Assignment history

Inventors

The sole named inventor is Nitesh Ratnakar. The patent's face and original assignment records indicate he was the original owner as an individual, not on behalf of an employer at the time of the invention. There are no unusual patterns, such as multiple inventors departing an original assignee, as the patent originated with an individual.

Original assignee

The patent was granted to the inventor, Nitesh Ratnakar, as an individual. There was no original corporate assignee. This indicates the patent was not developed as part of employment at an operating company and did not originally protect a commercial product line.

Assignment timeline

• 2024-10-09 (executed) / recorded 2024-10-12 — Reel 068880/0971

  • Conveyance: Assignment
  • Assignor: Nitesh Ratnakar, Dr.
  • Assignee: MIRA ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY SYSTEMS, INC.
  • Correspondent: Nitin Penn, The Penn Group, PC, 6100 Fairview Road, Suite 1135, Charlotte, NC 28210
  • Context: The inventor transferred the patent to a corporate entity years after issuance, initiating the ownership chain that would lead to assertion.

• 2024-10-30 (executed) / recorded 2025-01-08 — Reel 069778/0811

  • Conveyance: Assignment
  • Assignor: MIRA ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY SYSTEMS, INC.
  • Assignee: CONTACTWAVE LLC
  • Correspondent: Nitin Penn, The Penn Group, PC, 6100 Fairview Road, Suite 1135, Charlotte, NC 28210. This is the same correspondent who recorded the immediately preceding assignment.
  • Context: This rapid transfer to Contactwave LLC, the entity that would begin filing infringement lawsuits just over a month later, is a classic transfer-to-asserter transaction.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 9531665
    2015 : Application filed by Nitesh Ratnakar
    2016 : Patent issued to Nitesh Ratnakar
    2024 : Assigned to MIRA Advanced Tech
         : Assigned to Contactwave LLC
         : First infringement suit filed

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — Present. The patent was transferred to Contactwave LLC (Reel 069778/0811), an entity with no known products that exists to license and enforce this patent portfolio, as evidenced by its immediate litigation campaign.

2. Known asserter in the chain — Present. Contactwave LLC is the current assignee (Reel 069778/0811) and, as documented in the litigation summary, is a patent assertion entity that has filed multiple infringement suits.

3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — Present. The attorney Nitin Penn of The Penn Group, PC, is the correspondent of record for both the transfer from the inventor to MIRA (Reel 068880/0971) and the subsequent transfer from MIRA to Contactwave LLC (Reel 069778/0811). This recurrence demonstrates a coordinated chain of transfers managed by the same agent.

4. Cascading transfers — Present. The assignment to MIRA was executed on October 9, 2024, and the subsequent assignment from MIRA to Contactwave LLC was executed just 21 days later on October 30, 2024. This rapid, back-to-back transfer through an intermediary is a hallmark of setting up an assertion campaign.

5. Pre-litigation transfer — Present. The assignment to the ultimate plaintiff, Contactwave LLC, was executed on October 30, 2024 (Reel 069778/0811). The first lawsuits asserting the patent were filed on December 2, 2024, a little over one month later. This timing strongly indicates the transfer was made specifically to prepare for and enable the litigation campaign.

6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — Not present. There is no evidence of a bankruptcy proceeding in the ownership chain.

7. Privateering — Not present. There is no operating company in the chain that could be using Contactwave LLC to sue its competitors.

8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — Not present. The chain terminates at a known plaintiff, not a defensive entity.

Verdict

NPE — high confidence

The verdict is driven by multiple, strong, and unambiguous signals. The patent was transferred through a rapid, cascading chain of assignments (executed just 21 days apart) managed by the same legal correspondent (Reels 068880/0971 and 069778/0811). This chain terminated at Contactwave LLC, an entity that began filing infringement lawsuits a month after acquiring the patent, clearly marking it as a purpose-built assertion vehicle.

Verify at: USPTO Patent Assignment Search for Pat. No. 9531665