US 11553055

US Patent 11553055, titled "Automated communication-based intelligence engine," was filed by Numberai Inc on January 7, 2021, and issued on January 10, 2023. The inventors listed are Daniel Hodges, Tasos Roumeliotis, Joel Grossman, Andrew Ruff, Steven Ginn, and Andrew Smith.

Abstract:
The patent describes a system that automatically creates and maintains one or more digital "entity models" based on communication data received over a network. This process utilizes machine learning, a user interface, a sentiment analyzer, a communication monitoring agent, and an automated bot. The bots are built from templates. The system continuously analyzes new communication data to improve the entity model, keep the bot updated, and update other services the entity uses. It also helps businesses categorize other entities to identify competitors and provides analytics on how users interact with the entity model. The system can automatically maintain listings like Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) and is designed for a networked, potentially distributed, environment.

Independent Claims Overview:

• Claim 1 (System for Entity Model Creation and Updating): This claim describes a computer system with one or more processors programmed to automatically build and maintain an "entity model" for a "primary entity" (e.g., a business). It functions by monitoring the primary entity's communications, using this data to create the model, and then continually monitoring new communications. When new relevant communications are detected, the system applies the existing entity model to generate updates, which are then transmitted to a specific platform via a network (e.g., updating a website's FAQs).
• Claim 11 (Method for Entity Model Creation and Updating): This claim outlines a computer-implemented method that mirrors the functionality of Claim 1. It details the steps performed by processors: monitoring a primary entity's communications, building an entity model, subsequently monitoring particular communications, applying the model to these communications to generate updates for an entity datastore, and finally applying these updates to a platform over a network.
• Claim 12 (Method for Routing Online Conversations): This method describes how a system, through its processors, intelligently routes online conversations to optimize for "conversions" (e.g., sales). It involves:
  1. Collecting numerous electronic communication sessions from various "secondary entities" (e.g., customers) and identifying which ones resulted in a conversion.
  2. Training a model to predict the likelihood of conversion based on these historical conversations.
  3. Receiving new communications from a secondary entity during a session.
  4. Using an artificial response system (like a chatbot) to initially respond.
  5. Analyzing the new communications to determine their conversion likelihood using the trained model.
  6. Deciding whether to hand off the communication session from the artificial response system (e.g., to a human agent) based on the determined conversion likelihood.
• Claim 18 (System for Routing Online Conversations): This claim describes a computer system specifically designed to implement the online conversation routing method detailed in Claim 12. It includes processors configured to receive communications, train a conversion likelihood model, receive and respond to new communications using an artificial response system, analyze conversion likelihood, and hand off sessions based on that likelihood.
• Claim 19 (Method for Entity Categorization Scheme): This claim describes a computer-implemented method for categorizing "secondary entities." The method involves:
  1. Monitoring a multitude of communications involving various secondary entities.
  2. Analyzing these communications to determine characteristics such as the number, timing, length, distribution channel, or content of the communications.
  3. Clustering (grouping) these secondary entities together into at least one cluster based on the analysis.

USPTO and CAFC Docket Search:

A search for US11553055B2 on the USPTO database indicates that the patent is Active and is projected to expire on July 16, 2038.

A search for "CAFC 2026 dockets 11553055" did not return any specific dockets for patent 11553055 in the year 2026 at the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.




https://patents.google.com/patent/US11553055B2/en
https://cafc.uscourts.gov/opinions-orders/

As of April 26, 2026, there is no known litigation specifically involving US Patent 11553055. Searches of litigation databases like Unified Patents Portal and the CAFC dockets for this specific patent number did not yield any results.

Therefore, all claims of US Patent 11553055 remain untested in litigation.

Proceedings overview

There are no AIA trial proceedings on file for US Patent 11553055, either from the USPTO Open Data Portal or identified through web search. This indicates the patent has not yet been challenged through inter partes review (IPR), post-grant review (PGR), or covered business method (CBM) review at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB).

