2016-12-15 (CHE-313.092.272, Technoparkstrasse 2, 8406 Winterthur). The EP priority application was thus filed roughly six months before the entity that later took the US grant existed. Consistent with a ZHAW spin-off filing first and incorporating second — but it does mean the record for the pre-US-filing period needs the EP file (applicant of record on EP 16001320.7) to complete the chain.
• Not the "all inventors bolt within 12 months" pattern. Only one of four named inventors left before the acquisition, and he left ~9 months before the deal, with his equity and signature rights struck from the register (2020-09-07) — not in the aftermath of a sale. The other two operating-company inventors increased their holdings to a 50/50 100-unit split in the same filing, i.e. they consolidated rather than cashed out.
• Inventor straddles buyer and target: Reinke is an inventor on this patent and a co-founder/co-CEO of the acquiring company. That is an alignment-of-interest signal (both firms are ZHAW spin-offs), not an arm's-length NPE setup.

Original assignee

Coatchecker GmbH (also written CoatChecker GmbH), Switzerland — the entity named on the issued patent and on the 2017-12-04 recorded assignment.

• Registered: CHE-313.092.272, Kanton Zürich; incorporated 2016-12-02 at Technoparkstrasse 2, 8406 Winterthur; Stammkapital CHF 20,000; audit waiver declared. Later moved to Saatlenstrasse 271, 8050 Zürich (SHAB 183, 2020-09-21). Source: lixt.ch register extract.
• Statutory purpose (translated): "development, manufacture and distribution of systems for the thickness measurement of materials" — a genuine manufacturing/commercial purpose clause, not an IP-holding purpose clause.
• Primary line of business: ZHAW spin-off making non-contact photothermal coating-thickness gauges, specialised in sealing/insulation layers and millimetre-range thicknesses — precisely the "thick coating on thick substrate" use case the patent's specification addresses. Third-party profiles describe it as manufacturing and selling measuring devices for non-destructive thickness testing, with one patent filed (this one). Source: CB Insights — Coatchecker.
• Did they ship a product embodying the claims? Yes — the company is characterised as a device maker/seller, and its stated specialism matches the patent's claimed application class (coating on substrates up to several cm). The US claim set is a device claim, so a shipped gauge is the relevant embodiment; the patent's own FIG. 1 handheld-device description aligns with it.
• Current status: acquired, not dissolved and not bankrupt. coatmaster AG announced the acquisition of CoatChecker GmbH in June 2021 (trade press 2021-06-24/07-01). Sources: coatmaster release; Coatings World; Swiss trade coverage noting both are ZHAW spin-offs (HAW/fiwi).

Successor: coatmaster AG, Flugplatzstrasse 5, CH-8404 Winterthur, Switzerland — a private Swiss AG (~25–30 employees, Winterthur HQ plus Germany/US branches), selling the coatmaster Flex handheld, Atline, Inline and 3D coating-thickness systems on the Advanced Thermal Optics (ATO) platform. Its 2025 catalogue lists an excitation system with "2x forced ventilation cooled light sources" and a separate cooling unit — i.e., the assignee is still commercialising hardware in the exact architectural family claimed. Source: coatmaster product catalogue 2025 (PDF). Both assignees are privately held; no SEC 10-K/8-K exists for either.

Assignment timeline

Two recorded entries. Reel/frame and dates as they appear in the supplied USPTO-derived legal events.

• 2017-08-15 → 2017-08-26 (executed; "SIGNING DATES FROM 20170815 TO 20170826") / recorded 2017-12-04 — Reel 044283/0696

  • Conveyance: Assignment (ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST)
  • Assignor: BLEULER, ALEXANDER; STORSKOGEN, JORIS; SALIHI, NUSRET; AND OTHERS (the fourth inventor, Reinke, is the "other")
  • Assignee: COATCHECKER GMBH, Switzerland
  • Correspondent: not available in the source text — the legal-events extract does not carry the correspondent field. Would need the Assignment Center abstract page or the reel image.
  • Context: Ordinary inventor-to-company assignment perfecting title in the original assignee (the company at that point being the applicants' own spin-off vehicle). Signing ran ~2 months after the 2017-06-09 US filing and the record was lodged the same week the pre-grant publication issued (2017-12-14).

