US 4866257

I'll search for current information on this patent, including any CAFC 2026 docket activity.

Let me check for any litigation or appellate activity specifically.

Summary — US Patent 4,866,257

Note on search scope: I searched for US 4,866,257 (and its reexamination certificate US4866257C1) against public patent databases (Google Patents, FreePatentsOnline, Justia, uspto.report) and looked for appellate/litigation activity. I found no CAFC 2026 docket activity for this patent. That is unsurprising: the record shows the patent reached anticipated expiration on 2018-01-09 (Google Patents legal-status entry), so its enforceable term ended roughly eight years before the date you specified. Any 2026 Federal Circuit appeal of this specific patent would be essentially impossible on the current record. I am flagging this as an explicit uncertainty rather than asserting a negative I cannot prove from a single database.

Bibliographic data (authoritative, from the patent record)

Assignee chain (as recorded): Spectra-Physics, Inc. → change of name 1988 → Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems, Inc. (1994) → PSC Scanning, Inc. (merger/name change 2004) → listed today under Datalogic Scanning Inc.

Abstract

A bar code scanner provides data to a host computer. It includes scanning apparatus that optically scans bar code labels and produces an electrical signal, and a decoding circuit that translates that signal into a digital signal. A microprocessor controls scanner operation and translates the digital signal into data for the host computer under the control of control characters. The scanner also has a non-volatile random-access control memory storing those control characters, and an interface connecting the host computer and microprocessor that moves data out to the host and moves control characters from the host computer into the non-volatile memory via the microprocessor.

Plain-language overview of the independent claims

Claim 1 — the scanner apparatus. A bar code scanner that (a) optically scans a label and generates an electrical signal, (b) decodes that signal into digital data, (c) uses a microprocessor to control the scanner and format/emit data to a host computer according to stored "control characters," (d) keeps those control characters in non-volatile random-access memory (e.g., EEPROM/NOVRAM), and (e) has an interface that both sends data to the host and lets the host push control characters down into that non-volatile memory through the microprocessor. The conceptual core is host-downloadable, power-loss-surviving configuration.

Claim 9 — the scanner with multiple label-pair character sets. Same architecture as Claim 1, but the non-volatile memory stores a plurality of sets of control characters, where those sets identify characters that, if seen on a pair of successively scanned labels, indicate (i) that the two labels belong to the same product and (ii) which label is "first" and which is "second." This is the EAN-13 two-label/add-on scenario described in the spec (e.g., "21" = first of a pair, "22" = second).

Claim 14 — the method of programming. A method of programming a bar code scanner that has a non-volatile control memory storing multiple label-pair character sets (same definition as Claim 9), comprising: (a) connecting a data source to the scanner; (b) transmitting a plurality of sets of control characters from the data source to the scanner; and (c) storing those sets in the non-volatile control memory.

Claim 15 (dependent on 14) adds step (d): interrogating the scanner's non-volatile control memory and comparing the stored sets against what was previously transmitted — i.e., the verify-after-write feature described in the spec's SEND/RCL/READ workflow.

Prosecution/reexamination note (important for claim scope)

The Google Patents "Claims (15)" listing is the original, pre-reexamination set. The 2001-01-09 reexamination certificate (US4866257C1) states: claims 9–13 confirmed; claims 1–8 and 14 patentable as amended; claim 15 patentable as dependent on an amended claim; and new claims 16–30 added and held patentable. So the currently effective claim set is 30 claims, not 15 — the online claim text under US4866257A should be treated as superseded by the C1 certificate for scope purposes.

Disambiguation warning (per your strict-ID rule)

The string "4866257" also resolves to a Japanese patent, JP4866257B2 ("半導体撮像素子" / semiconductor imaging element, KENZAN Co., issued 2012-02-01, application JP2007-30531, a divisional of JP2006-132957). That is a completely unrelated document — different jurisdiction, different family, different subject matter (CMOS image sensor charge-discharge circuitry). It should not be conflated with US 4,866,257. I did not find any shared family relationship.

Confidence

High confidence on all bibliographic data, the abstract, and the claim summaries — these come directly from the patent full text and the reexamination certificate record. Lower confidence on the "current assignee" (Google Patents explicitly disclaims accuracy) and on the asserted absence of 2026 CAFC activity, which reflects what public sources show rather than an authoritative docket check of every Federal Circuit proceeding.

I'll search for litigation involving US patent 4866257.

Let me search more specifically on litigation databases and the patent's reexamination history.

Let me search additional litigation-specific sources.

Summary of Findings

No litigation involving U.S. Patent No. 4,866,257 was found in my searches.

I searched for the specific number 4866257 / "4,866,257" in connection with litigation, defendants, infringement actions, and the patent's owners (Spectra‑Physics / PSC / Datalogic). I did not locate any complaint, district court case, ITC investigation, CAFC appeal, or PTAB/IPR proceeding that asserts or adjudicates this particular patent. I want to be explicit about the limits of this answer: my search access here is limited, and I could not directly query the specialized litigation databases you named (Unified Patents litigation portal, Docket Navigator, Lex Machina, PACER). The absence of results below is therefore "not found," not a verified negative.

What I did find (context, not litigation)

Important: the 2001 C1 reexamination certificate is a USPTO proceeding, not litigation. It indicates the patent was challenged at the PTO (ex parte reexamination, control number not surfaced in my results) during the period when it was being enforced/marked by the then‑owner. Reexaminations of this era are frequently triggered by, or run in parallel with, infringement litigation, but I found no case name, docket, or court tied to this patent to confirm that here. Do not treat the reexamination as evidence of a lawsuit.

False-positive matches to be aware of (per your strict‑interpretation rule)

• JP 4866257 B2 — a different, unrelated Japanese patent ("半導体撮像素子" / semiconductor image pickup device, owner KENZAN Co., Ltd.). Searching the bare string "4866257" returns this; it is not the U.S. patent and is not litigation.
• Datalogic Magellan™ 800i product manual lists "4866257" in its patent‑notice list — that is patent marking, not a lawsuit.

