Patent 11500496

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.

Active provider: Google · gemini-2.5-flash

Ownership chain (1)

Asserters network →

Structured records extracted from the assignment-history narrative below. Each entity links to its full ownership-network profile.

  1. 2021-07-12 · reel 056461/0815 · Assignment of Assignors Interest

    AN, CHIMOOK; CHO, SUNG-WOONG; KIM, DOYEON; LEE, JAEHYUN; PARK, SUNGHYUNSAMSUNG DISPLAY CO., LTD.

    Correspondent: SUHYUN KIM · LEWIS ROCA ROTHGERBER CHRISTIE

    internal reorg

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

  • Chiwook AN (Samsung Display Co Ltd)
  • Doyeon Kim (Samsung Display Co Ltd)
  • Sunghyun Park (Samsung Display Co Ltd)
  • Jaehyun Lee (Samsung Display Co Ltd)
  • Sung-woong CHO (Samsung Display Co Ltd)

No unusual patterns observed, as all inventors appear to have remained with Samsung Display Co Ltd.

Original assignee

Samsung Display Co Ltd. They are a major global manufacturer and shipper of display products, including OLEDs, which embody the claims of US11500496B2. Their primary line of business is the research, development, and manufacturing of display technologies. Samsung Display Co Ltd is currently an operating company.

Assignment timeline

The USPTO Assignment Center (https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/) shows the following assignment for US Patent 11500496:

  • 2021-07-12 (executed) / recorded 2021-07-12 — Reel 056461/0815
    • Conveyance: Assignment of Assignors Interest
    • Assignor: AN, CHIMOOK; CHO, SUNG-WOONG; KIM, DOYEON; LEE, JAEHYUN; PARK, SUNGHYUN (all inventors)
    • Assignee: SAMSUNG DISPLAY CO., LTD.
    • Correspondent: SUHYUN KIM, LEWIS ROCA ROTHGERBER CHRISTIE LLP, 201 E WASHINGTON ST STE 1200, PHOENIX, AZ, UNITED STATES, 85004
    • Context: Internal reorg (transfer from individual inventors to the corporate assignee).

This record indicates an assignment from the individual inventors to Samsung Display Co., Ltd. Since Samsung Display Co., Ltd. is also listed as the original assignee on the patent, this appears to be a formality to officially transfer the rights from the inventors to their employer. There are no other recorded assignments for this patent in the USPTO Assignment Center.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 11500496
    2020 : Filed by Samsung Display Co Ltd
    2021 : Assigned inventors to Samsung Display Co Ltd
    2022 : Issued to Samsung Display Co Ltd

NPE / troll-pattern signals

  1. Shell-entity transfer — not present. The sole assignee is Samsung Display Co Ltd, a large operating company.
  2. Known asserter in the chain — not present. Samsung Display Co Ltd is not a known NPE.
  3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — not present. Only one assignment is recorded, and there's no indication of this correspondent recurring in other known NPE chains.
  4. Cascading transfers — not present. Only one assignment is recorded.
  5. Pre-litigation transfer — unclear. There's a litigation listed on Google Patents for this family (IPR2025-01477 and a US case filed in Texas Eastern District Court), but the assignment predates these by several years, making it unlikely to be pre-litigation transfer. Without specific dates for the first infringement suit against this patent, it is difficult to determine with certainty.
  6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. Samsung Display Co Ltd is an active, operating company.
  7. Privateering — not present. No evidence of transfer to an NPE for assertion on behalf of an operating company.
  8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — not present. The patent remains with Samsung Display Co Ltd.

Verdict

Operating-company assertion (current assignee ships products embodying the claims and is suing actual competitors)

The patent is owned by Samsung Display Co Ltd, a major operating company that manufactures and sells display devices. The only recorded assignment is a formal transfer from the individual inventors to Samsung Display Co Ltd on 2021-07-12 (Reel 056461/0815). While there are litigations associated with the patent family, these are against other operating companies, which is characteristic of operating-company assertion rather than NPE activity.

USPTO Assignment Center search: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/

Generated 5/23/2026, 12:46:16 PM