• 2019-06-05 (effective date as recorded) / recorded 2019-09-05 — Reel 052260/0139

  • Conveyance: Change of Name
  • Assignor: COATCHECKER GMBH
  • Assignee: COATMASTER AG, Switzerland
  • Correspondent: not available in the source text (same limitation as above).
  • Context: Recorded as an internal identity change only — no consideration, no third-party acquirer on the face of the record.

⚠️ Contradiction to flag — this is the single most important issue in the chain.
The recorded change-of-name (CoatChecker GmbH → Coatmaster AG, effective 2019-06-05) is inconsistent with the public corporate record on three independent points:

1. coatmaster AG's own renaming was from a different predecessor. The company that became coatmaster AG was Winterthur Instruments AG (shareholder resolution 2019-05-17; announced by the company, with "Winterthur Instruments AG is now coatmaster AG" as the headline). Source: coatmaster renaming release.
2. CoatChecker GmbH still existed under that name after the 2019 effective date. The Zürich register shows "CoatChecker GmbH" amending its statutes and moving to Saatlenstrasse 271, 8050 Zürich on 2020-09-07 (SHAB 183, 2020-09-21) — i.e. still CoatChecker GmbH ~15 months after the recorded "change of name."
3. The two companies were reconceived as separate entities until 2021. coatmaster AG announced it acquired CoatChecker GmbH in June 2021, describing them as two distinct ZHAW spin-offs.

Two readings are possible and I cannot resolve which is correct from these sources: (a) the 2019 recording genuinely effected the name change and the 2021 press was a later, separate reorganisation; or (b) the document recorded on 052260/0139 was in substance the Winterthur Instruments AG → coatmaster AG renaming and the assignor field is misattributed (or, alternatively, the 2021 acquisition was simply never separately recorded at USPTO, leaving the recorded chain to rest on a 2019 entry whose assignor caption does not match the Swiss register).
Either way, a chain-of-title opinion here must pull the actual reel 052260/0139 document image and, if the acquisition route is the true one, look for an unindexed/late-recorded CoatChecker GmbH → coatmaster AG assignment around 2021–2022. Do not treat "recorded change of name 2019" as conclusive.

If the Assignment Center has no further records: the two entries above are the complete recorded chain as reproduced in the authoritative text. No post-2019 assignment appears in the record; the 2019 change-of-name is the last recorded event, and the patent is still Active, with anticipated expiration 2037-06-09, 4th-year maintenance fee paid 2022-03-30 and 8th-year fee paid 2026-04-01, both as SMALL ENTITY.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 10094772
    2016 : EP priority application filed
         : CoatChecker GmbH incorporated in December
    2017 : US application filed
         : Inventors assign to CoatChecker GmbH
    2018 : Patent issued
    2019 : Change of name to Coatmaster AG recorded
    2021 : Coatmaster announces CoatChecker acquisition
    2026 : Eighth year maintenance fee paid

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — NOT PRESENT. Both links are Swiss operating companies with ordinary registered commercial purposes. CoatChecker GmbH: "development, manufacture and distribution of systems for thickness measurement of materials," CHE-313.092.272, 20k CHF capital (lixt.ch). coatmaster AG: a real manufacturer with ~25–30 staff, a Winterthur HQ, foreign branches and a published 2025 hardware catalogue. No "IP/Holdings/Ventures/Licensing" suffix, no Delaware/Texas registered-agent address, no product-less shell.

2. Known asserter in the chain — NOT PRESENT. Neither COATCHECKER GMBH nor COATMASTER AG appears among the listed NPE families (Acacia, Marathon, IV, IPNav, Wi-LAN, Mosaid/Conversant, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio, MPHJ, Lumen View, Round Rock, Document Generation Corp, Spangenberg entities). I found no RPX/Unified Patents asserter-directory hit for either name.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNCLEAR (data gap, not an absence). The authoritative text supplied for this patent does not include the correspondent-of-record field for either reel (044283/0696 or 052260/0139), and I could not reach Assignment Center to retrieve it. Two recorded events by the same owner-side Swiss patent department is the benign expectation here, but I have no evidence either way and decline to guess.

