US 4947028

I'll research US 4947028 through multiple targeted searches.

Let me verify the litigation/reexamination history and check for any 2026 CAFC docket activity.

US 4,947,028 — "Automated order and payment system"

Important threshold caveat: the patent number you gave resolves to US 4,947,028, and I found no evidence of any CAFC docket in 2026 (or any year) involving it. I also found several near-miss identifiers that must not be conflated — see §5.

1. Bibliographic data (authoritative, from the patent record)

Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US4947028A](/patent/US4947028A)/en · PDF: https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/a1/f5/4a/c2d24c9106a6ea/US4947028.pdf

2. Abstract (as issued)

An automated order and payment system permitting consumers to order products/services from any location. Product/service selection data is generated by scanning identification codes imprinted in advertising media or displayed on a TV screen. A specially modified version accepts voice commands via voice-recognition for physically handicapped users. The consumer scans a company code and product/service codes with an optical scanner in the Order Computer Terminal (OCT); the data is stored in the OCT along with credit information read from credit cards (magnetic stripe, microchip, or optical storage), then transmitted to a Central Computer System (CCS). The CCS receives data from multiple OCTs, verifies product/service availability, and verifies the consumer's creditworthiness against credit databases. On approval, a verification signal is returned to the consumer's OCT, and the consumer then confirms the order, whereupon the system places the order and provides the credit reference to the supplier.

3. Critical caveat: the claims changed after issue

The "Claims (14)" text shown on the Google Patents page is the original, pre-reexamination claim set. The reexamination certificate materially altered the patent:

• Claims 2, 8, 9 and 12 were cancelled.
• Claims 1, 3–7, 10–11, 13 and 14 were determined patentable as amended.

So claim 1 as it exists today is not the claim-1 text as issued. The B1 certificate shows the original "[plurality of remote programmable data input/output] means" element amended to recite "a plurality of remote ... terminals, and a central data processor, each one of said plurality of remote terminals comprising:" and then folds in limitations substantially resembling the cancelled claim 2 plus additional structure: an optical reader producing first data representative of visually displayed product/service identification codes; a payment card reader producing second data representative of payment card information from any of a plurality of the user's different payment cards; integral memory means temporarily storing the first and second data; integral communication means transmitting the first and second data to the central data processor subsequent to storage; and additional integral memory means storing control programs. The central data processor side adds first central communications means for receiving the transmissions, order pricing means for calculating an order cost based on at least the first data, and second central communication means (the remainder of the amended claim text was truncated in the source I retrieved).

Anyone analyzing scope, validity, or infringement must work from the B1 certificate, not the printed patent.

4. Plain-language overview of the independent claims

Independent claim 1 — the system (original): A system with (a) a remote programmable data input/output device that optically scans identification codes and accepts credit-card information read from the card's stored data; (b) an integral communication link; (c) an integral memory storing programs and the optically scanned code information; (d) a central data processor able to receive data from many such remote devices; and (e) additional communication enabling the central processor to reach external databases for credit authorization and product/service ordering. In plain terms: a scanner-plus-card-reader terminal, networked to a host that itself talks to outside credit and merchant databases.

Independent claim 1 — as amended by reexamination: The same concept but recast as a plurality of remote terminals each having an optical reader, a multi-format payment-card reader, temporary storage of the scanned and card data, a communications interface that transmits after storing, and program memory — paired with a central data processor that receives the transmissions, computes an order cost (pricing), and communicates onward. The amendment appears to have been made to distinguish the art (notably the "no data communication back from the central database to the data-collection device" gap acknowledged in the Background) and to add structural specificity.

Independent claim 12 — the terminal itself (CANCELLED): Claimed the programmable remote Order Computer Terminal standing alone — optical scanning means, credit-card data acceptance, integral communication means, and integral program/data memory. Cancelled in reexamination; no longer enforceable.

Independent claim 13 — the process (original): A method of rapidly ordering and paying, comprising the ordered steps of: optically inputting printed/transmitted identification codes for merchant and goods/services; entering credit and consumer data read from any of a plurality of storage media on credit cards; storing and transmitting that data to a central computer system; the central system separately processing the data to determine (1) product/service availability and (2) the consumer's creditworthiness; notifying the consumer of approval or rejection; and delivering the goods per prearranged parameters or as designated by the consumer at the time of sale.

Independent claim 13 — as amended: Determined patentable as amended (the specific amended wording was not fully captured in the sources retrieved; treat the above as the original scope).

Dependent claims 3–7 add the specific card-input modalities (magnetic stripe reader, embedded-microchip reader, laser optical reader, speech processing) and the multi-media communication capability; claims 10, 11, and 14 add the merchant/supplier availability database, consumer notification of acceptance/rejection, and the microchip/magnetic/optical card data sources respectively.

5. Litigation and CAFC 2026 docket search — result: no match found

I searched for litigation and Federal Circuit activity tied to 4,947,028 and found no 2026 (or earlier) CAFC docket for this patent. Given the patent expired in 2008 and its reexamination certificate dates to 1993, that absence is consistent with expectations. I cannot confirm any pending 2026 appeal; treat any claim to the contrary as unverified.

Because of the strict literal-ID rule, I flag these distinct records that share similar numeric strings and were prominent in search results — none of these is US 4,947,028:

• JP 4947028 B2 — Japanese Patent No. 4947028, Denso Corporation, "driving assistance device for a vehicle," registered 2012-03-16 / issued 2012-06-06. Same numeric string, different jurisdiction and entirely different subject matter. https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/51/09/fd/a6ab436f94c16b/JP4947028B2.pdf
• U.S. Patent 8,688,028 (StratosAudio, Inc.) — asserted in StratosAudio, Inc. v. Hyundai Motor America, No. 6:20-cv-01125 (W.D. Tex.) and four parallel W.D. Tex. suits against Volkswagen, Volvo, Subaru, and Mazda; multiple PTAB IPRs (e.g., IPR2021-00716, instituted Oct. 25, 2021). This is the common "'028 patent" shorthand in recent CAFC/PTAB materials — not 4,947,028.
• U.S. Patent 8,020,028 (MicroPairing Technologies v. General Motors) — claim 18 indefiniteness/IPXL dispute. Again unrelated.

6. Confidence and uncertainty

• High confidence: title, inventor, application/filing/issue dates, assignment chain to Visa, family members, expired status, and the fact and effect of the 90/002,536 reexamination (cancellation of claims 2, 8, 9, 12; amendment of 1, 3–7, 10–11, 13, 14).
• Moderate confidence: the exact full text of amended claim 1 and amended claim 13. The source text I retrieved was truncated mid-claim. For an authoritative full claim set you should pull the B1 reexamination certificate directly from USPTO PatentCenter (application 07/221,536 / reexam 90/002,536).
• Negative finding: no CAFC 2026 docket for 4,947,028 was located; this is an absence of evidence in the searches I ran, not proof of nonexistence. A definitive check would require the CAFC docket system and PACER/Docket Alarm queries by patent number.

I'll research litigation involving US 4,947,028 across patent litigation databases.

The initial results are mostly false positives (other patents numbered '028'). Let me search litigation-specific databases directly.

Let me try more targeted litigation-database searches.

Bottom line

Based on my searches of the sources you directed me to (the Unified Patents litigation portal, Google Patents/Justia/PTAB records, RPX Insight litigation documents, and general docket-aggregator content surfaced through web search), I found no litigation — no district court case, no CAFC appeal, no ITC investigation, and no PTAB proceeding — in which US 4,947,028 ("Automated order and payment system," inventor Jonathan M. Gorog) is the asserted or challenged patent.

I am not able to produce a case list because no case appears in the records I could reach. I want to be explicit that this is "no litigation found," not "confirmed zero litigation," because I could not complete a live PACER docket query or a full Docket Navigator / Lex Machina run before my tool budget was exhausted (see caveats below).

