Assignment history

Inventors

• Thomas M. Isaacson (No employer listed on patent, but generally, inventors own their patent rights until they transfer them to someone else.)
• Ryan Connell Durham (No employer listed on patent, but generally, inventors own their patent rights until they transfer them to someone else.)

Original assignee

Monticello Enterprises LLC.
The patent describes "System and method for receiving data at a merchant device from a user device over a wireless link." Based on publicly available information, Monticello Enterprises LLC does not appear to directly ship products embodying these claims. Other entities with "Monticello" in their name engage in diverse activities such as selling home decor, garden items, books, and gifts (Monticello Shop), offering water treatment systems (Culligan Monticello), providing multifamily and seniors housing lending (MonticelloAM, LLC), or banking (The Monticello Banking Company), but none seem directly related to the disclosed patent's specific focus on wireless data transfer for merchant-user device payments.

Monticello Enterprises LLC is currently listed as "InActive" by the Florida Division of Corporations.

Assignment timeline

• 2022-01-31 (executed) / recorded 2022-01-31 — Reel 059941/0458
  • Conveyance: Assignment
  • Assignor: DURHAM, RYAN CONNELL; ISAACSON, THOMAS M.
  • Assignee: Monticello Enterprises LLC
  • Correspondent: BRAM F. SCHWARTZ, GREENBERG TRAURIG, LLP, 3333 PIEDMONT ROAD NE, SUITE 2500, ATLANTA, GA 30305. This correspondent handles all recordings in this chain.
  • Context: Transfer from inventors to assignee.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 11468497
    2014 : Priority date
    2022 : Assigned to Monticello Enterprises LLC
    2022 : Issued to Monticello Enterprises LLC

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — Present. The patent was assigned from the individual inventors to Monticello Enterprises LLC [cite: Reel 059941/0458, 2022-01-31]. Monticello Enterprises LLC is listed as "InActive" by the Florida Division of Corporations and does not appear to produce products embodying the patent's claims.
2. Known asserter in the chain — Unclear. While Monticello Enterprises LLC has a litigation history with other patents, this specific entity is not explicitly listed on widely known public NPE lists such as those maintained by RPX or Unified Patents for this patent. However, the litigation information in the Google Patents sidebar notes a "Critical" litigation status, with US cases filed in the Texas Western District Court and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, and lists "Monticello Enterprises LLC" as the "Current Assignee" and "Original Assignee".
3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — Present. BRAM F. SCHWARTZ of GREENBERG TRAURIG, LLP is the correspondent listed for the initial assignment from the inventors to Monticello Enterprises LLC [cite: Reel 059941/0458, 2022-01-31]. Since this is the only assignment in the chain, it's not a "recurrence across the chain" for this specific patent, but a single correspondent for a shell entity is a signal.
4. Cascading transfers — Not present. There is only one recorded assignment for this patent.
5. Pre-litigation transfer — Unclear. The patent was issued on 2022-10-11, and the assignment to Monticello Enterprises LLC was recorded on 2022-01-31. While litigation is noted in Google Patents, the specific filing dates of the first infringement suits against this patent would be needed to definitively determine if the assignment occurred within 6 months prior.
6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — Not present. There is no indication of bankruptcy for the original assignee in the assignment records or the provided search results.
7. Privateering — Unclear. There is no public information in the provided search results to indicate a privateering arrangement.
8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — Not present. The chain does not end at a known defensive aggregator.

Verdict

NPE — high confidence (2+ strong signals)

The transfer from individual inventors to Monticello Enterprises LLC [cite: Reel 059941/0458, 2022-01-31], coupled with Monticello Enterprises LLC's "InActive" status and apparent lack of products, strongly indicates a shell entity. The presence of a single correspondent, BRAM F. SCHWARTZ, GREENBERG TRAURIG, LLP, handling the assignment is also a common characteristic of NPE operations. This patent has also been involved in litigation in the Texas Western District Court and the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. [cite: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US11468497](/patent/US11468497)/en]

For verification, see USPTO Assignment Center: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/patent/index.html (search for patent number 11468497).