Where the answer would be confirmed

To definitively rule litigation in or out, the following should be checked directly (I could not complete these queries):

• PACER (all district courts) and the CAFC docket for "4,866,257" / "4866257"
• Docket Navigator / Lex Machina / RPX / Unified Patents litigation portal patent page for US 4,866,257
• USPTO PatentCenter reexamination file for the 2001 C1 certificate (the reexamination request often identifies a concurrent litigation as a substantial new question of patentability)

Bottom line: Based on the searches available to me, there is no known litigation involving US 4,866,257. The only significant adversarial record I could identify for this patent is the ex parte reexamination that produced the US 4,866,257 C1 certificate on 2001‑01‑09. Any statement that the patent was litigated would, on my current information, be unsupported.

I'll verify the PTAB picture with targeted searches before answering, since the structured block defaults to "no AIA trial proceedings."

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file: 0. No Inter Partes Review, Post-Grant Review, or Covered Business Method review has ever been filed against US 4,866,257 — the USPTO Open Data Portal returns none, and targeted searching surfaced none (no IPR/PGR/CBM petition, no institution decision, no FWD, no appeal). The only post-grant USPTO activity on this patent is a pre-AIA ex parte reexamination that concluded in 2001 with a reexamination certificate (US4866257C1), which is not an AIA trial and carries none of IPR's estoppel or claim-cancellation mechanics. The practical bottom line for a defendant today is unusual: there is no PTAB roadmap and no PTAB body count — but there is also essentially no patent left to fight over, because the patent is expired and listed as "Expired - Lifetime," and its claims were narrowed by reexamination more than two decades ago.

AIA trial proceedings

None. I found no IPR, PGR, or CBM proceeding — no proceeding number, institution decision, final written decision, termination, or Federal Circuit appeal. I am stating this affirmatively rather than leaving it open, with the caveat that my verification was by web search of public sources (Google Patents, FreePatentsOnline, USPTO PTAB portal results) rather than a direct query of PTAB E2E / PTAB API; if a very recent, unindexed filing exists, it is not reflected in any public source I could reach on 2026-09-28.

Note on why this is unsurprising rather than suspicious:

• PGR is impossible. Post-grant review must be petitioned within 9 months of grant. This patent granted 1989-09-12 — the window closed decades before PGR existed for it.
• CBM is a dead letter here. AIA § 18 covered-business-method review sunset for new petitions on 2020-09-16, and the patent's subject matter (a bar code scanner storing control characters in EEPROM) is not a covered business method anyway.
• IPR was legally available but economically unattractive. IPR is not limited by patent age, and the Board has held it retains jurisdiction even over expired patents (see, e.g., Apple Inc. v. Gesture Tech. Partners, LLC, IPR2021-00922, Paper 10 (PTAB Nov. 29, 2021)). But IPR on a long-expired patent is typically only worth filing to knock out a live back-damages claim. No such IPR was filed, which suggests this patent was never the centerpiece of a modern damages demand.

Related post-grant activity (NOT an AIA trial)

Ex parte reexamination → Reexamination Certificate US4866257C1

• Type: Ex parte reexamination (pre-AIA, 35 U.S.C. §§ 301–307). Not an AIA trial; no PTAB panel, no institution decision, no § 315(e) estoppel.
• Filed: request date not established from available sources. Google Patents records the certificate as first reexamination, published 2001-01-09.
• Status: Concluded. Certificate issued and published 2001-01-09 as US4866257C1; patent listed "Expired - Lifetime."
• Judge panel: Not applicable (Central Reexamination Unit examiner, not an APJ panel).
• Petition grounds: Not verifiable from available sources. Ex parte reexamination is limited to prior-art patents and printed publications under §§ 102/103; the reexamination request itself is not publicly attributed to a named requester (that is the defining feature of ex parte reexam — the requester may remain anonymous).
• Certificate — verbatim disposition (this is the claim-level outcome that matters): "THE PATENTABILITY OF CLAIMS 9-13 IS CONFIRMED. CLAIMS 1-8 AND 14 ARE DETERMINED TO BE PATENTABLE AS AMENDED. CLAIM 15, DEPENDENT ON AN AMENDED CLAIM, IS DETERMINED TO BE PATENTABLE. NEW CLAIMS 16-30 ARE ADDED AND DETERMINED TO BE PATENTABLE."
• Settlement / termination: Not applicable.
• Appeal: No Federal Circuit appeal identified.
• Defensive value: Mixed and now largely historical. Claims 9–13 survived verbatim, and new claims 16–30 were added — so the patent survived reexam — but claims 1–8 and 14 were amended, meaning anyone relying on the original claim text of those claims is reading language that no longer governs. The reexam certificate is the operative claim set for US4866257C1.

Reference links: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4866257/en (original) and https://patents.google.com/patent/US4866257C1/en (reexam certificate). PTAB decision search: https://developer.uspto.gov/ptab-web/#/search/decisions · CourtListener: https://www.courtlistener.com

Strategic summary

Claim status. There has been no cancellation of any claim by an AIA trial — zero claims of US 4,866,257 have been invalidated at the PTAB, because no AIA trial was ever filed. The claim set that governs is the post-reexamination set: claims 1–8 and 14 as amended, claims 9–13 confirmed, claim 15 patentable as dependent on an amended claim, and new claims 16–30. The original 15 issued claims as printed in the 1989 patent are therefore the wrong yardstick — for any assertion, demand the reexamination certificate and read claims 1–8 and 14 in their amended form. Beyond that: the patent is expired. Google Patents lists legal status "Expired - Lifetime" with an anticipated expiration of 2018-01-09; the 2018 date is not reconcilable from the face of a patent filed 1987-11-19 on a standard 17-from-grant/20-from-filing basis, so treat the precise expiration date as unverified while treating the fact of expiration as established. Infringement of an expired patent can only support past damages — there is no injunction, and no ongoing royalty theory.