Why the usual search results are misleading here (important for your file)

A large fraction of hits for the string "4947028" in litigation-flavored documents are not this patent. Under your strict-literal-ID rule, these must not be conflated:

Source for the Polaris disambiguation: https://cases.justia.com/federal/district-courts/minnesota/mndce/0:2014cv03412/[141970](/patent/141970)/46/0.pdf — the '"028 Patent" there is expressly U.S. 8,827,028. Source for the StratosAudio disambiguation: https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/public-informations/petitions/[1547846](/patent/1547846)/download-documents (Patent Owner Preliminary Response referencing U.S. 8,688,028).

Where US 4,947,028 actually shows up in the records I retrieved

Every substantive hit for US 4,947,028 / "4,947,028 A (Gorog)" was in a prior-art / citation context, not a litigation context:

• Cited as prior art — international search report. WO 97/05582 (PCT/AU96/00481) lists "US, 4947028 A (GOROG) 7 August 1990" as an "X" category reference against claims 1–14, citing col. 3, lines 49–62; col. 4 line 54 – col. 5 line 23; col. 6 line 8 – col. 7 line 43: https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/5b/7b/4f/d9f9d67c17d62e/WO1997005582A1.pdf
• Cited as prior art — later US patents. e.g., US 7,333,953 (Banaugh et al.), US 8,140,405, US 7,053,603, US 7,744,001, US 8,743,822 (Arizona FOIA records document): https://patents.justia.com/patent/[8140405](/patent/8140405) ; https://patents.justia.com/patent/[7050603](/patent/7050603)
• Cited as prior art — reexamination/PTAB litigation-search exhibits (e.g., US PAT 4947028 "AUTOMATED ORDER AND PAYMENT SYSTEM, Assignee: Arbor" appearing in a reexamination litigation-search report; and in CBM2020-00011 exhibit listings): https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/public-informations/petitions/[1534401](/patent/1534401)/download-documents and https://www.docketalarm.com/cases/PTAB/CBM2020-00011/... — again, cited by those proceedings, not the subject of them.
• Google Patents records 510 citing documents ("Cited By") but no litigation tab content: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4947028/en

Administrative (non-litigation) proceedings I did identify

• US 4,947,028 B1 — a B1 reexamination certificate publication dated 1993-06-08, which indicates the '028 patent was the subject of a reexamination (an ex parte proceeding), with claims confirmed/amended by certificate. Google Patents shows this as publication "US4947028B1" with the same 1993-06-08 date as "Application granted": https://patents.google.com/patent/US4947028/en and https://patents.google.com/patent/US4947028B1/en
  • I was not able to identify the reexamination control number or the requester from the pages I retrieved. Do not treat the "B1" as a litigation event.
• Ownership chain (reassignment records, not litigation): Arbor International Inc. → U.S. Order, Inc. (assigned 1990-09-18) → Visa International Service Association (assigned 1994-10-11). Current assignee of record per Google Patents: Visa International Service Association.
• Legal status: Expired – Lifetime; "anticipated expiration" listed as 2008-07-19 (20 years from the 1988-07-19 US filing date). This is consistent with the patent's term having lapsed well before the modern e-commerce litigation wave, which is a plausible practical explanation for the absence of assertion activity.

Caveats — what you should verify before relying on this

1. I could not complete direct live queries. My tool budget was exhausted before I could run targeted PACER (Docket Navigator/RPX) queries, Lex Machina, or the Unified Patents case-list pages you cited (https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/caselist). Treat my "none found" as a strong preliminary indication, not a certification.
2. Search over web results returned only secondary/aggregator pages. No PACER docket, complaint, or CAFC docket naming US 4,947,028 as an asserted patent appeared in any retrieved result.
3. Pre-2000 litigation is poorly indexed online. Because this patent was in force from 1990 to ~2007–2008, any assertion activity would most likely have occurred in the 1990s, when dockets are often not digitized. The reexamination certificate (B1, 1993) is itself circumstantial evidence that the patent attracted attention in that era — a reexam is often triggered by, or run in parallel with, a dispute.
4. Recommended next steps for a definitive answer:
   • PACER Docket Search / Docket Navigator for "4,947,028" as patent-in-suit, all districts, 1990–2008.
   • Lexis CourtLink / Westlaw KeyCite history for the patent (the USPTO CRU "Litigation Search Report" methodology seen at https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/public-informations/petitions/1534401/download-documents is a useful template).
   • USPTO Patent Center "Transaction History" and the reexamination file for US 4,947,028 to confirm the B1 reexam control number and any § 1.565(a) litigation notices filed by the patent owner (those notices, if any, would identify litigation directly).
   • Contact Visa International Service Association (current assignee of record) for assertion/licensing history.

If a formal deliverable is required: I can state, with the caveat above, that no litigation involving US 4,947,028 is known or discoverable in the sources searched, and I cannot supply plaintiff/defendant/jurisdiction/case-number/filing-date/outcome entries because no such case was located. I will not populate that table from the look-alike '028 patents, since doing so would be an impermissible number-correcting error.

I'll verify the ODP-derived "no proceedings" default against public sources before writing anything up.

Let me run a few more targeted checks before concluding the default holds.

PTAB Proceedings — US 4,947,028 ("Automated Order and Payment System")

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file: 0 (0 active / 0 claims invalidated / 0 claims sustained / 0 settled / 0 institution denials) — the USPTO Open Data Portal structured block reports no AIA trial proceedings, and my independent searches of public PTAB-facing sources surfaced none, so the defensive posture is not "the patent is hardened," but rather the far stronger position that the patent expired on 2008-07-19, eighteen years ago, and its claims can no longer support any recoverable infringement theory — a demand letter citing US 4,947,028 today is not a litigation threat but at most a historical footnote.

Below, per the output template, I report the null result with the claim-level and status detail that a defendant actually needs, plus the non-PTAB signals (statutory expiration, family filings, and a likely 1993 reexamination certificate) that dominate the analysis.

No AIA trial proceeding — record is empty

• Type: N/A (no Inter Partes Review, no Post-Grant Review, no Covered Business Method review)
• Filed: N/A
• Status: N/A — ODP ingest reports no proceedings; no countervailing public evidence found
• Judge panel: N/A — no panel ever convened on this patent
• Petition grounds: N/A — no petition on file
• Institution decision: N/A
• Final Written Decision: N/A — no claim of US 4,947,028 has ever been canceled by the PTAB. Claims 1–14 all stand as issued (subject to the reexamination caveat below); every claim is UNTESTED at the PTAB, not "sustained"
• Settlement / termination: N/A
• Appeal: N/A — no FWD to appeal, hence no CAFC docket
• Defensive value: A defendant gains nothing from PTAB history here, because there is none — but it gains everything from the calendar. See the expiration analysis in the next section.

Verification performed (2026-10-01): targeted searches for US4947028 / 4,947,028 in combination with IPR, PGR, CBM, PTAB, petitioner, and reexamination terms returned only prosecution-era and third-party prior-art hits — no petition, no institution decision, no FWD, no CAFC opinion. The proceedings listing therefore stands as reported.

⚠️ False-positive warning — do not conflate. The string "494" appears in numerous unrelated PTAB matters. For example, CBM2017-00032 concerns U.S. Patent 9,053,494 B2 (Customedia / J.P. Morgan Chase / Facebook v. Skky line of CBM-eligibility authority) — a different patent with a different owner and different claims. The only "4947028" in that document is a coincidental case-citation number in a New York state decision. I found no PTAB matter in which US 4,947,028 was the challenged patent.

Bibliographic and status facts that actually control

From the authoritative patent record (https://patents.google.com/patent/US4947028/en):

Term arithmetic. This is a pre-AIA patent filed 1988-07-19 and issued 1990-08-07. Under the URAA transitional rule, it earned the longer of 17 years from issue (2007-08-07) or 20 years from the earliest U.S. filing date (2008-07-19) — hence the recorded expiration of 2008-07-19, which also confirms the term ran in full (no maintenance-fee lapse, no terminal disclaimer shortening visible in the record).

Why there is no PTAB proceeding — the window was structurally closed.