4. Cascading transfers — NOT PRESENT. Two events across a 21-month span, both owner-side. Not a chain of LLC-to-LLC hops; no shared-adviser or common-principal pattern is even possible to construct from the record.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — NOT PRESENT. No suit naming this patent was identified in the prior docket check, and none surfaced in this pass. The only candidate timing (2019 name consolidation, 2021 acquisition) is not followed by any assertion activity I can find.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — NOT PRESENT. No insolvency. CoatChecker GmbH went into the June 2021 transaction as a going concern with a named acquirer, and its inventors consolidated equity rather than liquidating.

7. Privateering — NOT PRESENT. The transfer direction is the opposite of privateering: an operating spin-off's patent landing inside a larger operating company in the same technology niche, with a co-founder of the acquirer named as an inventor.

8. Defensive aggregator — NOT PRESENT. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT, Unified Patents or OIN. It terminates at coatmaster AG, an operating device company — which is the inverse of the neutralisation signal.

Contextual counter-signals worth recording: maintenance fees paid through the 8th year (2026-04-01) at small-entity rates, with expiry not until 2037 — a fee profile consistent with a small operating manufacturer defending its own platform, not a volume aggregator; and the acquirer's 2025 catalogue still markets ventilation-cooled excitation units in the claimed architectural family.

Verdict

Operating-company assertion — with the explicit caveat that the "assertion" prong is not satisfied.

Justification: the recorded chain runs from the four inventors to CoatChecker GmbH (reel 044283/0696, recorded 2017-12-04) and then to coatmaster AG (reel 052260/0139, effective 2019-06-05, recorded 2019-09-05) — two Swiss operating entities, no LLC shells, no known asserter, no cascading transfers, no bankruptcy and no defensive-aggregator terminus, so all eight NPE signals are absent or at most unclear (signal 3 only, for want of correspondent data). The current assignee demonstrably ships products in the claimed technological family (coatmaster Flex / Atline / Inline / 3D, with forced-ventilation-cooled light sources), so this is an ordinary operating-company ownership chain — but since no infringement suit naming US 10094772 was found, this is best read as a non-asserting operating company, not an active plaintiff.

Caveats a reader must carry forward: (i) the CoatChecker GmbH → coatmaster AG change-of-name of 2019 conflicts with the Swiss register and with coatmaster's own 2019 and 2021 announcements (see the flagged contradiction above) — title should be verified from the reel 052260/0139 image and a check for any late-recorded 2021+ assignment; and (ii) the correspondent-of-record was not retrievable from the supplied source, so the repeat-correspondent signal is unresolved rather than negative.

Verify at: USPTO Assignment Center — https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search patent 10094772; then open reels 044283/0696 and 052260/0139 for the correspondent and address fields), and https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html as the mirrored interface.

I'll search for the patent record and its cited prior art to ground this analysis.

Let me verify the key prior-art references individually.

Let me check the remaining references I haven't yet grounded.

Prior-Art Analysis — US 10094772 B2

1. Record identification and search provenance

Target patent (verified literally, no auto-correction): US 10094772 B2 — confirmed as US 10,094,772 B2, application US 15/618,841, "Device for the contactless and non-destructive testing of a surface by measuring its infrared radiation," Coatmaster AG (originally Coatchecker GmbH), priority EP 16001320.7 filed 2016-06-10, US filed 2017-06-09, granted 2018-10-09.

Searches were run against the Google Patents mirror of the official record, FreePatentsOnline, Justia Patents, and the EPO publication server. I found no separately-published USPTO examiner citation list beyond the two citation tables reproduced in the authoritative text you supplied; those tables are the basis below.

Stated limitation: I could not reach USPTO PatentCenter's citation/IDS tab directly in this run. Accordingly, the reference list below is the one reproduced in the authoritative record ("Citations (12)" / "Patent Citations (13)"). Treat the identity of the citations as reliable and the examiner's substantive use of them as inferred, not confirmed.

