Patent 8721511

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.

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Ownership chain (1)

Asserters network →

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

  1. 2011-07-13 · recorded 2011-08-01 · reel 026210/0179 · ASSIGNMENT

    ENDELMAN, KEN; MASTERSON, BRIAN; SAVARINO, CHRISTOPHER J.; STUDENT, JOERG; DAVIS-WILSON, JENNIFER ELLEN; OBERWELZ, ELGER; OVERTHUN, THOMAS DIETER CHRISTIAN; PATRON, ANTHONY; WEBSTER, DAVID; YURCHENCO, JAMES R.BALANCED BODY, INC.

    Correspondent: DONN K. HARMS · DONN K. HARMS, REGISTERED PATENT ATTORNEY

Assignment history

Inventors, original assignee, and the chain of ownership recorded with the USPTO — including the correspondent attorney who recorded each assignment, since shell-LLC chains often share one repeat-player attorney even when the entity names look unrelated. Surfaces NPE / patent-troll patterns: shell-entity transfers, known asserters in the chain, repeat correspondent fingerprints, pre-litigation assignments, and bankruptcy fire-sales.

✓ Generated

Inventors

  • Ken Endelman: Balanced Body Inc.
  • Christopher J. Savarino: Balanced Body Inc.
  • Brian Masterson: Balanced Body Inc.
  • Elger Oberwelz: Balanced Body Inc.
  • James R. Yurchenco: Balanced Body Inc.
  • Anthony Patron: Balanced Body Inc.
  • Thomas Dieter Christian Overthun: Balanced Body Inc.
  • Joerg Student: Balanced Body Inc.
  • David Webster: Balanced Body Inc.
  • Jennifer Ellen Davis-Wilson: Balanced Body Inc.

All named inventors appear to have been employed by Balanced Body Inc. at the time of filing, as indicated by the assignment of interest from them to the company.

Original assignee

The original assignee is Balanced Body Inc. They are a global leader in Pilates equipment and education, manufacturing and selling various fitness apparatus, including reformers, towers, chairs, and barrels. The patent itself describes a "Reformer exercise apparatus," which is a core product for Balanced Body Inc.. The company was founded in 1976 by Ken Endelman, who remains the owner and CEO. Balanced Body Inc. is currently operating.

Assignment timeline

  • 2011-07-13 (executed) / recorded 2011-08-01 — Reel 026210/0179
    • Conveyance: ASSIGNMENT
    • Assignor: ENDELMAN, KEN; MASTERSON, BRIAN; SAVARINO, CHRISTOPHER J.; STUDENT, JOERG; DAVIS-WILSON, JENNIFER ELLEN; OBERWELZ, ELGER; OVERTHUN, THOMAS DIETER CHRISTIAN; PATRON, ANTHONY; WEBSTER, DAVID; YURCHENCO, JAMES R.
    • Assignee: BALANCED BODY, INC.
    • Correspondent: DONN K. HARMS; DONN K. HARMS, REGISTERED PATENT ATTORNEY; 1270 AVE DEL ORO; LA SELVA BEACH, CA 95076.
    • Context: Transfer of inventor's rights to the corporate assignee.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 8721511
    2011 : Inventors assign to Balanced Body Inc
    2014 : Patent issued

NPE / troll-pattern signals

  1. Shell-entity transfer — Not present. The only recorded transfer is from the inventors to the operating company, Balanced Body Inc.
  2. Known asserter in the chain — Not present. Balanced Body Inc. is an operating company and not identified on public NPE lists.
  3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — Unclear. Donn K. Harms is listed as the correspondent for the single recorded assignment (Reel 026210/0179, recorded 2011-08-01). With only one entry in this patent's chain, it's not possible to determine if this correspondent is a repeat player in a pattern indicative of NPE activity.
  4. Cascading transfers — Not present. There is only one assignment recorded.
  5. Pre-litigation transfer — Not present. The assignment occurred before the patent issued and is a standard transfer from inventors to the original assignee.
  6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — Not present. There is no indication of bankruptcy proceedings related to the assignment.
  7. Privateering — Not present. No evidence suggests a transfer to an NPE for assertion on behalf of an operating company.
  8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — Not present. The patent remains with its original operating assignee.

Verdict

Insufficient data
There is only one assignment recorded for US Patent 8,721,511, which is the initial transfer of ownership from the individual inventors to the original assignee, Balanced Body Inc. This is a standard patent prosecution step and does not provide sufficient data to identify any NPE or patent-troll patterns.

USPTO Assignment Center search for US8721511: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/patents/8721511

Generated 5/29/2026, 5:57:09 PM