Estoppel landscape. There is no § 315(e)(2) estoppel facing you, because § 315(e) binds only IPR/PGR petitioners and their privies, and no one has petitioned. Ex parte reexamination creates no § 315(e)(2) estoppel on the (anonymous) requester. That means a defendant's full prior-art library remains available — § 102/§ 103 grounds, printed publications, systems prior art, and § 112 defenses were all untouched by the 2001 reexam and are all still open. The one genuine constraint is practical, not statutory: the pre-AIA reexam certificate hardens claims 9–13 (confirmed after examination), so a defense aimed at those claims carries a heavier burden.

Pattern signals. No repeat petitioner — there is no petitioner at all. No patent-owner PTAB appeal strategy, because there was no PTAB case to appeal. No defensive aggregator (Unified Patents or similar) in the chain — no CBM/IPR bears the fingerprints of a crowd-funded challenger. Ownership has passed through a long corporate chain (Spectra-Physics, Inc. → Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems, Inc. → PSC Scanning, Inc.; current assignee listed as Datalogic Scanning Inc.), with secured-lender assignments (Fleet Bank / Fleet National Bank / Wells Fargo Foothill) typical of the PSC/Datalogic corporate transactions. The patent also appears on PSC/Datalogic product manuals ("this product may be covered by one or more of the following patents"), which is a legacy-notice signal, not an assertion signal.

Recommended next steps

• If you hold a demand letter citing US 4,866,257, the threshold questions are (1) is the demand premised on the original 1989 claim text or the amended claims 1–8/14 from the 2001 certificate, and (2) does it seek anything other than past damages? On an expired patent, the second question usually ends the matter commercially.
• Do not assume PTAB armor is needed. There are no IPRs to leverage and none to fear — but equally, there is no FWD to cite. Your invalidity case, if you need one, is built in district court or in a DJ action, with the full prior art available and no estoppel.
• Pull the reexamination file history (reexam certificate US4866257C1 and its underlying papers) before responding substantively. The amendments to claims 1–8 and 14 are the likely prosecution-history estoppel/claim-scope battleground, and the amendment record often supplies the cleanest § 112 or narrowing arguments.
• Confirm expiration precisely via USPTO PatentCenter / Global Dossier rather than relying on aggregator dates, given the inconsistency noted above. If expiration is confirmed pre-suit, a Rule 12 motion targeting available remedies (no injunctive relief; past damages only, subject to § 286's six-year lookback from the complaint) is a cheap early lever.
• If you suspect a recently filed, unindexed AIA petition, verify directly on PTAB E2E (https://ptacts.uspto.gov) or the PTAB API; I could not confirm one exists, and nothing in the public record supports it.

Caveat on sourcing: every claim-level statement above is drawn either from the structured PTAB block in the prompt (zero proceedings) or from the Google Patents / FreePatentsOnline record of the reexamination certificate quoted verbatim. I did not find a PTAB institution decision, FWD, or CAFC opinion to link, because none exists for this patent.

I'll start by pulling what I can verify from the record and cross-checking the assignment data. Let me run several searches.

Good corroboration on the PSC/Wells Fargo security agreement. Let me dig for reel/frame specifics and correspondents.

Ownership & Assignment Analysis — US 4,866,257

Patent: US 4,866,257 A (and reexamination certificate US 4,866,257 C1)
Title: Bar code scanner and method
Appl. No.: 07/122,743 · Filed: 1987-11-19 · Issued: 1989-09-12 · C1 published: 2001-01-09
Current assignee listed: Datalogic Scanning, Inc. · Status: Expired – Lifetime (anticipated expiration 2018-01-09)

Sourcing caveat, stated up front. I could not open the Assignment Center detail pages (or the legacy assignment.uspto.gov index) for this patent during this session; the reel/frame values below are taken from the assignment records as transcribed in the Google Patents legal-events table for this family (patents.google.com/patent/US4866257/en). Critically, that transcription does not expose the correspondent of record — the attorney/firm that filed each recording. I therefore cannot make a repeat-correspondent finding for this chain, and I will not fabricate one. Every statement below is either (a) directly in the transcribed record, or (b) explicitly labelled as inference.

Identifier collision to note. "JP 4866257 B2" is an unrelated Japanese patent (semiconductor imaging element, KENZAN Corp., 2012) and "US 4,866,257" appears on some pages alongside the Japanese number. Per the no-auto-correct rule, treat these as distinct documents; the Japanese number is not this family.

Inventors

Unusual-pattern check — negative. The prompt flags "all inventors departing within 12 months of filing" as a fire-sale precursor. That is not what happened here. Both inventors executed an assignment before filing (1987-10-30, three weeks pre-filing), and Actis is still filing as a Spectra-Physics inventor in March 1990 (US 5,144,118). This is the ordinary pattern for a division of a laser company that had an established engineering site, not a departing-founder scenario.

Prosecution counsel (not the assignment correspondent — do not conflate). Sibling patents in this same Spectra-Physics scanner family (US 4,861,972; US 5,144,118; US 5,198,649) list Killworth, Gottman, Hagan & Schaeff as attorney/agent of record. That is the prosecution firm, and I have not verified it as the recording attorney on any assignment reel. Flagging it only as a lead for a follow-up Assignment Center pull.

Original assignee

Spectra-Physics, Inc., 3333 North First Street, San Jose, CA 95134 (originally a California corporation; a Delaware re-registration is recorded at reel 004854/0646).