1. IPR/PGR only became available for petitions filed on or after 2012-09-16. This patent had already been expired for four years by then.
2. CBM review ran from 2012-09-16 to its statutory sunset on 2018-09-16. This patent's claims (order entry, credit authorization, merchant/supplier databases) are textbook "financial product or service" subject matter that would today be prime CBM fodder — but CBM requires the petitioner to have been sued for, or charged with, infringement. Between 2012 and 2018 the patent was expired, expired patents generate no live infringement claims, and no accused infringer ever needed to (or did) file.
3. The residual possibility of IPR on an expired patent (the Board does institute where a live past-damages dispute exists) never materialized, because the § 286 six-year damages lookback closed out long ago. A complaint filed today (2026-10-01) could reach back only to 2020-10-01 — entirely after the 2008-07-19 expiration. There is no past-damages stake to justify a petition, and no economic reason for any petitioner to file one.

Flagged lead (not a finding — verify before relying on it). The Google Patents record lists a second publication, US 4,947,028 B1, published 1993-06-08, alongside an "Application granted" entry on that date. In USPTO numbering convention, a "B1" suffix on a US patent number denotes a first reexamination certificate. If that reading is correct, this patent went through an ex parte reexamination roughly three years after issuance, and the claim text reproduced in the full-text record above is the "A" (original grant) text, which may or may not correspond to the reexamined claim set. I could not verify the substance of that reexamination (whether claims were confirmed, amended, or added) from the material available to me. This is a research lead, not a conclusion: pull the B1 certificate before treating any specific claim's metes and bounds as final. Note that a reexamination is not an AIA trial and is not a "proceeding on file" for purposes of the ODP block.

Defensive-signal aside. US 4,947,028 was itself used as a category "X" reference against claims 1–14 of a later-filed application — see the international search report in WO 97/005582 A1 (Keycorp Limited, "Remote smartcard terminal link"), which cites "US 4947028 A (GOROG), 7 August 1990, col. 3, lines 49-62, col. 4 line 54 – col. 5 line 23, col. 6 line 8 – col. 7 line 43" against all claims: https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/5b/7b/4f/d9f9d67c17d62e/WO1997005582A1.pdf. Two things follow: (a) the Office and third parties read Gorog broadly, which cuts against narrow constructions; and (b) a deep well of pre-1988 art sits on the face of the patent itself (Kumar 4,621,189; Hice 4,578,572; Schepers 4,621,259; Sandstedt 4,415,065; Kodron 4,516,016; Awane 4,608,487; Culp 4,471,218; Yamamoto 3,668,312; Monteath 4,329,684; Johnson 3,292,489; Pontefract 4,525,624; Lowell 4,115,870).

Strategic summary

Claim status — CANCELED: none. SUSTAINED: none (the PTAB has never ruled). UNTESTED: all of claims 1–14. No claim of US 4,947,028 has been invalidated in an AIA trial, and no claim has been upheld in one either — the distinction matters, because a defendant must not read "no invalidations" as "these claims have survived scrutiny." They have not been scrutinized at the PTAB at all. Their vulnerability, if it were ever tested, would flow from the patent's exceptional breadth (claim 1 recites a remote optical-scanning/credit-card-reading terminal plus a central processor, with no meaningful structural detail beyond that) and from a crowded pre-1988 art field. But that test will not happen: all 14 claims are expired and unenforceable as to any post-2008-07-19 conduct.

Estoppel landscape — there is none, and that asymmetry favors the defense. § 315(e)(2) estoppel attaches only to a petitioner (and its privies) in an instituted IPR. With zero instituted proceedings, no party anywhere is estopped from raising any § 102/§ 103/§ 112 ground. For a defendant being asserted against today, every art ground available on the face of the patent and in the public literature remains fully available — unconstrained by any prior petitioner's choices or by any Board finding. (This is cold comfort in practice: the more decisive answer is that there is no live cause of action to defend, so no art ground needs to be run.)

Pattern signals — none of the usual litigation-driven dynamics are present. No petitioner filed even a single IPR, let alone a multi-petition campaign, because the patent was expired before the IPR era began. The patent owner (Visa International Service Association since 1994-10-11) never faced a PTAB appeal, so there is no pattern of aggressive appellate practice to plan around; the CA2010846C and EP0446500B1 family members are foreign/Canadian counterparts that were never PTAB-relevant. No defensive aggregator is in the chain — Unified Patents and similar entities did not target this patent, which is unsurprising for an expired asset. The 510 forward citations in the Google Patents record reflect this patent's historical importance as prior art, not as an assertion vehicle.

Bottom line for a defendant: the absence of PTAB activity is not the "well-asserted patents eventually attract IPRs" signal here — it is the signal that the patent died of natural causes in 2008, before it could be challenged.

Recommended next steps

1. Lead with expiration, not with the PTAB. If you have received a demand citing US 4,947,028, the dispositive response is that the patent expired 2008-07-19 ("Expired – Lifetime" per the ODP/Google Patents record) and that any complaint filed today could, under 35 U.S.C. § 286, reach back only to 2020-10-01 — entirely post-expiration. There are no recoverable damages and no injunctive relief available. Do not frame your response as "we will IPR the patent," because (a) there is nothing left to challenge that would matter, and (b) the threat is legally hollow.
2. Verify the reexamination certificate before quoting claim text. Order US 4,947,028 B1 (1993-06-08) from Patent Center / a certified copy vendor. If the reexamination amended or added claims, your invalidity and non-infringement contentions (and any comparison chart a counterparty sends you) must use the B1 text, not the A-grant text reproduced in the full-text record. Report back with the certificate's substance if this becomes contested.
3. Pull the full prosecution history and the assignment chain. Two questions worth answering: (i) whether the 1993 reexamination was prompted by a third-party request or an Office initiative, and (ii) whether any pre-2008 litigation by U.S. Order, Inc. or Visa produced claim construction that could inform the "expired patent" narrative — useful context even where no damages survive.
4. If you nonetheless need an invalidity position on the record (e.g., for a declaratory-judgment posture, an indemnity demand from a supplier, or a license renegotiation), the prior-art set is rich and entirely unencumbered by estoppel: the twelve references cited in the patent's own Background section, plus the WO 97/005582 X-citation treatment of Gorog against claims 1–14, give you an immediate starting framework. But weigh whether the exercise is worth the spend against an expired patent.
5. Watch the demand letter itself for a different theory. Because this patent is expired, a counterparty citing "US 4,947,028" may actually be asserting a later, surviving member of the same commercial family, a continuation, or an unrelated patent with a similar number. Confirm the exact patent and claim numbers before drafting any response — do not assume the demand is a mistake, and do not assume it is this patent.
6. No PTAB milestones to calendar. There is no institution deadline, no oral hearing, and no statutory one-year FWD date, because there is no trial. If a third party tells you a proceeding exists on this patent, ask for the proceeding number and docket it against P-TACTS / PTAB E2E — my searches found none, and the textual near-misses (CBM2017-00032 / U.S. 9,053,494) are a different patent entirely.

Sources cited: US 4,947,028 full text and bibliographic data, https://patents.google.com/patent/US4947028/en; family members CA 2,010,846 C and EP 0 446 500 B1 (same record); WO 97/005582 A1 international search report, https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/5b/7b/4f/d9f9d67c17d62e/WO1997005582A1.pdf (Gorog cited as category "X" against claims 1–14). Verification searches run 2026-10-01 for IPR/PGR/CBM/PTAB/reexamination combinations on "4947028" and "4,947,028" returned no AIA trial proceeding.

I'll research the assignment record through targeted searches.

Let me dig into the specific assignment records and any litigation history.

Assignment & Ownership Trace — US 4,947,028

Methodological caveat up front (read before using any figure below): my retrieval tools returned the assignment events (dates, assignor, assignee, conveyance) from the Google Patents legal-events record at https://patents.google.com/patent/[US4947028A](/patent/US4947028A)/en, but did not return the reel/frame numbers or the correspondent of record for any of the three links. I will not invent them. Every reel/frame field below is marked NOT RETRIEVED with the exact query needed to fill it. The correspondent field — the single most valuable NPE tell in this task brief — is therefore an open item, not a negative finding.

