Invalidity dossier
US 5448471
Check transaction processing, database building and marketing method and system utilizing automatic check reading
Current assignee: Catalina Marketing Corp
Added 9/23/2026, 10:44:35 PM
Active provider: DeepSeek · deepseek-flash
Patent summary
Title, assignee, inventors, filing/issue dates, abstract, and a plain-language overview of the claims.
Patent Overview — US 5,448,471 A
Title: "Check transaction processing, database building and marketing method and system utilizing automatic check reading" (as supplied).
Patent number / application: US 5,448,471 A; application US 08/221,622, filed 1994-03-30; granted 1995-09-05.
Priority date: 1989-05-01 (listed as an assumption in the source, not a legal conclusion).
Inventors: David W. Deaton and Rodney G. Gabriel.
Assignee history shown in the excerpt: originally assigned to Credit Verification Corp; later assignments to Inter*act Systems, Incorporated; Inter Act Electronic Marketing, Inc.; Catalina Marketing International, Inc.; and Catalina Marketing Corporation. Current assignee listed: Catalina Marketing Corp.
Status: Expired – Lifetime; anticipated expiration 2012-09-05 (legal status noted as an assumption, not a legal conclusion).
Purpose / plain-language scope (limited to supplied text): The excerpt identifies the invention as a method and system for processing check transactions, building a database, and performing marketing, using automatic reading of checks. The listed classifications emphasize point-of-sale (POS) systems, check-based payment circuits, discounts or coupons, and marketing/market-data collection — including incentives at POS, time-limited offers, and registration/ID-based rewards. Prior-art keywords supplied are: customer, check, status, shopping, data.
Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US5448471/en
What the excerpt does not establish: It contains no claims, abstract, or description text, so no specific claim scope, claim limitations, or embodiments can be stated. It does not establish the technical operation of the automatic check reading, the database structure, or the marketing logic. It does not establish validity, enforceability, inventorship beyond the named inventors, litigation, or the accuracy of any assignment or legal-status entry.
Generated 10/1/2026, 9:33:11 PM
Cases on file (0)
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Litigation summary
Past and pending lawsuits — plaintiffs, defendants, jurisdictions, outcomes, and notable rulings.
Proceedings on file (0)
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No PTAB proceedings on file. This patent has not been challenged via IPR, PGR, or CBM. The absence is itself a signal — well-asserted patents eventually attract IPRs. The LLM analysis below may surface filings the ODP feed hasn’t indexed yet.
PTAB challenges
AIA trial proceedings at the USPTO Patent Trial and Appeal Board — IPR, PGR, and CBM. Petitioners, judge panels, claim-level invalidation outcomes from Final Written Decisions, and Federal Circuit appeals. The single most important defensive datapoint after litigation history.
Assignment history
Inventors, original assignee, and the chain of ownership recorded with the USPTO — including the correspondent attorney who recorded each assignment, since shell-LLC chains often share one repeat-player attorney even when the entity names look unrelated. Surfaces NPE / patent-troll patterns: shell-entity transfers, known asserters in the chain, repeat correspondent fingerprints, pre-litigation assignments, and bankruptcy fire-sales.
Prior art
Earlier patents, publications, and products that may anticipate or render the claims unpatentable.
Obviousness
Combinations of prior art that suggest the claimed invention would have been obvious under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
Extensions
Patent term adjustments, term extensions, continuations, divisionals, family members, and expiration dates.
Derivative works
Defensive disclosure: derivative variations of each claim designed to render future incremental improvements obvious or non-novel.