Count discrepancy — flag for your file. The record contains two citation tables: one headed "Citations (12)" and one headed "Patent Citations (13)". The 13-entry table adds US 2014/0252232 A1 (Winterthur Instruments, pub. 2014-09-11), which is the continuation publication of US 2013/0037720 A1 already in the 12-entry table. So the true count of distinct cited documents is 13, comprising 11 distinct families (the two Winterthur publications being one family). I use the 13-entry list throughout.

2. Prior-art date framework

US 10094772 has an effective filing date of 2016-06-10 and was filed after 2013-03-16, so AIA 35 U.S.C. § 102 governs. Every one of the 13 cited documents has a publication date well before 2016-06-10 and therefore qualifies as prior art — the US patents and US published applications under § 102(a)(1) (patented/published) and/or § 102(a)(2) (US patent/application effectively filed before the effective filing date); the German document under § 102(a)(1) as a printed publication.

Important structural point that governs the whole § 102 analysis. US 10094772 contains one independent claim (claim 1); claims 2–12 all depend from and incorporate claim 1. A dependent claim cannot be anticipated by a reference that does not anticipate its base claim. Therefore § 102 anticipation of any claim of this patent requires a single reference disclosing every element of claim 1 plus the dependent claim's added limitation. I map against the seven claim-1 elements:

3. The cited references — citation data and descriptions

Family citing (not prior art, for completeness): DE 10 2014 218 136 B4 (Fraunhofer, pub. 2019-07-18) and CN 111381134 B — these cite the US 10094772 family; they are later in time and cannot be prior art.

4. Element-by-element § 102 analysis of the substantive candidates

4.1 US 2013/0037720 A1 and US 2014/0252232 A1 (Winterthur Instruments) — the primary reference

Discloses (a) ✅ incoherent sources (flash lamps/LEDs) directable at the surface; (b) ✅ detector on a detection axis toward the surface; (b′) ✅ imaging optics mapping the testing area onto the detector (anticipates claim 9); (c) ✅ a filter between source and surface — the ring-shaped filter device 4 that separates IR spectral portions of the lamp light; and at least a hint of claim 11 (lens between source and surface, for the detection path) and a low-IR-emissivity gold concentrator for suppressing device self-emission.

Fails: (d) ❌ only a single filter medium — no second filter medium between the first filter and the surface; (e) ❌ no coolant channel formed between two filter media, and no coolant drive actively exchanging fluid through such a channel; (f)/(g) ❌ no first/second insulation walls between source and detector and no channel between them — the reference instead relies on the reflective torus and detector placement behind it. The reference also expressly favors flash durations of ~5 ms, i.e. the short-pulse regime the present patent departs from.

Conclusion: Does not anticipate claim 1 (missing (d), (e), (f), (g)), and therefore cannot anticipate claims 2–12. It is, however, the single best § 103 reference and the natural starting point for any obviousness challenge; it is also the reference the specification itself identifies as the prior art being improved upon.

4.2 DE 10 2012 103 975 B3 (BAM)

Discloses (a) ✅ LED array directable at the part; (b) ✅ IR camera; (c) ⚠️ a dichroic filter that blocks the excitation band and transmits the detection band — but positioned in the detection device between the IR camera and the test part, not "between each radiation source and the surface to be tested"; (e-adjacent) ⚠️ an express teaching to cool the LED array with a coolant from a recirculating cooler for long-duration inspection, to suppress the source array's own thermal emission.

Fails: (d) ❌ no second filter medium; (e) ❌ no coolant channel between two filter media (the coolant cools the LED array); (f)/(g) ❌ no insulation walls and no inter-wall coolant channel.

Conclusion: Does not anticipate any claim. It is nonetheless a strong § 103 reference in combination with Winterthur, because it independently teaches the very motivation recited in the present specification (long exposure times → secondary infrared centres → remove the heat to avoid corrupting the detector).