Correction to the previously generated summary

The earlier section's bibliographic table listed the chain as Arbor International Inc. → U.S. Order, Incorporated (1990‑09‑18) → Visa (1994‑10‑11). That omits a fourth link: a recorded reassignment from the inventor Jonathan M. Gorog to Arbor International Inc. on 1990‑04‑18. The full chain is four recorded events, not three. Everything else in the prior section's chain description is consistent with what I retrieved.

Inventors

Unusual pattern flagged (apparent, not confirmed): the patent moves from Arbor International to U.S. Order, Inc. within ~3 months of U.S. Order's founding (U.S. Order was characterized as a "four‑year‑old company" in August 1994, i.e. founded ~1990), and U.S. Order's chairman was William F. Gorog while the inventor is Jonathan M. Gorog. That surname overlap plus the near‑simultaneous entity formation and transfer reads as a related‑party / founder‑affiliate transfer, not an arm's‑length acquisition. I could not confirm a family relationship from any source — treat it as a pattern worth checking, not an established fact.

There is no evidence of the "inventor departs original assignee within 12 months" fire‑sale precursor. Gorog's name does not appear as an assignor again after 1990‑04‑18.

Original assignee

Arbor International Inc. (rendered "ARBOR INTERNATIONAL INC." in the reassignment record — same entity, punctuation variance only).

• Primary line of business: not determinable from my sources. It does not appear in the American Banker/Washington Post trade coverage of the relevant period, which suggests it was a small R&D/venture vehicle rather than an operating manufacturer. I will not label it a shell on naming alone — that fails the task's evidence standard.
• Did it ship a product embodying the claims? Unclear for Arbor itself. The first confirmed product match is at the successor: U.S. Order's ScanFone screen telephone, which per American Banker carried "a reader for credit and debit cards" and delivered home banking/bill pay — a structural match to independent claim 1's remote terminal with optical/card input and integral communications to a host.
• Current status: dissolved/absorbed. The patent record shows Arbor assigning everything to U.S. Order on 1990‑09‑18.

Successor status (for completeness): U.S. Order (Herndon, VA) was controlled by holding company WorldCorp, with Knight‑Ridder Inc. holding a minority stake. In August 1994 Visa acquired U.S. Order's home‑banking and bill‑paying operations, forming Visa Interactive; ~55 U.S. Order employees moved to Visa. What remained at U.S. Order was merged in 1996 with Colonial Data Technologies to form Intelidata Technologies Corp., which subsequently ran into investor trouble. (American Banker, 1994‑08‑04 · American Banker, Intelidata · Washington Post, 1996‑08‑05)

Assignment timeline

Three of four links are recorded in the Google Patents legal-events record. Reel/frame values were not returned by my tooling.

• 1988‑07‑19 (filing date) / recorded 1990‑04‑18 — Reel NOT RETRIEVED/NOT RETRIEVED

  • Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest
  • Assignor: Jonathan M. Gorog (inventor)
  • Assignee: Arbor International Inc.
  • Correspondent: NOT RETRIEVED — this is the field to pull first; it establishes the prosecution firm of record.
  • Context: Start‑up capitalization transfer — inventor to his own venture entity, recorded ~21 months after filing and only ~4 months before issuance.

• 1988‑07‑19 → 1990‑09‑18 (execution date NOT RETRIEVED) / recorded 1990‑09‑18 — Reel NOT RETRIEVED/NOT RETRIEVED

  • Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest
  • Assignor: Arbor International, Inc.
  • Assignee: U.S. Order, Incorporated, a corp. of DE
  • Correspondent: NOT RETRIEVED — if this matches the 1990‑04‑18 correspondent, it is an affiliate‑reorg tell rather than a market transfer.
  • Context: Affiliate consolidation / internal reorganization — consistent with U.S. Order's formation and the Gorog surname link. Not a fire‑sale: the patent had issued only ~6 weeks earlier.

• 1993‑06‑08 — not an assignment. Reexamination certificate US 4,947,028 B1 issues (ex parte reexam 90/002,536, requested 1991‑12‑06). Claims 2, 8, 9 and 12 cancelled; claims 1, 3–7, 10–11, 13 and 14 held patentable as amended. Listed here because it appears in the legal‑events feed and materially narrowed the asset before the Visa transfer.

• (executed on or before 1994‑08‑03) / recorded 1994‑10‑11 — Reel NOT RETRIEVED/NOT RETRIEVED

  • Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest (see document for details)
  • Assignor: U.S. Order, Inc.
  • Assignee: Visa International Service Association
  • Correspondent: NOT RETRIEVED.
  • Context: Acquisition / asset sale — this is the recording of the Visa acquisition of U.S. Order's home‑banking and bill‑pay operations announced 1994‑08‑03. The "(see document for details)" qualifier on the conveyance type is consistent with a broader asset‑purchase instrument rather than a bare patent assignment. It is not a bankruptcy sale and not a transfer to an asserter.

Cross‑checks performed: Google Patents legal events (four entries above); RPX Insight record for US4947028A showing status "Expired due to Term" (https://insight.rpxcorp.com/patent/US4947028A) — RPX coverage indicates the patent was indexed for defensive monitoring, not that RPX or any aggregator acquired it; no Unified Patents or RPX asserter‑directory entry was found tying this patent to any high‑frequency plaintiff; no litigation and no CAFC docket naming 4,947,028 was located (confirming the prior section's negative finding); no SEC filing was located within my search budget confirming the U.S. Order→Visa patent conveyance as a line item.

If the Assignment Center in fact holds no further records beyond these, that is itself a finding — the chain is short, complete, and terminates at an operating company. But I cannot yet rule out additional encumbrances (e.g., a security agreement) that Google's feed does not surface. Run: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ → search patent 4947028 → capture Reel/Frame + Correspondent for all four rows.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 4947028
    1988 : Filed by inventor Jonathan M Gorog
         : Arbor International named assignee
    1990 : Recorded reassignment to Arbor International
         : Reassignment to US Order Incorporated
    1991 : Ex parte reexamination requested
    1993 : Reexamination certificate B1 issued
    1994 : Reassignment to Visa International
    2008 : Patent expired

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell‑entity transfer — NOT PRESENT. No recorded assignee carries an "IP / Patents / Licensing / Holdings / Ventures" suffix, none is a single‑purpose Delaware or Texas LLC, and no assignee address in the record is a registered‑agent service. The three recorded links run inventor → venture entity → operating screen‑phone company → the world's largest card network. Absence of corroborating detail (addresses, reel/frame) is a limitation, not evidence for this signal.

2. Known asserter in the chain — NOT PRESENT. No assignor or assignee matches any entity on the public NPE lists enumerated in the brief (Acacia, Marathon, IV, IPNav, Wi‑LAN, Mosaid/Conversant, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio, MPHJ, Lumen View, Round Rock, Document Generation Corp, Spangenberg entities), and no Unified Patents / RPX asserter‑directory hit was found for this patent. Visa International Service Association is the terminal assignee and is an operating payment‑network — it is not an NPE and has not been designated one by those directories.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — UNCLEAR / NOT DETERMINABLE. The correspondents were not returned by my retrieval. This is the signal most likely to be hiding a finding, because the 1990‑04‑18 and 1990‑09‑18 recordings are the two most likely to share a filing attorney (affiliate reorg). Action item: pull the correspondent for all four rows; if the 1990‑04‑18 and 1990‑09‑18 correspondents match, characterize the Arbor→U.S. Order step as counsel‑mediated affiliate paper, not a market transfer. Recurrence across other patents on the same correspondent is also unmeasured.

4. Cascading transfers — NOT PRESENT. Three assignments spread over ~4 years and 3 months (1990‑04 → 1990‑09 → 1994‑10), separated by ~5 months and ~49 months respectively. No sequence of chained LLCs within 24 months; no common‑principal LLC cluster. The closest thing to a cascade is the five‑month Arbor→U.S. Order gap, which the founder‑surname pattern explains as a related‑party step.

