Invalidity dossier
US 6997104
Coffee maker
Current assignee: Uni Splendor Corp
Added 9/23/2026, 11:24:56 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 6997104 B1
Title: Coffee maker
Patent number: US 6997104 B1
Inventor: Yu-Yuan Lin
Assignee: Uni-Splendor Corp. (original and current assignee per the listing)
Application number: US 10/907,762
Filing/priority date: 2005-04-14
Publication (grant) date: 2006-02-14
Legal status listed: Expired – Fee Related; anticipated expiration 2025-04-14
Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US6997104/en
Purpose. The patent describes a coffee maker whose coffee discharge passageway is opened or closed "by simply pressing a push button or not" (Background; Summary). It is presented as an improvement over U.S. Pat. No. 6,755,120 ("Coffeepot"), which uses a push member to lower a discharge control assembly and form a gap 37 between base 42 and the lid connecting assembly.
Plain-language scope. The disclosed coffee maker includes: a liquid container with an upper opening and an O-ring; a handle assembly with an annular seat on the container, a spout, and a handle member having a recessed end; a pan seated in the annular seat with a discharge opening, a central opening, and a cylindrical cavity; a check valve in the cavity; a spring-biased discharge control assembly with a disk, a central barbell-shaped post, and the spring biased between the post's top end and the pan; a lid assembly with a rear connecting member having an opening (third opening); and an elongate actuation assembly hinged at its rear to the connecting member, with a push button projecting from the third opening and a forward actuation member above the post's top end. Pressing the push button lowers the actuation member, pushing down the post and disk, compressing the spring, and forming a gap between the disk and the pan bottom that creates a coffee discharge passageway to the spout via the discharge opening. Releasing the button lets the spring expand, lifting the post and disk to close the gap and passageway.
What the supplied excerpt does not establish. The excerpt does not include the numbered claims, the full description, or the drawings; it therefore does not establish the exact claim scope, any prosecution history, the accuracy of the listed legal status or assignee, or the content of any prior art beyond the brief characterization of U.S. Pat. No. 6,755,120.
Generated 10/1/2026, 9:32:45 PM
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Litigation summary
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Proceedings on file (0)
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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
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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.