Strategic summary

As of today, June 19, 2026, all claims of US Patent 11553055 remain UNTESTED at the PTAB. There are no claims that have been canceled or sustained through an AIA trial proceeding. This means there is no estoppel landscape established under 35 U.S.C. § 315(e)(2) for any prior art grounds that were raised or reasonably could have been raised in a PTAB proceeding. For a defendant facing assertion of this patent, all prior art grounds are theoretically available for a potential PTAB challenge.

The absence of PTAB activity can be interpreted in several ways. It could mean the patent has not yet been widely asserted, or that potential challengers have not found sufficiently strong grounds to warrant an IPR, PGR, or CBM filing, or that any challenges have settled confidentially before public filing. However, it is also common for patents that are actively asserted to eventually attract PTAB challenges.

Recommended next steps

Since no PTAB activity exists for US Patent 11553055, a potential defendant should be aware that the claims have not been subjected to PTAB scrutiny. If considering a challenge, a defendant would have the full range of prior art and statutory grounds available for an IPR, PGR, or CBM petition (assuming eligibility requirements for each trial type are met). The absence of prior PTAB challenges means there is no existing estoppel that would limit the grounds a new petitioner could raise.

Inventors

• Daniel Hodges (Numberai Inc)
• Tasos Roumeliotis (Numberai Inc)
• Joel Grossman (Numberai Inc)
• Andrew Ruff (Numberai Inc)
• Steven Ginn (Numberai Inc)
• Andrew Smith (Numberai Inc)

All inventors were associated with the original assignee, Numberai Inc, at the time of filing.

Original assignee

The original assignee is Numberai Inc.
Numberai Inc, operating as Numa, is an active company specializing in AI-powered communication platforms for businesses, particularly car dealerships. Their primary line of business involves providing a cloud platform with a voice assistant and AI agents that automate customer interactions, streamline operations, and enhance customer engagement across various messaging services like SMS, Facebook, and WhatsApp. The company's platform integrates with existing dealership tools and aims to transform how dealerships handle sales and service.

Assignment timeline

No assignment records for US11553055B2 were found on the USPTO Patent Assignment Search database. This indicates that the patent likely remains with the original assignee, Numberai Inc (now Numa).

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 11553055
    2021 : Application filed by Numberai Inc
    2023 : Patent issued to Numberai Inc

NPE / troll-pattern signals

1. Shell-entity transfer — not present. No transfers have been recorded.
2. Known asserter in the chain — not present. The patent remains with Numberai Inc, which is an operating company.
3. Repeat correspondent across the chain — not present. No assignments are recorded.
4. Cascading transfers — not present. No assignments are recorded.
5. Pre-litigation transfer — not present. No litigation has been identified, and no transfers are recorded.
6. Bankruptcy fire-sale — not present. No indication of bankruptcy for Numberai Inc.
7. Privateering — not present. No transfers or assertion activities suggestive of privateering have been identified.
8. Defensive aggregator (anti-NPE) — not present. The patent has not been assigned to a defensive aggregator.

Verdict

Insufficient data. As of the current date, there are no recorded assignments for US11553055B2 on the USPTO Patent Assignment Search database. This means the patent appears to be held by the original assignee, Numberai Inc (operating as Numa), which is an active operating company. Without any assignment records, no NPE/troll patterns can be identified or confirmed.

USPTO Assignment Center search for US11553055B2: https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/

To identify the most relevant prior art for US patent 11553055, I will access the patent's citation list. Since direct access to the USPTO database for live citation extraction isn't feasible here, I will rely on the provided patent text, which includes "Prior art keywords" and a "Links" section that typically leads to official patent data.

Based on the provided patent text, the "Prior art keywords" are listed as: entity, model, communication, communications, data. The patent also lists several "Other versions," which usually include related applications or publications, some of which may contain their own prior art citations. The most direct source for prior art cited by US11553055B2 would be within the patent document itself.