5. Pre‑litigation transfer — NOT PRESENT / NOT APPLICABLE. No infringement suit naming 4,947,028 was located in any year, so there is no suit date to measure against. The final assignment (recorded 1994‑10‑11) predates the patent's 2008‑07‑19 expiration by ~14 years.

6. Bankruptcy fire‑sale — NOT PRESENT in this chain. The patent left U.S. Order in 1994 via a negotiated asset sale to Visa, years before any distress at the successor entity. Downstream difficulty at Intelidata Technologies Corp. (the 1996 U.S. Order/Colonial Data merger successor) post‑dates the transfer and, on the evidence I retrieved, did not involve this patent. I found no Chapter 7/11 proceeding touching US 4,947,028.

7. Privateering — NOT PRESENT (no evidence). The Visa acquisition is explained on the trade‑press record as a commercial product play (building the Visa Interactive business unit and its home‑banking technology rules), not as a transfer to an NPE asserting on Visa's behalf. No Patent Progress, EFF, or SEC‑filing coverage linking US 4,947,028 to a proxy assertion campaign was found. Note the structural capacity for a card network to hold transaction‑processing patents defensively — but capacity is not evidence.

8. Defensive aggregator — NOT PRESENT. The chain does not terminate at RPX, AST, LOT, Unified Patents, or OIN. It terminates at Visa International Service Association (listed by Google Patents as current assignee, with the usual disclaimer), and the patent expired 2008‑07‑19 for failure to pay maintenance — a functional neutralization, but not by aggregator acquisition.

Additional non‑assignment observation: the ex parte reexamination 90/002,536 (requested 1991‑12‑06) cancelled four claims and narrowed the rest — the classic signature of a validity challenge, and it happened while U.S. Order, not Visa, held title, ~2.5 years before the sale. Whether the requester was the patentee or a third party (a competitor, or a party U.S. Order was pressing) is not determinable from what I retrieved. Its only relevance to this analysis is that the asset Visa bought in 1994 was a narrowed asset — which argues against a "buy‑to‑assert" motive.

Verdict

Defensive / non-asserting — with an explicit deviation from the category definition, flagged so it is not misread.

The chain does not terminate at a defensive aggregator, so the literal definition is unmet. What the record actually shows is a four‑event, ~7‑year operating‑company chain — Gorog → Arbor International Inc. (rec. 1990‑04‑18) → U.S. Order, Incorporated (rec. 1990‑09‑18) → Visa International Service Association (rec. 1994‑10‑11) — terminating in an operating payment network, followed by unasserted expiration on 2008‑07‑19 and no litigation on record in any year. Zero of the eight NPE signals are present; the only ambiguity is signal 3, where the correspondents were unretrievable. The patent is therefore functionally non‑asserting and contains no NPE pattern — but the user should read this as "no evidence of assertion," not as "affirmatively cleared as defensive." If the categorization must be read strictly, the honest label for the assertion question alone is Insufficient data; the ownership question, however, is well enough documented to rule the NPE categories out.

Verification links:

• USPTO Assignment Center (search patent 4947028 for Reel/Frame + Correspondent): https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/
• Mirror index: https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html
• Patent record / legal events: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4947028A/en
• RPX Insight record: https://insight.rpxcorp.com/patent/US4947028A

Highest‑value open item: the correspondent of record on all four rows. It is the one field that could convert signal 3 from "unclear" to a finding, and it is the field I could not retrieve.

I'll research the prior art cited in US 4,947,028. Let me run targeted searches on the references listed in the patent record and the reexamination file.

Now let me research the remaining references cited in the patent's Background section and reexamination file.

Prior Art Analysis — US 4,947,028 ("Automated order and payment system," Gorog)

Note on tool limits: I exhausted my search budget before retrieving dedicated pages for four of the references (US 4,608,487; US 4,471,218; US 3,668,312; US 4,329,684; US 3,292,489; US 4,525,624; US 4,115,870). For those I rely on the authoritative description recited in the patent's own Background section and flag my confidence accordingly. I did not fabricate dates I could not verify.

0. Two framing points before the table

(a) What counts as "prior art" here. The prior-art references for US 4,947,028 are the twelve U.S. patents the applicant discusses in the Background of the Invention (col. 1–2). They are items of existing art cited against/discussed in the '028 patent. They must not be confused with the roughly 510 forward citations ("Cited By") on the Google Patents page (e.g., US 5,220,501; US 5,310,997; US 5,848,399; the L.V. Partners / Digimarc / Open Market families). Those are later documents that cite the '028 patent — they are not prior art to it. Likewise, WO 97/05582 (which lists "US 4947028 A (GOROG)" as an "X" reference) is downstream of the '028 patent, not prior art to it. Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4947028/en

(b) The claims to test anticipation against. As established in the earlier summary, the pre-reexam claim set printed on the patent is not the operative claim set. Claims 2, 8, 9, and 12 were cancelled and claims 1, 3–7, 10–11, 13–14 were held patentable as amended by reexamination certificate US 4,947,028 B1 (June 8, 1993). Any § 102 analysis of unreissued claim numbering is academic; I give both readings where useful.

1. The references, one by one

R1 — U.S. 4,621,189 — Kumar et al. (Telxon Corp.)

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,621,189, "Hand Held Data Entry Apparatus," inventors Rajendra Kumar and Robert F. Meyerson, assignee Telxon Corporation. App. No. 06/785,604, filed Oct. 8, 1985; issued Nov. 4, 1986.
• Description (verified): A hand-held data-entry unit with a keyboard, a dot-matrix LCD, memory, and a detachable optical scanning head (bar-code wand, e.g., Welch-Allyn/Opticon) that can be clipped onto the body in more than one orientation via a non-polarized multi-contact connector. Data can be entered by keyboard or scanner, viewed on the display, and transmitted to/from a host computer. Sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US4621189](/patent/US4621189) ; https://uspto.report/patent/grant/4621189
• § 102 assessment: Potentially relevant to claims 1 and 12 (the "remote programmable data input/output means" with optical reader + keypad + memory). Kumar discloses the terminal-side structure (optical reader, keypad, memory, host communication). It does not disclose credit-card reading, external credit-authorization databases, or merchant-inventory verification. It therefore cannot anticipate the system claims on its own; it is at most a § 103 building block against the amended claim 1's "optical reader … program memory" limitations. Anticipation: No. Note this reference was also stressed in a later PTAB record as teaching a hand-held computer with a magnetic credit-card reader — that characterization is from an IPR petition exhibit, not from the '189 patent text I retrieved: https://ptacts.uspto.gov/ptacts/public-informations/petitions/[1534401](/patent/1534401)/download-documents

R2 — U.S. 4,578,572 — Hice (Data Information Management Systems, Inc.)

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,578,572, "Modular Microprocessor-Based System for Printing and Reading a Personal Identifier Code on a Form," inventor John R. Hice. App. No. 06/505,234, filed Jun. 17, 1983; issued Mar. 25, 1986.
• Description (verified): A laser-printer + portable bar-code wand reader system for printing and reading personal identifier bar codes on forms (targeted at the elections/voter-registration process). The reader is microprocessor-based and reads the bar code to generate data for processing. Sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US4578572](/patent/US4578572)
• § 102 assessment: Discloses a bar-code printer + separate bar-code reader. It has no central order-processing computer, no credit functionality, no product/service ordering, no two-way communication. The applicant cited it only to show the general state of bar-code printing/reading. Anticipation: No for any of claims 1, 12, or 13.

R3 — U.S. 4,621,259 — Schepers et al. (International Standard Electric Corp.)

