Patent 9517782

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.

Active provider: Google · gemini-2.5-flash

Ownership chain (1)

Asserters network →

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

  1. 2016-06-08 · recorded 2016-06-09 · reel 038862/0859 · Assignment

    PIRTLE, ROSSRAILWARE, INC.

    original assignment

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

  • Ross Pirtle (employer not determinable)

Original assignee

The original assignee is RAILWARE Inc. It is unclear if RAILWARE Inc. shipped a product embodying the claims, their primary line of business, or their current status (operating, acquired, dissolved, in bankruptcy).

Assignment timeline

  • 2016-06-08 (executed) / recorded 2016-06-09 — Reel 038862/0859
    • Conveyance: ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST
    • Assignor: PIRTLE, ROSS
    • Assignee: RAILWARE, INC.
    • Correspondent: Not listed on Google Patents; a search on USPTO Assignment Center would be needed to identify the correspondent.
    • Context: Original assignment from inventor to company.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 9517782
    2013 : Priority date
    2016 : Assigned to RAILWARE Inc
         : Patent issued
    2023 : PTAB case IPR2023-01179 filed
    2024 : US case filed New York Southern District Court
         : US case filed Pennsylvania Eastern District Court
    2025 : US case filed California Northern District Court
         : US case filed California Northern District Court
    2026 : PTAB case IPR2026-00133 filed

NPE / troll-pattern signals

  1. Shell-entity transfer — unclear. While RAILWARE Inc. could potentially be a licensing-only LLC, there is no explicit information provided in the patent text or search results to confirm this.
  2. Known asserter in the chain — not present. Based on the provided information, none of the listed assignees (Ross Pirtle, RAILWARE Inc.) match known NPEs like Acacia Research, Marathon Patent Group, Intellectual Ventures, IPNav, Wi-LAN, Mosaid/Conversant, Vringo, Pendrell, Innovatio IP Ventures, MPHJ Technology, Lumen View Technology, Round Rock Research, or Erich Spangenberg entities.
  3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — unclear. The correspondent for the initial assignment from Ross Pirtle to RAILWARE, INC. (Reel 038862/0859) is not listed in the provided Google Patents information. A USPTO Assignment Center search would be required to determine this and assess for recurrence.
  4. Cascading transfers — not present. Only one assignment is listed.
  5. Pre-litigation transfer — unclear. While there are multiple litigation events listed for the patent, the initial assignment to RAILWARE Inc. occurred in 2016, and the first listed litigation event (IPR2023-01179) was filed in 2023, which is more than 6 months later. Further detailed litigation filing dates would be needed to assess this for other cases.
  6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. There is no information to suggest that the original assignee, RAILWARE Inc., filed for bankruptcy or that the patent was sold in such proceedings.
  7. Privateering — not present. No information suggests a transfer to an NPE asserting on an operating company's behalf.
  8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — not present. The chain does not terminate at a known defensive aggregator.

Verdict

Insufficient data. While the patent is currently involved in litigation as indicated by the PTAB and district court cases, the lack of detailed assignment records beyond the initial inventor-to-company transfer, and the absence of information regarding RAILWARE Inc.'s operational status, products, or primary business, prevents a confident determination of an NPE pattern. A complete USPTO Assignment Center search is needed to identify correspondents and any subsequent transfers.

USPTO Assignment Center Search for US9517782

Generated 5/26/2026, 6:48:25 PM