• Primary line of business: laser and electro-optics manufacturer. The bar-code scanner work sat in the Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems division based in Eugene, Oregon — fixed, laser-based retail point-of-sale scanners of the same generation as the accused/covered products in the Datalogic manual lists.
• Did it ship a product embodying the claims? Yes, evidenced. Later Datalogic Scanning / PSC Inc. product reference guides carry a "covered by one or more of the following patents" list that expressly includes 4866257, alongside 4861972, 4861973, 4879456, 5144118, 5198649, 5247161, 5347113, etc. (e.g. Datalogic PowerScan 7000 product reference guide, PSC Inc. manual 284_800_2). That is the operative-company footprint that matters for the verdict below.
• Current status of the original assignee entity: not operating as such. The scanner business was carved out (1994 → Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems, Inc.), merged down (2004 → PSC Scanning, Inc.), and the residual Spectra-Physics laser business went its own way into what is now the MKS Instruments laser group. The original San Jose assignee entity no longer owns this patent.

Assignment timeline

All eight recorded events are transcribed on the Google Patents legal-events table. Dates: executed (effective) / recorded, per the record.

• 1987-10-30 (exec.) / 1987-11-19 (rec.) — Reel 004811/0514

  • Conveyance: Assignment (ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST)
  • Assignor: Randy D. Elliott; Robert J. Actis (individually)
  • Assignee: Spectra-Physics, Inc., 3333 North First Street, San Jose, CA 95134, a corp. of CA
  • Correspondent: not exposed in this record source — cannot state. (Prosecution counsel on the family is Killworth, Gottman, Hagan & Schaeff; not verified as recording counsel.)
  • Context: founding assignment — pre-filing inventor-to-company transfer; the standard employee-invention conveyance.

• 1987-02-13 (exec.) / 1988-01-25 (rec.) — Reel 004854/0646

  • Conveyance: Change of Name (CHANGE OF NAME, see document for details)
  • Assignor: Spectra-Physics (Delaware), Inc., a corp. of DE (changed to)
  • Assignee: Spectra-Physics, Inc. (a corp. of DE)
  • Correspondent: not exposed.
  • Context: change of name only — corporate re-registration of the assignee from the California entity to the Delaware entity. Note the odd sequencing: executed 1987-02-13, i.e. before the 1987-10-30 inventor assignment, but recorded after it. No change in beneficial ownership.

• 1994-03-18 (exec.) / 1994-05-02 (rec.) — Reel 006962/0844

  • Conveyance: Assignment (ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST)
  • Assignor: Spectra-Physics, Inc.
  • Assignee: Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems, Inc., Oregon
  • Correspondent: not exposed.
  • Context: internal reorganization / carve-out — the scanner division was spun into a stand-alone Oregon entity. Still a family transfer, not a sale to a third party.

• 1996-07-12 (exec.) / 1996-09-12 (rec.) — Reel 008133/0346

  • Conveyance: Security Agreement
  • Assignors: PSC, Inc.; PSC Acquisition, Inc.; Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems, Inc.; and others
  • Assignee: Fleet Bank (New York)
  • Correspondent: not exposed.
  • Context: securitization / secured credit facility — a blanket IP collateral grant. Independently corroborated: the "Credit Agreement dated as of July 12, 1996" is among PSC Scanning, Inc. (f/k/a SpectraScan, Inc., successor by merger to PSC Acquisition, Inc.), PSC Inc., the lender parties, and Fleet National Bank as administrative agent (Amendment Six to Credit Agreement, Amendment Four). The July 12, 1996 execution date on the reel matches the credit agreement exactly.

• 2001-01-09 (issued) — Reexamination certificate, first reexamination (US 4866257 C1) (not an assignment; included because it is the most litigation-adjacent event in the chain)

  • Claims 9–13 confirmed; claims 1–8 and 14 patentable as amended; claim 15 patentable; new claims 16–30 added.
  • Requester of the ex parte reexamination is not identified in the available record. Do not assume it was a challenger or a defendant — that cannot be established from what I have.

• 1996-07-12 (exec.) / 2001-02-13 (rec.) — Reel 011474/0204

  • Conveyance: Security Interest
  • Assignors: PSC Automation (formerly LazerData Corporation); Optel Systems Limited; Optical Storage International; and others
  • Assignee: Fleet National Bank, as Administrative Agent (Rhode Island)
  • Correspondent: not exposed.
  • Context: securitization / secured credit facility, re-recorded. Note the five-year lag between execution and recording — this is a re-recording of the same July 12, 1996 collateral package, under the assignee bank's new name (Fleet Bank → Fleet National Bank). Reflects the bank merger, not a new transaction.

• 2003-12-23 (exec.) / 2003-12-29 (rec.) — Reel 014926/0809

  • Conveyance: Release of Security Interest
  • Assignor: LJ Scanner Holdings, Inc., as successor in interest to Fleet National Bank (a/k/a Fleet Bank), as Administrative Agent
  • Assignee: PSC Inc. (Oregon)
  • Correspondent: not exposed. Name worth flagging: "LJ Scanner Holdings, Inc." is a name that reads like an NPE-style holding vehicle. It is not one on this record — it appears only as the lender-side successor-in-interest to Fleet National Bank releasing collateral. Deal with it as a financial-institution successor vehicle, not as a transfer-to-asserter. (Term-loan collateral agents routinely sit in special-purpose holdcos.)
  • Context: release of collateral — payoff/refinancing closes the 1996 Fleet facility's lien on this patent.

• 2003-12-23 (exec.) / 2003-12-29 (rec.) — Reel 014815/0764

  • Conveyance: Security Interest (Intellectual Property Security Agreement)
  • Assignor: PSC Scanning, Inc.
  • Assignee: Wells Fargo Foothill, Inc., Georgia (as Agent)
  • Correspondent: not exposed.
  • Context: securitization / refinancing — same-day replacement of the Fleet lien with a Wells Fargo Foothill lien. The instrument is directly verifiable: an Intellectual Property Security Agreement dated as of December 23, 2003, made by PSC Inc., a New York corporation, in favor of Wells Fargo Foothill, Inc., as agent appears in the USPTO legacy assignment PDFs in the adjacent reel block (reel 014822 index showing PSC Inc. design-patent assignments) — legacy-assignments.uspto.gov PDF.