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,621,259, "Consumer Electronics Equipment Combination Consisting of a Television Receiver and of a Video Recording and/or Reproducing Apparatus," Schepers et al., assignee International Standard Electric Corporation. Filed Mar. 25, 1982; issued Nov. 4, 1986.
• Description (verified): A television/VCR combination with a light pen ("Telpen," bar-code wand) 26 used to scan a bar code that encodes the characteristics of a selected station program, feeding a station-programming device; the combination also includes a processor module, program storage, and a data/address bus supporting limited "home computer" operation. Sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US4621259](/patent/US4621259) ; http://nnp.nnchan.ru/glype/browse.php?... (Google Patents listing).
• § 102 assessment: This is the closest of the "TV/printed-code input" references to the '028 concept of scanning a code from a displayed/printed medium to select an item. But it is a station-selection / VCR control apparatus, not a goods/services ordering and payment system; there is no central order server, no credit authorization, no merchant inventory check, no consumer confirmation step. Anticipation: No for claims 1/12/13; possible § 103 combination material against the "identification code displayed on a television screen" limitation.

R4 — U.S. 4,415,065 — Sandstedt

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,415,065, "Restaurant or Retail Vending Facility," inventor Gary O. Sandstedt. Filed Nov. 17, 1980; issued Nov. 15, 1983. (Related: US 4,569,421, same inventor.)
• Description (verified): A hand-held portable order-entry terminal with keyboard and bar-code/optical pickup for a waiter, communicating via paging/input stations to a local processor and onward (via pollable data logger + modems/telephone) to a central data processor that maintains records and provides centralized record-keeping across multiple facilities. Sources: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US4415065A](/patent/US4415065A) ; https://uspto.report/patent/grant/4415065
• § 102 assessment: Discloses a scan-and-transmit-to-central-computer ordering chain — the most conceptually similar of the cited art to the process of claim 13. However, it is directed to in-restaurant waiter order entry, has no credit-card data capture, no external credit-authorization database, and no consumer-facing terminal. Anticipation: No for claim 1/12/13 as amended; strong § 103 material for the "optically input identification codes … transmit to a central computer" steps.

R5 — U.S. 4,516,016 — Kodron

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,516,016, "Apparatus for Recording and Processing Guest Orders in Restaurants or the Like," inventor Rudolf S. Kodron. App. No. 06/423,004, filed Sep. 24, 1982; issued May 7, 1985.
• Description (verified): Menus at each table carry bar-code patterns per item; the guest uses a reading pencil to optically scan the codes; signals travel to a central accepting location with a check printer. The pencil lights green if the order can be fulfilled and intermittent red if it cannot — i.e., an explicit order-availability feedback to the user. Sources: https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/c0/be/0d/591292bc877573/[US4516016](/patent/US4516016).pdf ; https://patents.google.com/patent/US4516016 ; https://uspto.report/patent/grant/4516016
• § 102 assessment: This reference is important because it discloses scanning printed bar codes to place an order + feedback of accept/reject (availability) to the user — the conceptual core of '028 claim 11's "notify the consumer of acceptance or rejection." But Kodron's feedback is a fulfillment/availability signal, not a credit-approval signal, and there is no payment-card reader and no external credit database. Anticipation: No for claims 1/12/13 as amended; Kodron is the most pertinent art on the availability-feedback limitation (claims 11, 13).

R6 — U.S. 4,608,487 — Awane et al.

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,608,487, Awane et al., "bar code reader used to input information to automated vending machines." Issued Aug. 26, 1986 (assignee believed to be Omron Tateisi Electronics — unverified). Description is taken from the '028 patent's own Background (the applicant's characterization), not independently re-verified by me.
• § 102 assessment: Discloses optical (bar-code) input to a vending machine. No central order computer, no credit authorization, no multi-terminal network. Anticipation: No.

R7 — U.S. 4,471,218 — Culp

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,471,218, Culp, "portable data entry terminal … containing an optical bar code reader and memory that subsequently transfers the data from the portable unit to a central computer." Issued Sep. 11, 1984 (date approximate/unverified in my retrieval; cited as a background reference in the '028 and '189 patents).
• § 102 assessment: Discloses portable optical-reader terminal + memory + later upload to a central computer — the "store-then-transmit" architecture relevant to the amended claim 1's "transmitting … subsequent to storage" limitation. No credit capture, no external databases, no consumer confirmation. Anticipation: No; potential § 103 material for the storage/transmit element.

R8 — U.S. 3,668,312 — Yamamoto et al.

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 3,668,312, Yamamoto et al. Issued May 30, 1972 (date from general knowledge, not re-verified). Applicant's characterization: a system in which a party receiving a television image uses a light pen to indicate a selection of an option, "used in the context of a telephone system."
• § 102 assessment: Discloses light-pen selection from a TV image, with telephone communication. One of the earliest "select-from-screen-and-transmit" references. No bar-code ordering of goods, no credit, no inventory. Anticipation: No.

R9 — U.S. 4,329,684 — Monteath et al.

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,329,684, Monteath et al. Issued May 11, 1982 (date from general knowledge, not re-verified). Applicant's characterization: a light-sensing apparatus capable of sensing either a bar code or the light output of a particular area of a television screen to allow input of information to a central computer.
• § 102 assessment: Directly relevant to the "scan a code off a television screen to input to a central computer" limitation of claim 1 / abstract. Still lacking credit, ordering, and inventory elements. Anticipation: No; likely § 103 material for the TV-screen-scanning limitation.

R10 — U.S. 3,292,489 — Johnson et al.

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 3,292,489, Johnson et al. Issued Dec. 20, 1966 (date from general knowledge, not re-verified). Applicant's characterization: retrieving information from a database where data is displayed on a CRT with an associated optical code that is scanned by a hand-held optical sensor, which feeds the database for retrieval.
• § 102 assessment: Discloses CRT + optical code + hand-held scanner + database retrieval — an early "scan-the-screen" interactive-data system. No ordering/payment. Anticipation: No.

R11 — U.S. 4,525,624 — Pontefract

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,525,624, Pontefract. Issued Jun. 25, 1985 (date from general knowledge, not re-verified). Applicant's characterization: a data-storage device that stores information for a salesman, input via key pad; at close of day the stored data is transmitted by telephone to a central computer.
• § 102 assessment: Discloses the batch store-and-forward-to-central-computer model. No optical code scanning of advertising, no credit-card capture, no external credit databases. Anticipation: No.

R12 — U.S. 4,115,870 — Lowell

• Full citation: U.S. Patent No. 4,115,870, Lowell. Issued Sep. 26, 1978 (date from general knowledge, not re-verified). Applicant's characterization: a hand-held data-processing terminal storing key-pad-entered data, with a data-transmission circuit allowing transmission over telephone lines to a central computer.
• § 102 assessment: Same genus as Pontefract (hand-held terminal + telephone upload to host). No scanning of advertising codes, no credit capture, no credit/inventory verification. Anticipation: No.

2. Summary table — does any cited reference anticipate?

Bottom line on § 102: No single cited reference discloses, as arranged in one system, all of: (i) consumer-side optical scanning of advertising identification codes, (ii) reading credit data from the card itself via magnetic/optical/microchip reader, (iii) transmission to a central computer, (iv) the central computer checking both product/service availability and the consumer's creditworthiness via external databases, and (v) two-way communication returning an accept/reject to the consumer. This is precisely the gap the applicant asserted in the Background ("None of the patents describe data communication back from the central database to the data collection device in the same process … [and none] account for the credit needs of the public"). The cited references are therefore best characterized as § 103 combination art, not § 102 anticipatory art, and it is consistent with the record that the examiner did not reject the claims outright over them.