The patent US11553055B2 explicitly states: "This application is a division of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 16/015,935, filed Jun. 22, 2018, now U.S. Pat. No. 10,917,483, which claims the benefit of U.S. provisional application Nos. 62/523,419, 62/523,475, 62/523,452, 62/523,463, 62/523,490, and 62/523,507, each filed Jun. 22, 2017. U.S. patent application Ser. No. 16/015,935 and each of the above-indicated U.S. provisional applications are incorporated by reference as if fully set forth."

Therefore, these are the immediate family of prior art documents. To identify other relevant prior art (non-family), I would typically look at the "References Cited" section of the patent on the USPTO website or Google Patents. However, since the prompt specifies to only use the provided text as authoritative, and the full "References Cited" list is not explicitly provided in the text snippet, I cannot detail all prior art references.

To address the request within the constraints, I will identify the provided family prior art and mention that a complete analysis of cited prior art would require accessing the full "References Cited" section of the patent.

Most Relevant Prior Art (from patent family listed in description):

The patent US11553055B2 is a divisional application, and therefore directly related to:

• U.S. Patent No. 10,917,483
  • Full Citation: U.S. Pat. No. 10,917,483
  • Publication/Filing Date: Filed June 22, 2018 (as U.S. patent application Ser. No. 16/015,935).
  • Brief Description: This is the parent patent from which US11553055B2 is a divisional. It would cover similar or overlapping subject matter regarding systems for automated communication-based intelligence engines, including creating and maintaining entity models, clustering entities, and routing online conversations. The abstract for US11553055B2 largely mirrors the concepts likely present in its parent.
  • Potential Anticipated Claim(s): Given its direct relationship as a parent application, it potentially anticipates all independent claims (Claim 1, 11, 12, 18, 19) of US11553055B2, or at least covers the foundational aspects that would make the claims of US11553055B2 obvious extensions. The divisional nature implies that some claims in US11553055B2 were not allowed in US10917483 but were deemed patentable when pursued in a separate application.

In addition, the parent application (U.S. patent application Ser. No. 16/015,935) claims the benefit of several provisional applications. These provisional applications establish an earlier priority date for the subject matter disclosed within them.

• U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/523,419

  • Full Citation: U.S. provisional application No. 62/523,419
  • Publication/Filing Date: Filed June 22, 2017.
  • Brief Description: As a provisional application, its content would likely describe an early version of the automated communication-based intelligence engine, entity modeling, or related aspects.
  • Potential Anticipated Claim(s): Potentially all claims of US11553055B2, depending on the scope of disclosure within this provisional application.

• U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/523,475

  • Full Citation: U.S. provisional application No. 62/523,475
  • Publication/Filing Date: Filed June 22, 2017.
  • Brief Description: Similar to the above, this provisional application would disclose aspects of the invention at an earlier stage.
  • Potential Anticipated Claim(s): Potentially all claims of US11553055B2, depending on the scope of disclosure within this provisional application.

• U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/523,452

  • Full Citation: U.S. provisional application No. 62/523,452
  • Publication/Filing Date: Filed June 22, 2017.
  • Brief Description: This provisional application would also detail early aspects of the invention.
  • Potential Anticipated Claim(s): Potentially all claims of US11553055B2, depending on the scope of disclosure within this provisional application.

• U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/523,463

  • Full Citation: U.S. provisional application No. 62/523,463
  • Publication/Filing Date: Filed June 22, 2017.
  • Brief Description: This provisional application would also detail early aspects of the invention.
  • Potential Anticipated Claim(s): Potentially all claims of US11553055B2, depending on the scope of disclosure within this provisional application.

• U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/523,490

  • Full Citation: U.S. provisional application No. 62/523,490
  • Publication/Filing Date: Filed June 22, 2017.
  • Brief Description: This provisional application would also detail early aspects of the invention.
  • Potential Anticipated Claim(s): Potentially all claims of US11553055B2, depending on the scope of disclosure within this provisional application.