• 1996-09-09 (exec.) / 2004-02-18 (rec.) — Reel 014981/0235

  • Conveyance: Merger and Change of Name
  • Assignor: Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems, Inc.
  • Assignee: PSC Scanning, Inc., Oregon
  • Correspondent: not exposed.
  • Context: internal reorganization / merger (reflected as "SpectraScan, Inc." f/k/a in the credit agreement), recorded eight years after the effective date. The title-consolidation step that puts PSC Scanning, Inc. on the record as owner.

Post-2004. The transcribed record shows no further real-party assignment — no sale to an NPE or aggregator. The chain terminates in the Datalogic corporate family (Datalogic acquired the PSC scanning business; Google Patents lists Datalogic Scanning, Inc. as current assignee). The patent expired.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 4866257
    1987 : Filed by Elliott and Actis
         : Assigned to Spectra Physics Inc
    1988 : Change of name to Delaware entity
    1989 : Patent issued
    1994 : Assigned to Spectra Physics Scanning Systems
    1996 : Security agreement to Fleet Bank
    2001 : Reexamination certificate C1 issued
         : Security interest to Fleet National Bank
    2003 : Release by LJ Scanner Holdings
         : Security interest to Wells Fargo Foothill
    2004 : Merged into PSC Scanning Inc
    2018 : Patent term ends

NPE / troll-pattern signals

Additional non-signal observation. The reexamination that produced the C1 certificate (recorded 2001-01-09; claims 1–8 and 14 amended, new claims 16–30 added) shows that someone spent real money attacking or defending these claims. That is interest in the patent, not evidence of an NPE, and the requester is unidentified in my sources. Do not build an NPE case on it.

Unexplained item, flagged for completeness. Google Patents lists anticipated expiration as 2018-01-09, which is roughly a decade past the nominal 20-year term from the 1987-11-19 filing date. I cannot explain that gap from the data available and am not going to guess at it (a C1 reexamination term adjustment does not plausibly account for ~10 years). Treat the 2018 date as reported-not-verified.

Verdict

Operating-company assertion — with one express caveat.

The chain is an unbroken operating-company lineage, not an NPE chain: inventor assignment to Spectra-Physics, Inc. at reel 004811/0514 (1987-10-30/1987-11-19); change of name at reel 004854/0646; carve-out to Spectra-Physics Scanning Systems, Inc. at reel 006962/0844 (exec. 1994-03-18); merger into PSC Scanning, Inc. at reel 014981/0235 (exec. 1996-09-09); terminating in the Datalogic family, whose own product literature lists 4866257 among the patents covering its scanners. The only other recorded activity is secured-lender collateral — Fleet Bank at reel 008133/0346 (1996-07-12), Fleet National Bank at reel 011474/0204, release by LJ Scanner Holdings at reel 014926/0809, and Wells Fargo Foothill at reel 014815/0764 (both 2003-12-23) — i.e. securitization and refinancing, both explicitly enumerated as non-NPE contexts.

The caveat, stated plainly: the "assertion" half of the label is not evidenced. I found no infringement litigation naming this patent, and the patent has expired, so this is best read as operating-company ownership rather than an active assertion campaign. No signal in the checklist is "present"; two are "unclear" (repeat correspondent, bankruptcy fire-sale) only because the correspondent fields were not available to me and no bankruptcy record was located — absence of evidence, not evidence of absence. This is not a troll patent. If a more aggressive read is wanted, the single thread worth pulling is the 2003-12-23 release/refinancing pair and the role of LJ Scanner Holdings, Inc. — but on this record that entity acted as Fleet National Bank's successor collateral agent, which is a lender function, not an NPE function.

Verify at: USPTO Assignment Center and USPTO Patent Assignment Search — search patent number 4866257 (also pull 4866257C1), then retrieve the correspondent field on reels 004811/0514, 004854/0646, 006962/0844, 008133/0346, 011474/0204, 014926/0809, 014815/0764, 014981/0235 to resolve the repeat-correspondent signal left open above.

I'll verify the patent record at USPTO and gather details on each cited reference.

Prior-art analysis — US 4,866,257 ("Bar code scanner and method")

Scope note before the analysis. Per the strict-identifier rule I searched the literal number 4866257. The record resolves to exactly one U.S. grant: US 4,866,257 A, App. No. 07/122,743, "Bar code scanner and method," Elliott & Actis, filed/priority 1987-11-19, granted 1989-09-12, original assignee Spectra-Physics, Inc., Primary Examiner David L. Trafton, law firm Killworth, Gottman, Hagan & Schaeff. This confirms the prior sections rather than contradicting them; I flag only the date inconsistency you supplied — your task header says "Current Date: April 26, 2026," while the operating context says 2026-09-28. Neither affects the prior-art analysis.

The single decisive fact about the citation record

US 4,866,257 carries only two (2) references cited on its face, both cited by the examiner, both U.S. grants:

There are no other patent citations of record for US 4,866,257. The large "Cited By (44/82)" tables on Google Patents are forward citations (later patents citing 4,866,257) and are not prior art to it — they post-date the 1987 priority date and must not be treated as anticipatory. Any references I do not list above would require the reexamination file (see caveat at the end).

Reference 1 — US 3,735,096

Full citation. Knockeart, R.P. & Russo, F.A., "System for processing coded pulse data," U.S. Patent No. 3,735,096, filed Dec. 13, 1971, issued May 22, 1973, assignee The Bendix Corporation. U.S. Cl. 235/61.11 E; Int. Cl. G06k 7/10. 33 claims, 22 drawing figures. (Verified: patentimages PDF; uspto.report/patent/grant/3735096.)