3. Cautions / residual uncertainty

1. These are the references the applicant discussed. The Google Patents rendering I retrieved did not display a clean "[56] References Cited" (PTO-892/1449) list, so I cannot confirm which of these twelve were formally cited by the examiner versus merely discussed by the applicant. Treating them as "patent citations for 4947028" is reasonable but not equivalent to the examiner's citation list.
2. Reexamination references not captured. Reexamination 90/002,536 (leading to certificate B1) may have added references of its own. I did not retrieve the reexam file wrapper, so any references cited during the reexam are missing from this analysis. For a complete § 102/103 picture you must pull the reexam 90/002,536 file from USPTO Patent Center.
3. Unverified dates/assignees. Dates and assignees for R6–R12 marked "not re-verified" come from my training knowledge plus the '028 Background wording; the operating rule to prefer search results over training data means these should be confirmed against each reference's own front page before being relied on in a filing.
4. Which claims matter. Because claims 2, 8, 9, and 12 were cancelled and the rest were amended in the B1 certificate, an anticipation analysis keyed to the printed claim numbers is only illustrative. The operative independent claims are claim 1 (system, as amended) and claim 13 (process, as amended); claim 12 no longer exists.

Sources consulted: https://patents.google.com/patent/US4947028/en · https://patents.google.com/patent/[US4947028B1](/patent/US4947028B1)/en · https://patents.google.com/patent/US4621189 · https://uspto.report/patent/grant/4621189 · https://patents.google.com/patent/US4578572 · https://patents.google.com/patent/US4621259 · https://patents.google.com/patent/US4415065A · https://uspto.report/patent/grant/4415065 · https://patents.google.com/patent/US4516016 · https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/c0/be/0d/591292bc877573/US4516016.pdf

I'll ground the analysis by verifying the prior-art references listed on the patent page (the Background §2 set) and checking a few additional references needed for the motivation analysis.

Obviousness Analysis — US 4,947,028 ("Automated Order and Payment System")

Framing note before the analysis. Two procedural facts control everything below.

1. The live claim set is the B1 reexamination claim set, not the printed claims. The Google Patents "Claims (14)" text is the pre-reexamination set. The reexamination certificate (US 4,947,028 B1, 1993-06-08) cancelled claims 2, 8, 9 and 12 and confirmed claims 1, 3–7, 10, 11, 13 and 14 as amended. A §103 analysis of the pre-reexamination claims is academically interesting but legally beside the point. Where I analyze an amended limitation I say so.
2. My prior-art pool here is the set the patent itself identifies (Background §2, the "Prior Art" content on the page), supplemented by a small number of references I retrieved and verified during this analysis. Every supplementary reference is flagged as such, and anything I could not verify is flagged as unverified rather than asserted.

(Housekeeping flag: my two previously generated sections contradict each other on the reexamination control number — the "Patent summary" states Request No. 90/002,536 filed 1991-12-06; the "Litigation summary" states the control number was never identified. The number 90/002,536 also shares its last three digits with application 07/221,536, which is a suspicious coincidence. Treat the control number as unverified and pull the certificate from USPTO PatentCenter. Also note the task header gives a date of April 26, 2026 while my system date is October 1, 2026; irrelevant to the analysis, but flagged.)

1. Legal standard and level of ordinary skill

Pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. §103(a) governs (application filed 1988-07-19). The analysis applies Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1 (1966), and KSR Int'l Co. v. Teleflex Inc., 550 U.S. 398 (2007): (i) scope and content of the prior art; (ii) differences between the prior art and each claim; (iii) level of ordinary skill; (iv) secondary considerations. Under KSR, the motivation to combine need not be found in the references themselves — it may come from "the problem to be solved," "the mere existence of ... design incentives and other market forces," or "common sense" (KSR, 550 U.S. at 417–421). In re O'Farrell "obvious to try" applies where the prior art identifies a finite number of predictable solutions. Means-plus-function elements are construed to the corresponding disclosed structure and equivalents (WMS Gaming v. Int'l Game Tech.), which for §103 purposes means the art need only disclose a structure performing the recited function.

PHOSITA (my construction): an engineer or systems designer with a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering or computer science and 2–3 years of experience with data-collection terminals, point-of-sale credit-authorization systems, and telephone data communications — the exact intersection of the Background §2 references. This is a low skill level for the relevant combination, which matters: KSR makes combination of familiar, predictable components more likely obvious where skill is low and components are "known."

2. The controlling evidence is the patent's own admission of the problem

The specification and Background are, for §103 purposes, an express statement of the problem and of the gap in the art:

• "these patents all describe systems, each of which serves only a part of the entire retail cycle of customer demand, supplier filling that demand, payment ... and delivery." (Background §2)
• The stated justification for the invention is integration: "[t]he originality of the invention lies in the integration of existing devices, products and networks." (Field of the Invention)

That sentence is a KSR roadmap: the inventor's own characterization is that the components were known, existing and off-the-shelf, and the object was to combine them. It also frames the three asserted gaps that the patent claims to fill — and those gaps are exactly where the §103 battle must be fought:

3. Claim 1 — element-by-element mapping

Ground 1 (primary): Culp '218 in view of Kodron '016, further in view of US 3,938,090 and US 4,710,616

Culp, US 4,471,218 (MSI Data Corp.; filed 1982-05-19; issued 1984-09-11) is the closest single reference and is far richer than the '028 Background lets on. From the full text retrieved at uspto.report/patent/grant/4471218:

• Optical bar-code sensor + signal conditioning + microprocessor with program storage (ROM/RAM) + RAM data memory + battery, all in a portable enclosure → reads on claim 1(a) (optical scan), (b) (integral comms), (c) (memory storing programs AND the scanned information).
• Fig. 3: interfacing the terminal to a telephone handset/telephone line (FSK mark 1300 Hz / space 2100 Hz, generated by pulsing the sensor/emitter). Fig. 4: direct asynchronous interface to a computer → reads on communication means and on amended claim 1's "transmit ... subsequent to storage."
• Fig. 5 and the accompanying text: "[T]erminal 10 can receive data, parameters, commands or operating programs through sensor/emitter 12. Thus, bidirectional data or commands can be passed between terminal 10 and other intelligent devices." → This directly contradicts the patent's "no communication back" admission. It is the single most damaging passage in the record for element (b)/(d) of claim 1 and for claims 11/13's notification step.
• Fig. 6: bar-coded restaurant menu scanned by a portable terminal → transmitted to a central in-house computer 62, which "translate[s] the received data into prices and word descriptions," routes the order to a kitchen printer, and prints the bill. This is a literal anticipation of the "order pricing means" that the B1 amendment added to claim 1 (a total-price computation from scanned identification data at the central processor).

Kodron, US 4,516,016 (filed 1982-09-24; issued 1985-05-07):

• reading pencil at each table scans bar-code patterns on a menu; central accepting location; check printer.
• Critically: the pencil is "provided with an activating key and an indicating device which, after scanning of a code pattern ... lights up in green color if the order can be fulfilled by the establishment and which intermittently lights up in red color if the order cannot be fulfilled."

That is (i) a central location determining availability from stored menu/inventory data, and (ii) communicating the acceptance/rejection determination back to the consumer's data-input device. Kodron therefore supplies the very "data communication back" element the patent says did not exist, and it does so for the availability axis as opposed to the credit axis. Claim 11's "notify the consumer of the acceptance or rejection of an order ... based upon ... the availability/non-availability of the products or services" reads on Kodron almost verbatim.

US 3,938,090, "Terminal Apparatus" (issued 1976-02-10) — supplementary, verified by search: a point-of-sale credit-authorization terminal with a magnetic-stripe card reader, a keyboard, a read/write memory in which card and keyboard data are buffered "to be transmitted to a central data location for processing," a ROM storing instructions for operating the terminal used to control indicator lights that "direct the terminal user through the proper operating sequence," automatic dialing circuitry, and reception from the central location of "an audible response to indicate ... either approval or disapproval of the proposed transaction."
→ This supplies claim 1(a) (credit-card information read from the card), (c) (memory + stored programs), the prompting function recited throughout the specification, and two-way central communication with an approve/decline response — i.e., claims 3, 11 and 13's credit axis.

US 4,710,616 (Utley; filed 1986-06-02; issued 1987-12-01) — supplementary, verified by search: a multi-station data collection system with portable bar-code terminals storing data, a network controller receiving from up to fifteen terminals sequentially or simultaneously, and a modem to a mainframe. → Supplies claim 1(d)'s "plurality of remote ... means" + central data processing means with communications capability, and disposes of the amendment's "plurality of remote terminals ... and a central data processor" preamble.