4.3 US 4,708,482 A (Armco) — the only other reference with a real cooling/optical-filter nexus

Discloses (c)-adjacent ✅ a narrow bandpass optical interference filter in the measurement path, and temperature control of that filter (to 38 °C ± 2 °C) precisely because its passband drifts ~0.14 Å/°C; and active cooling ✅ of the enclosure by a water-cooled jacket. But it is a laser triangulation/reflectometry instrument, not photothermy: the laser is a distance probe, the "detection radiation" is scattered laser light, not thermal emission. It therefore fails (a) as claimed (no excitation source heating the surface for IR-response measurement), (d), (e), (f) and (g).

Conclusion: Does not anticipate any claim. Useful only as background evidence that (i) temperature-stabilizing an optical filter and (ii) liquid-cooling an instrument head were both known in hostile-environment optical metrology long before 2016.

4.4 US 2001/0001391 A1 (Kamieniecki)

Photo-thermal art (modulated illumination + emissivity/temperature response) for surface treatment of semiconductor wafers. No dual filter stack, no inter-filter or inter-wall coolant channels, no insulation-wall pair. Does not anticipate any claim; marginal § 103 relevance only as evidence that photothermal measurement of a modulated thermal response was routine.

4.5 US 2006/0096677 A1 (Camm)

Lamp-based RTP with pyrometry; the disclosure is concerned with stray and reflected lamp radiation reaching the detector and with lamp/window geometry — conceptually parallel to claim 1's stated purpose (preventing the lamp and the heated filter media from becoming spurious IR sources). Still: no two filter media, no coolant channel between them, no insulation-wall pair. Does not anticipate any claim.

4.6 US 2008/0117401 A1 (Nikon)

Exposure/surface-treatment tool with optical-element thermal management and purge gas around windows. No photothermal surface measurement. Does not anticipate any claim; possible § 103 support on "actively flowing gas across an optical element in the beam path."

4.7 US 2005/0274661 A1 (Jackson), US 2011/0146318 A1 (Wittmann), US 2012/0267546 A1 (Axcelis), US 2015/0322893 A1 (dHybrid), US 2006/0283790 A1 (Elkins), US 6,375,908 B1 (Kaszas-Savos)

These six have no meaningful technical nexus to claim 1's combination. On their faces they supply, at most, isolated generic hardware concepts (a coolant circuit, a blower/fan in a duct, a filter housing, a cold trap, a waste-processing kiln). None discloses a photothermal IR-response measuring instrument at all, let alone the claimed dual-filter cool-able window stack or the dual insulation-wall shield. Each fails multiple claim-1 elements and anticipates no claim. Several appear to have been swept in by keyword matches ("filter", "coolant", "blower", "heat") rather than substantive relevance; I would not rely on any of them.

5. § 102 conclusion

Bottom line: none of the 13 references cited on the face of US 10094772 anticipates any claim of the patent under 35 U.S.C. § 102. The only reference that discloses the photothermal measurement architecture at all — the Winterthur Instruments family (US 2013/0037720 A1 / US 2014/0252232 A1 / WO 2011/137547 / EP 2 567 222 B1 / US 8,766,193 B2) — discloses a single filter and no active cooling of the optical train, so the claimed combination of (d)+(e)+(f)+(g) is absent. Note the symmetry: because the US independent claim recites the dual-filter and dual-insulation-wall cooling architecture directly, whereas the EP counterpart's independent claim instead requires parallel radiation/detection axes with a collimating mirror (the FIG. 6 embodiment), a § 102 attack that works against one member will not automatically work against the other — exactly as flagged in the previously generated bibliographic section.

Where the real invalidity risk lies is § 103, not § 102: the natural combination is Winterthur (US 2013/0037720 A1 / US 2014/0252232 A1) as the base, plus DE 10 2012 103 975 B3 for the express teaching that high-power, long-duration excitation requires active cooling to kill the source's own thermal emission, plus US 4,708,482 A for temperature-stabilizing an optical filter and liquid-cooling an instrument head in a hostile environment. Whether that combination would have rendered "the space between the two filter media is the coolant channel" and "the space between the two insulation walls is a second coolant channel" obvious is the live question — and it is the dual-wall/double-glaze placement of the cooling, not cooling itself, that carries the claim.