Brief description. A hardware-oriented pulse-processing system for reading a reflective label bearing reflective segments. An optical reader generates dark-count/light-count clock pulses synchronized to the label's reflective transitions; comparator and state-counter logic validates the counts against reference limits, assembles the bit stream, and — the salient feature — compares successive sequences of received data and issues a "compare signal" only after a preselected number of successful comparisons, whereupon the code is accepted as valid and gated to a utilization device. The disclosure is in a railway car / container identification context (the assignee's ART system), and claim 13 expressly provides selector-switch means for selecting the number of labels to be decoded.

Anticipation (§ 102) analysis. Knocheart is not an anticipatory reference for any of claims 1–30 as issued, and I assess it as background/§ 103 art at best:

• The only claim element it touches is the generalized "scanning means … decoding means … translating said electrical signal into a digital signal" language of claims 1 and 9. Even there it discloses pulse processing of a reflective label, not a digital-signal "decoding means responsive to said scanning means" in the processor sense claimed.
• It contains no microprocessor, no non-volatile random-access control memory, no control characters, and critically no interface that transfers control characters from a host computer into memory via a microprocessor. It therefore cannot meet the characterizing limitations of claims 1 or 9.
• Closest incidental overlap: Knocheart's "[successive] sequences of data … compared … [and] a preselected number of successful comparisons" superficially echoes the verify-after-write step (d) of claim 15 ("interrogating said scanner non-volatile control memory and comparing the sets of control characters stored therein with the previously transmitted control characters"). But Knocheart compares successive read sequences of the same scanned label for read reliability — it has no notion of a stored, previously transmitted control-character set, no data source, and no non-volatile control memory. It does not anticipate claim 15, nor independent claim 14.

Bottom line for Ref. 1: potentially anticipates none. It is relevant only as evidence that validating/comparing decoded pulse sequences was known.

Reference 2 — US 4,563,739

Full citation. Gerpheide, G.E., Anderson, B.C. & Hill, L., "Inventory and business management system which accounts for the contents of full and partially filled product containers," U.S. Patent No. 4,563,739, filed Jul. 18, 1983, issued Jan. 7, 1986, assignee Impulse Computer Systems, Inc. (Billings, MT). Int. Cl. G06F 15/24, U.S. Cl. 364/403. (Verified: Google Patents US4563739A; uspto.report/patent/grant/4563739.)

Brief description. A microprocessor-based inventory/business-management system for liquor-dispensing operations. A conventional bar-code reader/wand 14 reads a commercial bar code 16 on a container 18; the wand's transition signals are timed and converted to a product identification signal, which the microprocessor-based microcomputer 28 compares against product records previously entered and stored in computer memory. A weigh cell 20 measures partial-container contents, and a keyboard 22/display 24 handle operator entry and reporting. Flow diagrams (FIGS. 4–9) cover "Set-Up," "Update Product Record," "Inventory Items," and "Print."

Anticipation (§ 102) analysis. Gerpheide is likewise not anticipatory for any claim, but it is the more conceptually relevant of the two:

• It discloses the general point-of-sale pipeline (bar-code wand → product-ID lookup against previously stored records → management reports) that forms the environment of claims 1/9 — optical label reading, a processor, and memory holding prestored data used to interpret scanned codes.
• It does not disclose a host-downloadable non-volatile control memory (its records live in general computer memory tied to the management application, not in an EEPROM/NOVRAM inside a scanner), does not disclose control characters governing data output/format, and does not disclose the two-label "first/second of the same product" character-set concept of claims 5 and 9.
• It comes closest to claim 5 ("control characters are character sets which … indicate that two bar code labels are associated with the same item") only in the trivial sense that both deal with a code identifying a product — Gerpheide has no label-pair/first-second distinction and no set of such characters, so claim 5 is not anticipated.

Bottom line for Ref. 2: potentially anticipates none. Relevant as art showing that scanning a bar code and matching it to prestored product records was known.

Overall conclusion

For US 4,866,257, the complete set of patent citations of record is two: US 3,735,096 and US 4,563,739. Neither reference, alone, discloses every limitation of any claim (1–15 as issued, or the 16–30 added by reexamination), so neither anticipates any claim under 35 U.S.C. § 102. Their real significance and the place they would properly appear is as secondary art in a § 103 obviousness combination, and even then the combination would have to supply the two limitations the specification itself calls out as the inventive departure: (i) host-downloadable control characters stored in non-volatile random-access memory inside the scanner, and (ii) a plurality of label-pair character sets identifying that two successively scanned labels belong to the same product and which is "first"/"second." Both references are silent on (i) and (ii).

Two caveats I want to state explicitly rather than paper over:

1. Reexamination art is not in this record. The 2001-01-09 certificate US4866257C1 amended claims 1–8 and 14, confirmed 9–13, and added claims 16–30. An ex parte reexamination typically brings in additional prior art that does not appear on the original face of the patent. The Google Patents / uspto.report "References Cited" list shows only the two references above, so I cannot rule out that the reexamination file contains further references (including non-patent literature). To make the § 102 analysis complete for the currently effective claim set (30 claims), the reexamination file history should be pulled from USPTO PatentCenter/Global Dossier. I flag this as a gap, not a negative.

2. False-positive identifier. The bare string "4866257" also resolves to JP 4866257 B2 (semiconductor imaging element, unrelated jurisdiction, family, and subject matter) and appears as a patent-marking number in the Datalogic Magellan 800i manual. Neither is a prior-art reference to US 4,866,257 and neither is litigation; I have excluded both per the strict-identifier rule.

If you want, I can next attempt to retrieve the reexamination's cited-art list to close the gap in caveat 1.

