Assignment history

Inventors

• Olle Lindén
• Kiril TRAJKOVSKI
• Per Sennström
• Carl Ståhl
• Markus Millfjord
• Henrik Hovmøller

All inventors were principals of the original assignee, Epickal AB (later Earin AB), at the time of filing. This represents a standard inventor-to-company assignment with no unusual patterns.

Original assignee

The original assignee named on the patent is Epickal AB, a Swedish company. This entity was the initial corporate vehicle for the inventors' work. Shortly after the patent was granted, the company changed its name to Earin AB. Earin AB conducted a highly successful Kickstarter campaign in 2014 for what became the Earin M-1, one of the first commercially available true wireless stereo (TWS) earbuds. The company went on to ship the M-1 and a successor, the M-2, clearly embodying the core claims of the patent. Earin AB was an operating company that designed, manufactured, and sold consumer electronics.

Assignment timeline

• 2015-04-16 (executed) / recorded 2015-04-20 — Reel 035447/0680

  • Conveyance: Assignment
  • Assignor: Olle Lindén, Kiril Trajkovski, Per Sennström, Carl Ståhl, Markus Millfjord, Henrik Hovmøller
  • Assignee: Epickal AB
  • Correspondent: Matthew E. Connors, Gesmer Updegrove LLP, 40 Broad Street, Boston, MA 02109
  • Context: Formal assignment of invention rights from the individual inventors to their operating company.

• 2016-10-27 (executed) / recorded 2016-11-02 — Reel 039912/0352

  • Conveyance: Change of Name
  • Assignor: Epickal AB
  • Assignee: Earin AB
  • Correspondent: Matthew E. Connors, Gesmer Updegrove LLP, 40 Broad Street, Boston, MA 02109. This is the same correspondent from the prior recording.
  • Context: Corporate name change only, reflecting the public branding of the company.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 9402120B2
    2014 : Filed by inventors
    2015 : Assigned to Epickal AB
    2016 : Issued
         : Name change to Earin AB

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer: Not present. The assignee, Earin AB, was the operating company that developed and sold the product. The address of record is a law firm, which is common for both operating companies and NPEs, but all other signals point to an operating company.

2. Known asserter in the chain: Not present. The chain of title from USPTO records ends at the operating company, Earin AB. No known NPEs appear in the recorded chain.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain: Present. Matthew E. Connors of Gesmer Updegrove LLP is the correspondent of record for both the initial assignment (Reel 035447/0680) and the subsequent name change (Reel 039912/0352). However, this is expected as the same law firm would typically handle corporate filings for a single client. It is not, in this context, a strong signal of NPE activity.

4. Cascading transfers: Not present. Only two recordings exist: an initial assignment and a name change.

5. Pre-litigation transfer: Not present. The recorded chain ends in 2016 with the operating company. Later litigation was filed by Earin AB itself.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale: Not present.

7. Privateering: Not present. The assertion was conducted directly by the operating company.

8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE): Not present.

Verdict

Operating-company assertion

The assignment history recorded with the USPTO is clean and straightforward, showing a direct chain of title from the inventors to their operating company, Earin AB. Earin AB developed, marketed, and sold wireless earbuds that practiced the claims of the patent. The subsequent litigation initiated by Earin AB represents a classic example of an operating company asserting its patents against competitors in the same market. No signals of NPE or patent troll activity are present in the recorded assignment chain.

For verification, see the USPTO Assignment Search for US patent 9402120B2: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/patent/search/result?patentNo=9402120