6. Notes, discrepancies and stated uncertainty

• Two conflicting citation counts in the record (12 vs. 13). I resolved to 13 by identifying US 2014/0252232 A1 as the omitted entry. If you need the certified face-of-patent list, pull the front page of the printed patent, not the Google mirror.
• Apparent IDS noise. Six of the 13 citations (US 6,375,908 B1; US 2005/0274661 A1; US 2006/0283790 A1; US 2011/0146318 A1; US 2012/0267546 A1; US 2015/0322893 A1) have no discernible technical bearing on the claims. I have not assumed the examiner relied on them; on the face of the references, they cannot support rejection.
• The closest prior art traces to the same inventor/lineage. Nils Reinke is a named inventor on the Winterthur family (EP 2 567 222 B1) and on US 10094772. Do not assume a § 102(b)(1)(A) grace-period or § 102(b)(2)(C) common-ownership escape: US 2013/0037720 A1 published 2013-02-14, more than one year before the 2016-06-10 priority date, so it is § 102(a)(1) prior art that the grace-period exceptions cannot remove. Separately, the EP 3255421 A1 record shows a party-data change from Winterthur Instruments AG to Coatmaster AG; I flag this as an observed record entry and cannot confirm the underlying chain of title from the material available to me.
• I did not independently verify that the examiner substantively applied any of these references in a rejection, nor did I retrieve the IDS/892 forms. As noted above, PatentCenter was not reachable in this run; this analysis is built on the citation tables in the authoritative patent text and on the cited documents' own disclosures.
• References cited within the closest prior art but not on the face of US 10094772 — e.g. DE 198 30 473 C1, WO 95/16907, WO 98/05949, US 3,206,603, US 2008/0185520 A1 (all listed in EP 2 567 222 B1's search report) — were not among the 13 citations and were outside the scope of this task. They should be pulled if you are building a full invalidity position, since a § 103 combination is not limited to the face-of-patent citations.

I'll ground the § 103 analysis in the prior-art references actually listed on this patent, verifying their disclosures where I can.

Let me gather the disclosures of the remaining cited references, especially those bearing on cooling, filters, and optical housings.

Obviousness Analysis — US 10,094,772 B2 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

Scope note. This builds on the earlier sections (bibliographic data, the plain-language claim 1 walk-through, and the "only one independent claim; claims 2–12 all depend from claim 1" finding). Nothing here repeats that content. I confirmed there is no second independent claim and no method claim, so the entire obviousness inquiry collapses to independent claim 1 plus twelve dependent limitations.

Governing law/date. Effective filing date is the EP priority date, 2016-06-10; therefore the AIA version of §§ 102/103 governs. Every reference relied on below published or issued well before 2016-06-10 and qualifies as prior art under § 102(a)(1).

1. Claim 1 decomposed into elements

Elements D + E + F together are the point of novelty. A, B and C are the admitted photothermal architecture of US 2013/0037720 A1 (the application itself describes that reference in its Background as the starting point).

Level of ordinary skill (POSITA). A person with a mechanical/optical engineering degree (or equivalent) and 2–5 years' experience in non-destructive thermal testing or high-power lamp/optical-system thermal design. This is a "combination of known elements" case, so the POSITA is a person of ordinary creativity, not an automaton (KSR Int'l v. Teleflex).

2. The prior art of record (verified disclosures and URLs)

Documents that cite this patent (not prior art): DE 10 2014 218 136 B4 (Fraunhofer — thermographic examination device for near-surface structures, granted 2019-07-18) and CN 111381134 B appear only in the "Families Citing this family" list, i.e. they post-date the '772 patent. They are not available as § 102/103 art and should not be cited as such. (DE 10 2014 218 136 has a 2014 priority, so if an earlier A-publication exists it would be art — I could not confirm the A1 publication date.)

3. Primary reference alone does not anticipate claim 1

US 2013/0037720 discloses A, B, C, and also the claim 10 inclination, claim 9/11 imaging device, and claim 12 control-unit functions (thickness evaluation). It discloses a single filter device in front of the lamps — with an optional liquid fill — but not (i) a discrete second filter medium spaced from the first, (ii) a coolant channel formed by the space between two filter media with a coolant drive, or (iii) a pair of insulation walls with a coolant channel between them. So claim 1 is not anticipated; the question is whether these gaps are obvious to fill.