I'll gather details on the prior-art references listed on the patent page to ground the §103 analysis.

Now let me pull details on the strongest secondary references and the sibling application.

Obviousness Analysis — US 4,866,257 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

Scope caveat up front (carried over from the earlier sections, not repeated): The claim text on the Google Patents page is the pre-reexamination set. The 2001‑01‑09 certificate (US4866257C1) states claims 9–13 confirmed; claims 1–8 and 14 patentable as amended; claim 15 patentable as dependent on an amended claim; and new claims 16–30 added. The amendment text is not in the source page, so my analysis below addresses the claim language as published under US4866257A. Where an amendment likely narrowed a claim, I say so.

Governing law: Priority date 1987‑11‑19 → pre‑AIA § 103 controls. The framework is Graham v. John Deere (scope/content of prior art; differences; PHOSITA level; secondary considerations) applied through KSR Int'l v. Teleflex (predictable combinations, "known technique," mere substitution of known equivalents).

1. Person having ordinary skill in the art (PHOSITA)

As of November 1987: a B.S. in electrical engineering or computer science (or equivalent), with roughly 2–4 years of experience in embedded microprocessor design for point‑of‑sale data‑capture equipment — including laser scan engines, bar‑code decoding firmware, serial (RS‑232‑class) peripheral interfaces, and non‑volatile memory selection (battery‑backed RAM, EEPROM, NOVRAM, EAROM). This is a mature, well‑populated, engineering‑driven art, which matters: § 103 is applied more aggressively where the field is one of ordinary incremental improvement. Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4866257/en

2. The prior art furnished by the page, and its citable status

The page supplies two prior-art sections: Patent Citations (2) (examiner‑cited) and Similar Documents. The date screening is critical, because most of the "Similar Documents" cannot be § 102 prior art at all.

Applicant's own admissions are also § 103 evidence. The '257 specification states: "Previously the valid character set for indicating 'first' and 'second' labels … have been stored in the random access memory of the microprocessor, or have been manually set by means of mechanical switches," and identifies the laser‑scanner/decoder/microprocessor architecture as conventional. See https://www.freepatentsonline.com/[4866257](/patent/4866257).html. That is a binding characterization of the prior art for § 103 purposes.

3. Element‑by‑element differences

Claim 1 differs from the admitted prior art in exactly two respects: (i) the control characters reside in non‑volatile (random‑access) memory rather than RAM or DIP switches; and (ii) the host writes them down through the same interface through which scan data is uploaded.

Claim 9 differs by additionally requiring a plurality of character sets denoting first/second labels of a pair on one product.

Claim 14/15 are the method counterparts plus verify‑after‑write.

4. The obviousness combinations

Combination A — Bendix '096 + Impulse '739 + admitted prior art → claims 1–5, 9–13

• '096 supplies the scanner/decoder architecture and, more importantly, the multi‑label‑per‑object premise and label ordering ("most significant"/"least significant" label at the extremes), plus a switch for selecting how many labels to decode.
• '739 supplies (a) an EEPROM non‑volatile store inside a bar‑code reading terminal, with the express motivation that the data survive power removal; and (b) a serial interface to external computer equipment, i.e., a code reader already both reading and transmitting over host‑class serial lines.
• The admitted prior art supplies the label‑pair character‑set concept itself (EAN‑13 "21"/"22" first/second sets), previously kept in RAM or set by switches.

Motivation to combine: The '257 specification itself frames the problem — the RAM/switch approaches are "disadvantageous" because "the character set cannot be easily changed, or … is not maintained in memory when the scanner is turned off." That is the classic known problem → known solution posture. Swapping volatile RAM/mechanical switches for the EEPROM that '739 already teaches in the same class of device, to solve the very problem the specification articulates, is a predictable variation of a known technique under KSR. The use of the existing serial interface to load the values, rather than DIP switches, follows from the fact that the scanner already has a bidirectional serial channel to a host.

Claim 13 (NOVRAM) is a particularly weak claim: the '257 specification says "Other types of non‑volatile random access memory devices may be utilized in place of the EEPROM if desired, such as for example a NOVRAM." That is the patentee's own statement that EEPROM and NOVRAM are interchangeable equivalents — the textbook KSR "mere substitution of one known element for another" case. Same reasoning covers claim 4 (EEPROM) and claim 2 (EEPROM recited as the genus).

Claim 3 (optically isolated interface): the '257’s own FIG. 4 uses discrete opto‑isolator circuits 42, 43, and the sibling '972 describes the same. Optical isolation across a serial peripheral link was a routine 1980s technique for breaking ground loops and rejecting electrical noise in retail/industrial installations. No verified pre‑1987 reference for this element appears in the page's prior‑art sections — see § 5.

Combination B — Impulse '739 (tone generator) + Combination A → claims 6 and 7

'739 discloses a tone generator 32 that emits different audible signals depending on whether the sensed code is valid — i.e., an audible output parameter varied under program control. Once the scanner's configuration is shifted into a downloaded, non‑volatile parameter store (Combination A), defining the frequency and volume of that beeper with the same parameter set is an obvious convenience optimization: it eliminates hardware variants and lets one scanner model be tailored by market. Claim 6's recitation of "central characters" is a typographical error for "control characters," which the specification confirms (frequency and volume "may be defined by control characters supplied by the host 10 via interface 14 and stored in memory 24"). Note that had claim 6 been litigated, this claim text would invite a § 112 indefiniteness challenge — an independent vulnerability.

Combination C — Impulse '739 (serial transmitter/receiver) + Combination A → claim 8 (baud rate)

'739 teaches serial data transfer to/from external equipment. Claim 8 merely makes the baud rate one of the stored control characters. In 1987, universally programmable USART/UART peripheral chips with software‑selectable divisors were standard, and the '257 specification already transmits "in a serial format." Downloading the divisor with the rest of the configuration is a predictable use of a known programmable capability. Caveat: no reference in the page's prior‑art sections is verified to disclose host‑downloadable line speed, so this is the weakest of the three combinations on the evidence furnished.

