Invalidity dossier
US 4634845
Portable personal terminal for use in a system for handling transactions
Current assignee: NCR Voyix Corp
Added 9/24/2026, 1:48:01 AM
Active provider: DeepSeek · deepseek-flash
Patent summary
Title, assignee, inventors, filing/issue dates, abstract, and a plain-language overview of the claims.
Patent Overview — US4634845A
Title: Portable personal terminal for use in a system for handling transactions
Patent number: US4634845A | Application: US06/685,622 | Inventors: William J. Hale, William R. Horst, Ellen P. Riley | Original assignee: NCR Corp (current assignee listed as NCR Voyix Corp) | Prior art/filing/priority date: 1984-12-24 | Publication (grant): 1987-01-06 | Status: Expired – Lifetime; anticipated expiration 2004-12-24. Related filings listed include EP0207125B1, DE3578468D1, JPH0766402B2, WO1986003869A1, and CA1240068A.
Purpose: The invention relates to a pocket-sized, portable, personal terminal unit usable in a system for handling a wide variety of financial, shopping, and other transactions. The stated aim is a "user-friendly" device for unifying handling of financial transactions along with certain personal activities; "user-friendly" is defined as providing sufficient lead-through instructions to let an average user operate the terminal without difficulty. The terminal is shown with a companion interface module that couples it to other terminals or systems (FIGS. 1–2), and example modes include initial, main menu, bank-account transaction review, and calculator (FIGS. 3–6).
Plain-language scope (from the supplied claim-style text): A data handling device with a panel; multiple discrete display elements arranged to present, when selectively energized, user instructions and key information over substantially all of the panel; multiple discrete switches for entering data; the display elements and switches positioned in overlapping relationship relative to the panel so switches can be actuated from the panel; and control means (data and machine-instruction storage plus execution) that selectively energizes display elements to present the key information and those user instructions associated with the switches to be used for the instructions being executed, giving the user a variable presentation.
Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US4634845](/patent/US4634845)/en
Not established by this excerpt: the full claims, detailed description, embodiments, and drawing contents; completeness of the claim language (text appears truncated mid-sentence); and any litigation, ownership-transfer, validity, or prior-art conclusions — the excerpt only lists litigation links without substance.
Generated 10/1/2026, 9:31:05 PM
Cases on file (0)
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Litigation summary
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Proceedings on file (0)
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No PTAB proceedings on file. This patent has not been challenged via IPR, PGR, or CBM. The absence is itself a signal — well-asserted patents eventually attract IPRs. The LLM analysis below may surface filings the ODP feed hasn’t indexed yet.
PTAB challenges
AIA trial proceedings at the USPTO Patent Trial and Appeal Board — IPR, PGR, and CBM. Petitioners, judge panels, claim-level invalidation outcomes from Final Written Decisions, and Federal Circuit appeals. The single most important defensive datapoint after litigation history.
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.
Prior art
Earlier patents, publications, and products that may anticipate or render the claims unpatentable.
Obviousness
Combinations of prior art that suggest the claimed invention would have been obvious under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
Extensions
Patent term adjustments, term extensions, continuations, divisionals, family members, and expiration dates.
Derivative works
Defensive disclosure: derivative variations of each claim designed to render future incremental improvements obvious or non-novel.