Assignment history

Inventors

• Brad THOMAS
• Louis Hartke
• Greg Langenfeld
• Matt Hutchinson

The employer at the time of filing is Vermeer Manufacturing Co., as evidenced by the assignment of the inventors' interest to Vermeer Manufacturing Company. There is no information provided regarding inventors departing the original assignee.

Original assignee

The original assignee named on the issued patent US10202266B2 is Vermeer Manufacturing Co..

Vermeer Manufacturing Co. is a manufacturer of industrial and agricultural equipment. The patent describes "compact tool carriers" designed for utility or do-it-yourself home projects, implying that Vermeer manufactures and ships products embodying the claims, such as the compact tool carrier 5 described in the patent.

Vermeer Manufacturing Co. is currently an operating company, as indicated by the "Active" legal status of the patent and its involvement in ongoing litigation, including an Inter Partes Review (IPR2025-00171) and district court cases in Iowa and Texas.

Assignment timeline

• 2015-05-04 to 2015-05-18 (executed) / recorded 2017-09-14 — Reel 043593/0011
  • Conveyance: Assignment of Assignors Interest
  • Assignor: Greg Langenfeld, Brad Thomas, Louis Hartke, Matt Hutchinson (inventors)
  • Assignee: Vermeer Manufacturing Company, Iowa
  • Correspondent: Not available in the provided patent text or Google Patents legal event summary.
  • Context: Initial assignment of inventor rights to the corporate assignee during the patent application process.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 10202266
    2015 : Inventors assign to Vermeer
    2017 : App filed & assignment recorded
    2019 : Patent issued to Vermeer
    2019 : Litigation filed in Iowa
    2024 : Litigation filed in Texas
    2025 : IPR filed against Vermeer

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — Not present. The only recorded transfer is from the inventors to Vermeer Manufacturing Co., which is an operating company.
2. Known asserter in the chain — Not present. Vermeer Manufacturing Co. is an operating company, not a known NPE from public lists. The petitioner in the IPR (IPR2025-00171) is Kubota North America Corporation and Kubota Tractor Corporation, indicating a dispute between operating companies.
3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — Unclear. The correspondent information for the single recorded assignment (Reel 043593/0011) is not available in the provided patent text. Even if it were, a single instance would not constitute a "repeat" pattern.
4. Cascading transfers — Not present. There is only one recorded assignment in the chain.
5. Pre-litigation transfer — Not present. The only assignment (from inventors to Vermeer, executed 2015-05-04 to 2015-05-18, recorded 2017-09-14, Reel 043593/0011) occurred years before any mentioned litigation (e.g., Iowa litigation in 2019, Texas litigation in 2024, IPR in 2025).
6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — Not present. There is no indication in the provided text that Vermeer Manufacturing Co. has filed for bankruptcy or that the patent was acquired through such proceedings.
7. Privateering — Not present. There is no evidence of Vermeer transferring the patent to an NPE for assertion on its behalf. The ongoing litigation suggests direct assertion by Vermeer.
8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — Not present. The patent is actively being asserted in litigation, not held by a defensive aggregator.

Verdict

Operating-company assertion

This verdict is based on the sole recorded assignment indicating a transfer from the inventors to Vermeer Manufacturing Co. (Reel 043593/0011, executed 2015-05-04 to 2015-05-18, recorded 2017-09-14). Vermeer Manufacturing Co. is clearly an operating company that manufactures compact tool carriers and is actively asserting this patent in ongoing litigation against other operating companies (e.g., Kubota in IPR2025-00171). There are no signals of shell-entity transfers, known NPE involvement, or other troll-like patterns in the assignment chain.

For verification, you can search the USPTO Assignment Center: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/