Patent 10904487

Assignment history

Inventors, original assignee, and the chain of ownership recorded with the USPTO — including the correspondent attorney who recorded each assignment, since shell-LLC chains often share one repeat-player attorney even when the entity names look unrelated. Surfaces NPE / patent-troll patterns: shell-entity transfers, known asserters in the chain, repeat correspondent fingerprints, pre-litigation assignments, and bankruptcy fire-sales.

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Assignment history

Inventors, original assignee, and the chain of ownership recorded with the USPTO — including the correspondent attorney who recorded each assignment, since shell-LLC chains often share one repeat-player attorney even when the entity names look unrelated. Surfaces NPE / patent-troll patterns: shell-entity transfers, known asserters in the chain, repeat correspondent fingerprints, pre-litigation assignments, and bankruptcy fire-sales.

✓ Generated

Inventors

  • Steven Nelson
  • Lana Wong
  • Hiroshi Kitada

The patent text does not explicitly state the employers of the inventors at the time of filing. However, given that Ricoh Co Ltd is the original assignee, it is highly probable that all inventors were employed by Ricoh Co Ltd or a subsidiary at the time of filing. There are no unusual patterns noted regarding the inventors' departure from the original assignee within 12 months of filing based on the provided information.

Original assignee

The entity named on the issued patent is Ricoh Co Ltd.

Ricoh Co Ltd is a multinational imaging and electronics company. Their primary line of business includes office imaging equipment (e.g., printers, copiers), production print solutions, document management systems, and IT services. They ship products embodying the claims, specifically interactive whiteboard appliances.

Ricoh Co Ltd is currently an operating company.

Assignment timeline

I have searched the USPTO Assignment Center for US patent 10904487. My search indicates that there are no recorded assignments for US Patent 10904487 on the USPTO Assignment Center. This typically means the original assignee, Ricoh Co Ltd, still holds ownership of the patent.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 10904487
    2019 : Filed by Ricoh Co Ltd
    2021 : Issued to Ricoh Co Ltd

NPE / troll-pattern signals

  1. Shell-entity transfer — not present. There are no recorded assignments for this patent, indicating it has not been transferred from Ricoh Co Ltd to a shell entity.
  2. Known asserter in the chain — not present. Ricoh Co Ltd is an operating company and not a known NPE. There are no recorded assignments to any known NPE.
  3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — not present. Since there are no recorded assignments, there is no chain of correspondents to analyze for recurrence.
  4. Cascading transfers — not present. No assignments are recorded.
  5. Pre-litigation transfer — unclear. While there is litigation activity reported, the absence of recorded assignments means no pre-litigation transfer via assignment record can be confirmed. It's possible an internal transfer occurred without being recorded, or that Ricoh Co Ltd is directly asserting the patent.
  6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. Ricoh Co Ltd is an operating company and there is no indication of bankruptcy.
  7. Privateering — unclear. There's no evidence of a privateering arrangement in the public assignment records.
  8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — not present. The patent remains with Ricoh Co Ltd, an operating company, and has not been transferred to a defensive aggregator.

Verdict

Insufficient data.
There are no recorded assignment records for US10904487 on the USPTO Assignment Center. This means there is no public chain of ownership to analyze for NPE patterns, beyond the original assignment to Ricoh Co Ltd. Therefore, a definitive verdict on NPE status cannot be made solely based on assignment records.

Generated 7/2/2026, 12:01:41 AM