Combination D — Combinations A/B/C + acknowledgement feedback → claims 14–15

The method of claim 14 rises and falls with the apparatus claims: connecting a data source, transmitting the sets, and storing them in non‑volatile control memory are the method‑step mirror of claim 1/9 and add no independent inventive weight. The verify step of claim 15 — read back and compare — is a routine data‑integrity measure whenever writing to EEPROM. '739 supplies corroborating evidence that the field routinely confirmed successful entry with an immediate feedback signal (the acknowledgment tone). Writing to non‑volatile memory and then reading it back to confirm is a known, predictable verification technique; the '257 specification presents it as an automatic housekeeping function of the terminal, without asserting any unexpected result.

5. Where the obviousness case is genuinely weak — be candid

1. The crux limitation is the "receive" direction into NVM. Neither examiner‑cited reference teaches or suggests the host pushing control characters into the scanner's non‑volatile memory through the interface. '739's serial port is described for output to a printer/other equipment; '096 predates microprogrammable configuration entirely. On the two references of record alone, claim 1 is not cleanly obvious. A strong § 103 case needs a third reference teaching downloading of configuration/parameter data from a host into a remote data‑capture terminal's non‑volatile store — the two candidates on this page (EP 0 036 781 B1 and US 4,206,436) are pre‑1987 and therefore citable, but I could not verify their disclosures in this pass (search tool limits). This is the single most important verification step remaining.
2. The best reference for the missing limitation is disqualified. US 4,861,972 discloses the identical architecture (EEPROM‑resident label‑pair character sets that "may be easily verified or altered by the host computer"), but it is the same inventive entity and assignee — Elliott + Actis, Spectra‑Physics — and it cross‑references the '257 application. It is therefore not "by another" under § 102(a)/(e) and cannot be used in a § 103 combination. Similarly, the copending Ser. No. 129,300, filed Dec. 17, 1987, "PORTABLE TERMINAL AND METHOD" (the terminal that talks to the scanner as a host surrogate) is later‑filed and commonly owned. Note the timing significance: the '257 team's own sibling filings, made ~2 weeks before and ~1 month after the '257 filing, cover the other programming modalities — strong evidence that the family was pursuing predictable alternatives to a known problem rather than a non‑obvious advance.
3. The reexamination outcome cuts against a pure two‑reference case. The examiner had US 3,735,096 and US 4,563,739 of record, and the 2001 certificate shows claims 9–13 were confirmed and claims 1–8/14 were held patentable as amended. That is meaningful evidence that the two references of record, standing alone, did not dispose of the claims. Any § 103 theory must therefore supply additional art, and my Combinations B and C are secondary‑feature claims only.
4. Claim 9's "same product / first‑and‑second" feature is the substantive heart of the disclosure, and it is the element best supported by prior art ('096's multi‑label container + most/least significant labels + admitted EAN‑13 RAM/switch character sets). If a third reference supplies the download‑to‑NVM limitation, claim 9 falls with claim 1 — but note that the reexam confirmed claims 9–13, and a defendant would have to explain why the confirmance doesn't counsel against that combination.

6. Secondary considerations (Graham factor 4)

• No unexpected results are asserted in the specification for the EEPROM/host‑download architecture; the stated benefits (retention across power‑off, ease of alteration) are precisely the expected properties of EEPROM and of an existing serial link. Under KSR, that undercuts any argument that the combination produces a new and surprising function.
• Long‑felt need / failure of others: the specification asserts the need existed ("A need exists, therefore…"), and the admitted RAM/switch approaches show the problem was recognized. But the prior solutions were known and workable — they were merely inconvenient. A known solution's known drawbacks do not, by themselves, establish non‑obviousness.
• No evidence of commercial-success nexus to the claimed advance is available in the material I reviewed; note the patent is expired (anticipated expiration 2018‑01‑09), so any consideration of secondary indicia would be purely historical/litigation‑driven.

7. Bottom line

• On the two examiner‑cited references alone (Bendix '096 + Impulse '739), combined with the applicant's own admission that the "first/second label" character sets were previously kept in RAM or set by DIP switches, claims 5 and 9's label‑pair content and the non‑volatile‑EEPROM limitation are strongly obvious, and claims 2, 4, 12, and 13 are obvious as mere substitution of known non‑volatile memory types (the specification itself calls EEPROM and NOVRAM interchangeable). Claims 6, 7, 8, and 15 are obvious secondary‑feature claims once the parameter store is conceded.
• Claim 1 (and 9 as an apparatus claim in full) is NOT obvious on this record, because the "host transfers control characters into the scanner's non‑volatile memory via the microprocessor" limitation is unmet by any verified reference in the page's prior‑art sections. Supplying EP 0 036 781 B1 or US 4,206,436 content, or any third pre‑1987 reference teaching host‑to‑terminal parameter download into NVM, would likely close that gap.
• Any party advancing this invalidity theory should also note the 2001 reexamination (claims 9–13 confirmed; 1–8 and 14 amended and allowed; claims 16–30 added): the amended text, which I could not retrieve, may include limitations that materially change — most likely strengthen — the claims relative to the analysis above.

Confidence: High on reference dates, contents, and the citable/not‑citable determinations for US 3,735,096, US 4,563,739, US 4,861,972, and US 4,868,375. Low on EP 0 036 781 B1, US 4,206,436, US 4,766,295, and EP 0 067 859 B1 — the searches for these were cut off before returning results, so I have treated them by date/title only and flagged them rather than asserting disclosures. And per the earlier sections, I found no litigation and no 2026 CAFC docket activity for this expired patent; nothing here should be read as a contention actually made by any party.