4. Grounds of rejection

Ground 1 (primary): Winterthur '720 in view of BAM '975, further in view of Armco '482

Why the references combine (motivation).

1. Same field, same problem, same goal. All three are optical/thermal measurement or treatment systems. '720 and BAM '975 are both active thermography for coating/layer evaluation; Armco '482 is IR/optical inspection where the target is hot and the instrument is in a hostile thermal environment. All three address the identical failure mode: heat-generated spurious radiation corrupting the optical measurement. BAM states it as the problem and prescribes the fix; Armco states it for the filter element specifically.

2. The '772 patent's own stated problem supplies the gap-filling reason. The specification (Summary) says the prior-art device "is not capable to determine such properties, if the underlying substrate is a thick body as a cement brick," nor for coatings of "1 millimeter to 10 millimeter," and the Detailed Description states the lamps run "between 0, 1 and 1000 seconds," "between 1 and 100 seconds" preferred. That is precisely the operating regime in which BAM teaches that cooling is what makes long-duration, high-output excitation usable and in which heated hardware generates secondary IR ("creates secondary infrared centers" per the '772 specification). A POSITA seeking to move from the '720's millisecond flash regime to the multi-second, high-energy regime would consult the thermography literature and find BAM's express cooling teaching.

3. Element E (space between two filter media = coolant channel with coolant drive). Two routes:

• The '720 filter device is already, in a preferred embodiment, a liquid-filled housing in front of the lamps. Once the filter is recognized as a heat-generating absorber, enclosing the cooling medium between two transmissive plates is the natural, conventional way to cool the optical element while keeping the liquid out of the lamp cavity — the classic jacketed/double-glazed window. Armco supplies the express teaching that an optical filter in such a system must be held at a controlled temperature, and its water-jacketed enclosure supplies the "coolant space between walls" concept. BAM supplies the driven recirculating coolant (Umlaufkühler) with the stated benefit of suppressing thermal self-emission.
• Alternatively, Camm (US 2006/0096677 / US 6,941,063) supplies a "cooled window disposed between the first heating source and the semiconductor wafer" — i.e., a cooled optical element in exactly the source-to-workpiece optical path recited in element C/D. A POSITA would substitute a spaced two-plate, fluid-cooled window for a single cooled window as a matter of design choice.

1. Element F (two insulation walls with a coolant channel between them). The '720 places its detector between lamp sources, so a shield between source and detector is already prudent, and the '772 specification confirms the purpose: shielding the detector "from a direct IR exposure" and from "reflected or diffracted IR exposure." Armco teaches exactly the structural solution — an enclosure/jacket with coolant between walls to hold the interior at a safe, stable temperature and prevent wall radiation from reaching the optics. Applying Armco's jacketed-wall teaching to the light shield between lamp and detector is a predictable use of a known technique for a known problem.

2. Reasonable expectation of success. BAM affirmatively reports success: cooling enables a "reliable operation" of high-output LEDs for long-duration lock-in thermography and suppresses thermal self-emission. Armco affirmatively reports success in holding an interference filter's passband stable. Nothing in the combination is unpredictable or beyond the ordinary skill of an optical-instrument designer.

Claim chart (claim 1) — Ground 1

Ground 2 (alternative for E and F): Winterthur '720 in view of Camm US 2006/0096677, further in view of Armco '482

Same logic, using Camm as the lead secondary reference for element E ("cooled window disposed between the first heating source and the semiconductor wafer" — US 6,941,063 B2). Camm is the closest structural analog to the claimed double-filter coolant channel because it places the cooled transmissive element in the excitation path rather than remote from it. This ground avoids any reliance on the LEDs-vs-broadband-lamp distinction and on BAM's "no filter in front of the source" statement (see § 5).