Motivation to combine (KSR rationales):

• Problem known, solution known: the patent's own Background states the problem (fragmentary coverage of the retail cycle) and the solution (integration of existing devices/networks).
• Predictable result: Culp already sends scanned order data over a telephone line to a computer that prices the order; adding a card reader (a standard POS module) and an authorization-network host to that architecture is a substitution of known components performing their known functions.
• Design incentive / market force: mail-order and catalog retailing had an acute, well-documented latency/cost problem; automation of the order-and-payment cycle was an express industry goal (the credit-authorization terminal business existed precisely for that purpose, per US 3,938,090's own background).
• Finite predictable solutions: the input-modality and communications-medium choices (keyboard/optical/voice; telephone/RF) were enumerable and each individually known.

Ground 2 (alternative, addressing the "printed or transmitted" language): Monteath '684 in view of Culp '218

Monteath, US 4,329,684 is the reference for claim 1(a)'s "printed or transmitted identification code information." Verified: the light pen senses either the digitally modulated light output of selected areas of a television screen (data transmitted at the field-scan rate, decoded into a bit stream) or a bar code printed in a broadcasting periodical, and the system distinguishes the two by trailing-edge asymmetry. The matching earlier disclosure in the same family (EP 0 013 634) confirms the bar-code/television duality. Combined with Culp's memory/comms and Kodron's return-path indicator, every element of claim 1 is met.

Supporting (in the patent's own Background list): Johnson '489 (optical code displayed on a CRT scanned by a hand-held sensor to retrieve database records); Yamamoto '312 (light pen/TV selection in a telephone-system context); Schepers '259 (bar-code reader coupled to a television station selector). All three independently show that the "scan a code off the screen" concept was old.

Claim 1 conclusion

Original claim 1: strongly obvious over Culp + Kodron + (US 3,938,090 or Coker) + Utley. Amended claim 1 (as reasonably reconstructed from the B1 certificate): the added limitations — multi-format payment-card reader, "transmit subsequent to storage," program memory, central order pricing means — are each independently taught (US 3,938,090 rate-adaptive reader/buffer RAM/ROM; Culp's transmit-on-command telephone interface; Culp's central price translation). The multi-card aspect adds no structural difference: a reader that reads "any of a plurality of the user's different payment cards" is simply a card reader. Expect the amended claim to be obvious as well, subject to the §6 caveat below.

4. Claim-by-claim conclusions

Claim 6 / the handicapped embodiment. The strongest point against non-obviousness here is again the patent's own text: the specification describes "a human voice recognition means," "a speech synthesizing means," and reading "[d]ata stored in microchips embedded in credit cards" as existing capabilities, not as inventions (Detailed Description, OCT components [3]–[6], [11]). Under KSR, "a known technique ... improv[ing] similar devices in the same way" is obvious. Caveat: I did not verify a specific pre-1988 voice-data-entry or speech-synthesis patent number within my tool budget, and I will not fabricate one. Candidates the reader should verify in the field include voice-operated control/data-entry patents and speech-synthesis reading aids for the blind (the commercial Votrax/TSI and Kurzweil devices are contemporaneous). If no such reference exists on the filing date, claim 6 survives on this element alone — but note the element is a dependent claim and the specification admits the hardware.

5. Claim 13 (process) in detail

The only element with no crisp single-reference mapping is the delivery-parameter recitation, and it is a business-practice step of the sort KSR and In re Kollar-line reasoning treat as obvious in view of the rest of the claim (no new machine or transformation). Note that under Mayo/Alice — irrelevant here because this is a §103 question — but worth observing that claim 13's steps are all conventional data-processing acts.

The one non-obvious candidate: the combination of availability verification and credit verification at the same central processor, with a single confirmation back to the consumer. Neither Kodron nor US 3,938,090 does both. But this is a classic "arrangement of old elements, each performing its function, yielding the predictable sum of the parts" — the KSR "predictable result" rationale, and the patent's own Background frames the integration as the goal.

6. Weaknesses in the obviousness case (arguments the patent owner would make)

I flag these so the conclusion is not overstated:

1. Reexamination outcome is evidence of non-obviousness of amended claim 1. The 1993 examiner, on whatever art was of record, allowed amended claim 1 and amended claim 13 while cancelling 2, 8, 9, 12. That is a contemporaneous agency determination that the specific combination claimed (multi-card payment reader + transmittal-after-storage + central pricing means) was not obvious over the art then before the examiner. My analysis above suggests that art of record was incomplete — it evidently did not include US 3,938,090 / Coker '799 (the credit-authorization terminal lineage) or Kodron's return-path indicator, at least not in the combination I propose. That is the crux: the B1 outcome is only as strong as the art the examiner saw.
2. Means-plus-function breadth cuts both ways. If "communication means," "memory means," etc., are construed broadly (structure + equivalents), they are easy to meet. If narrowly (only the disclosed structure), some elements narrow — but the disclosure itself is not narrow.
3. Secondary considerations are largely unavailable. The patent expired 2008-07-19; there is no nexus-bearing commercial success in the record I can see, and the assignee (Visa International Service Association, per the reassignment recorded 1994-10-11) acquired the patent rather than commercializing this claim set. A "long-felt need" argument (home shopping existed as a need for decades, and videotex home-shopping ventures such as Viewtron failed) is available to the patent owner but cuts both ways — failure of others can rebut obviousness, yet here the "failure" looks like market/timing failure rather than technical inability, and the components were demonstrably available (Culp implemented most of them in 1982).
4. Claim 5 (laser-optical card reader) is my genuine gap. I could not locate a verified pre-1988 optical-storage-card reader reference. If one exists, claim 5 falls; if the record is thin, claim 5 is the claim most likely to survive (for whatever that is worth on an expired patent).
5. Date/claim-text uncertainty. The B1 amendment's exact wording for claims 1 and 13 was truncated in the sources I could retrieve, and it is my inference (not an observation) that claims 3–7 and 10–11 had their dependencies rewritten away from cancelled claims 2 and 9. Verify against the certificate before relying on any specific amended limitation.

7. Bottom line

• Original claims 1 and 13 are obvious over Culp '218 (bar-code terminal + memory + telephone interface + central price computation + expressly bidirectional data/command transfer) in view of Kodron '016 (central availability determination and a signal returning to the consumer's input device) and a POS credit-authorization terminal (US 3,938,090 and/or Coker US 3,571,799) which supplies card reading, buffered memory, stored operating programs, user prompting, and two-way approval/denial. Utley US 4,710,616 supplies the plurality-of-terminals/central-host architecture.
• The dependent claims are obvious on the same or narrower grounds, with claim 5 flagged as an unresolved gap.
• The B1-amended independent claims are probably also obvious, but the argument is materially weaker and depends on (a) the exact amended text, which I could not fully retrieve, and (b) whether the credit-authorization-terminal lineage and Kodron's return-path teaching were before the 1993 examiner. I have moderate, not high, confidence here.
• The single most damaging document is the patent's own specification and Background: it characterizes the invention as "the integration of existing devices, products and networks," and its claim that no prior art taught "data communication back from the central database to the data collection device" is contradicted by Culp (bidirectional optical commands/data, Fig. 5) and by Kodron (green/red indicator on the reading pencil).

Verification steps required before this is a formal opinion: (1) pull US 4,947,028 B1 from USPTO PatentCenter for the exact amended claim text and dependency rewrites; (2) pull the reexamination file (control number unverified) for the art of record; (3) verify the Innovatron chip-card numbers and locate a verified optical-memory-card reference; (4) verify US 3,938,090's assignee and full text, and Coker US 3,571,799; (5) confirm whether US 5,572,572 (Transaction Technology Inc.; priority 1988-05-05 — it appears in the '028 patent's own "Cited By" list and thus has an earlier priority date than need be the case for §102(e) purposes) is §102(e)/§102(a) art against the 1988-07-19 filing.