• U.S. Provisional Application No. 62/523,507

  • Full Citation: U.S. provisional application No. 62/523,507
  • Publication/Filing Date: Filed June 22, 2017.
  • Brief Description: This provisional application would also detail early aspects of the invention.
  • Potential Anticipated Claim(s): Potentially all claims of US11553055B2, depending on the scope of disclosure within this provisional application.

A full and comprehensive prior art analysis would require examining the "References Cited" section of US11553055B2, which typically lists patents and non-patent literature considered by the examiner. Since this list is not provided in the prompt's text, I cannot enumerate those additional prior art documents.

Obviousness Analysis under 35 U.S.C. § 103

To establish obviousness under 35 U.S.C. § 103, it must be shown that the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the subject matter as a whole would have been obvious at the time the invention was made to a person having ordinary skill in the art. This analysis typically involves the Graham factors: (1) determining the scope and content of the prior art; (2) ascertaining the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art; (3) resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art; and (4) evaluating secondary considerations of non-obviousness. A motivation to combine prior art references is also generally required.

For US patent 11553055, the patent itself mentions "the prior art" in its background section, noting that it includes "a rather primitive example of automating the following of a user's journey through an entities communication-based information path," and that "E-commerce websites have made use of funnel analytics to better understand why and how potential customer make or do not make purchases."

Given that the current date is April 26, 2026, and the patent was issued on January 10, 2023, the time for filing a Post-Grant Review (PGR) has passed, as PGR must be filed within nine months of the patent's issuance. An Inter Partes Review (IPR) remains a possibility, as it can be initiated after the nine-month PGR window, challenging patentability based on anticipation or obviousness using only patents and printed publications as prior art.

Without specific prior art references identified and described in detail within the patent text beyond a high-level conceptual mention of "prior art" in the background, it is not possible to perform a comprehensive obviousness analysis and identify specific combinations of prior art references that would render the claims obvious. The patent itself does not explicitly name or detail specific prior art documents that are being distinguished, making it difficult to pinpoint exact combinations without further information.

To provide a robust obviousness analysis, specific prior art patents, publications, or other publicly available disclosures (pre-dating the priority date of June 22, 2017) would need to be identified. This would involve a comprehensive prior art search, which is outside the scope of the provided patent text and current search capabilities.

However, based on the general description of "prior art" in the patent's background, a person having ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention (June 22, 2017) would likely have been familiar with:

• Automated communication systems: Systems for handling customer inquiries, such as basic chatbots or automated email responses.
• Customer relationship management (CRM) systems: Technologies for managing and analyzing customer interactions and data.
• Machine learning for data analysis: The application of machine learning algorithms to various datasets, including textual data for sentiment analysis or pattern recognition.
• Web crawling and data aggregation: Techniques for collecting information from various online sources.
• Entity identification and categorization: Methods for identifying and classifying businesses or other entities, potentially through online directories or keywords.
• Funnel analytics in e-commerce: Understanding customer journeys and conversion rates in online sales.

The core challenge in a robust obviousness analysis of US11553055 would be to demonstrate that combining these known elements, in the specific manner claimed, would have been obvious to a skilled artisan. This would require showing:

1. Each limitation of the claims is present in one or more prior art references.
2. A motivation to combine these references, meaning there would have been a reason for a skilled artisan to combine the teachings of the prior art elements to achieve the claimed invention. This motivation could come from the prior art itself, from the nature of the problem to be solved, or from common sense.
3. A reasonable expectation of success in achieving the claimed invention by combining the references.

Without a list of specific prior art references from the prosecution history or other sources, any attempt to identify precise combinations and motivations for combination would be speculative. The patent's broad definition of prior art in its background section indicates that the individual components (like machine learning, sentiment analysis, bots, and monitoring agents) were likely known in some form. The inventive step, therefore, would lie in the specific integration and application of these components to create and automatically maintain an entity model, categorize secondary entities, and route conversations based on conversion likelihood.