Ground 3 (dependent claims — see table)

5. Counterarguments (why the rejection is contestable)

I should flag these honestly; they are the points a patent owner would press, and some are substantive:

1. BAM '975 arguably teaches away from element C/D. Although the dichroic filter blocks the excitation band, BAM expressly says the benefit is obtained "without the need for additional filters immediately in front of the light source" (ohne die Notwendigkeit von zusätzlichen Filtern unmittelbar vor der Lichtquelle). The claimed arrangement places both filter media in front of the source. A panel could find BAM's express statement points away from, rather than toward, the claimed location of the filter stack — which defeats using BAM as the primary source for D and E.

2. No reference discloses the two coolant channels as a combined architecture. Element E (space between two filters as a coolant channel) and element F (space between two insulation walls as a coolant channel) are, on the present record, only separately suggested (cooled window; cooled jacket/filter housing). The specific architecture — two stacked filter media flooded with circulating coolant in the excitation path, plus a coincident coolant-flooded double wall between lamps and detector — is not shown in any one reference. Obviousness therefore depends heavily on a "known technique for a known problem" rationale and risks a hindsight challenge (In re Warner, KSR caution against "a search for a reason to combine").

3. The '720 reference solves the same problem differently. '720 addresses spurious IR by (a) low-emissivity gold reflection surfaces, (b) the ring filter and (c) a liquid-filled filter housing — none of which is a driven coolant channel. A POSITA starting from '720 might view its approach as already sufficient for the flash regime; the move to the multi-second regime is the '772 inventor's insight, and may be argued as a non-obvious operating-range change.

4. Claim 2 has no supporting art of record, and claims 6–8 (third channel, inert gas, nitrogen) are only weakly supported. If claim 1 falls, claims 2 and 6 are the likely additional weak points for the patent owner; if the rejection of claim 1 is sustained, claim 2 would need a design-choice rationale that is genuinely thin.

5. Source-type mismatch. BAM's thermal-management teaching is tied to LEDs; the '720/'772 use broadband (xenon) flash lamps whose IR output is the very thing filtered. A patent owner will argue that a POSITA would not import an LED-based cooling philosophy into a broadband lamp system without more.

6. Bottom line

• Claim 1: Not anticipated, but reasonably rejectable as obvious over US 2013/0037720 A1 in view of DE 10 2012 103 975 B3 and US 4,708,482 A (with US 2006/0096677 A1 / US 6,941,063 B2 as the alternative teaching for the cooled element in the excitation path). The motivation is strong and document-grounded: (i) same field and same failure mode; (ii) BAM expressly identifies thermal self-emission as the limiting interference source and prescribes circulated-liquid cooling to enable long-duration, high-power thermography; (iii) Armco expressly teaches that the optical filter itself must be held at controlled temperature and shows a coolant-jacket enclosure; (iv) Camm expressly teaches a cooled window in the lamp-to-workpiece optical path. This is the classic KSR "known technique to address a known problem" case — a predictable, non-unpredictable solution with an affirmatively reported expectation of success.
• Strongest independent basis for the rejection is Ground 1, because it uses the applicant's own admitted starting point ('720) and fills the two identified gaps (cooled filter stack; cooled shield walls) with two references that address exactly those gaps.
• Weakest link in the rejection is BAM's express statement that no filter is needed immediately in front of the light source, coupled with the absence of any single reference disclosing the two-channel architecture. A patent owner's non-obviousness argument built on those two points is credible, and Ground 2 (Camm as the lead for the cooled excitation-path element) is the better hedge against it.
• Claims 9, 10, 11 and 12 are essentially subsumed by the primary reference, and claims 3, 4, 5, 7 and 8 are ordinary predictable variations. Claims 2 and 6 are the limitations with the weakest support from the prior art of record and are where the analysis should be focused if the rejection is to be sustained claim-by-claim.

Caveats. This is a paper analysis from the references listed on the patent; I did not have access to the examiner's actual § 103 rejections or the applicant's remarks, nor to PACER/Docket Navigator, and the specific content of the Jackson, Elkins, Nikon, Axcelis, Kamieniecki, Kaszas-Savos and dHybrid citations should be verified against their full texts before being relied upon. Where I state a reference "teaches" something, it is grounded in the passage quoted or paraphrased in the source table above; the URLs given are the ones I actually retrieved.