Assignment history

Inventors

• Sang Hoon Lee (Employer: AQ Corp)
• Kyoung Jun CHOI (Employer: AQ Corp)
• Sae Rom LEE (Employer: AQ Corp)

It is generally assumed that inventors' rights are transferred to their employer if the invention was developed as part of their employment duties or if they have an invention assignment agreement in place.

Original assignee

The original assignee on the issued patent is AQ Corp.

AQ Corporation is a global provider of NFC antennas to smartphone makers and an NFC Unified Solution provider. They create convergence of business models in various industries, including multimedia advertisement/information platforms such as digital signage, by incorporating Active NFC Tag modules so that various content can be communicated with NFC-phones.

Per Google Patents, AQ Corp's legal status is "Active, expires 2040-11-25." However, a company with the ticker AQCP, also named AQ Corp., is a US-based company operating in the Construction Materials sector within the Basic Materials industry, headquartered in Lincoln City, Oregon, and has undergone a merger with Global Preferred Advisors Inc. and focuses on the mining industry. This AQ Corp (AQCP) IPO'd in February 2023. This appears to be a different entity from the South Korea-based AQ Corporation, which manufactures NFC antennas and is the original assignee of the patent. Another "AQ Group" is a global manufacturer of components and systems to industrial customers, listed on Nasdaq Stockholm, with headquarters in Västerås, Sweden. This is also a different entity.

The AQ Corporation that is the assignee of this patent (located in South Korea) appears to be an operating company in the smartphone antenna and NFC solutions market.

Assignment timeline

• 2025-09-05 (executed) / recorded 2025-09-05 — Reel 067210/0675
  • Conveyance: Assignment of Assignors Interest
  • Assignor: CHOI, KYOUNG JUN; LEE, SAE ROM; LEE, SANG HOON
  • Assignee: AQ Corporation
  • Correspondent: MCDERMOTT WILL & EMERY LLP, 1201 AVENUE OF THE AMERICAS, NEW YORK, NY 10036
  • Context: This appears to be a formal assignment from the inventors to the original assignee, AQ Corporation, potentially as part of employment agreements.
• 2025-09-29 (executed) / recorded 2025-09-29 — Reel 067347/0932
  • Conveyance: PATENT SECURITY AGREEMENT
  • Assignor: AQ Corporation
  • Assignee: WYE IP CAPITAL LLC
  • Correspondent: J.P. NISSAN, ESQ., 1740 BROADWAY, 15TH FLOOR, NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10019. This correspondent is new to this chain.
  • Context: Securitization of the patent.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 11495875
    2019 : Priority date
    2022 : Application filed by AQ Corp
         : Patent granted to AQ Corp
    2025 : Inventors assign to AQ Corp
         : AQ Corp grants security interest to WYE IP CAPITAL LLC
    2026 : IPR filed by Unified Patents against AQ Corp

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — unclear. While WYE IP CAPITAL LLC does not appear to have public products or a clear operating business in the context of smartphone antennas, there is insufficient information to definitively label it a shell entity. It is the assignee in a security agreement, not a full assignment of ownership. No explicit address to a registered-agent service is provided in the assignment record.

2. Known asserter in the chain — not present. Neither AQ Corporation nor WYE IP CAPITAL LLC are listed as known NPEs by Unified Patents or RPX based on current search results. However, it is noteworthy that Unified Patents has filed an Inter Partes Review (IPR) against US11495875, naming AQ Corp as the patent owner. Unified Patents is an organization that seeks to deter patent trolls and reduce NPE patent assertions.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — not present. There are two different correspondents across the two assignment records. MCDERMOTT WILL & EMERY LLP handled the first assignment, and J.P. NISSAN, ESQ. handled the second (the security agreement).

4. Cascading transfers — not present. There are two assignments recorded, one from inventors to AQ Corp and then a security agreement from AQ Corp to WYE IP CAPITAL LLC, both occurring in September 2025. While relatively close in time, they are different types of conveyances and do not represent a cascade of ownership transfers through multiple shell LLCs.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — unclear. An IPR (IPR2026-00232) was filed against this patent by [Samsung Electronics Co Ltd](/litigations/by-plaintiff/Samsung%20Electronics%20Co%20Ltd) and Samsung Electronics America Inc. on January 26, 2026, naming AQ Corp as the patent owner. The security agreement with WYE IP CAPITAL LLC was recorded on September 29, 2025. This timing (approximately 4 months before the IPR filing) could be considered pre-litigation, though an IPR is a challenge to patent validity, not an infringement suit. The Google Patents entry mentions a US case filed in the Texas Eastern District Court (case 2:25-cv-01012), but the filing date for this case is not immediately apparent in the provided text.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. There is no indication that AQ Corp has filed for bankruptcy.

7. Privateering — not present. There is no information to suggest privateering activity.

8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — not present. The chain does not end with a known defensive aggregator. Unified Patents has filed an IPR against this patent, which is an anti-NPE action, but Unified Patents is the petitioner, not an assignee of the patent.

Verdict

Insufficient data
The primary indication is the securitization of the patent with WYE IP CAPITAL LLC, followed by an Inter Partes Review initiated by Unified Patents. While the IPR by Unified Patents suggests they believe the patent may be asserted by an NPE or is of questionable quality, WYE IP CAPITAL LLC's role as a secured party rather than outright owner in a full assignment is not a definitive "shell entity" transfer for assertion purposes based on the available information. More information about WYE IP CAPITAL LLC's business and specific litigation related to this patent would be needed for a conclusive NPE determination.

USPTO Assignment Center search for US11495875: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html?#/patent/search/result?id=11495875