US 5448046

I'll search for this specific patent number and any 2026 litigation dockets.

Search results note (read first)

I searched for the identifier 5448046 as directed. Two things to report up front:

1. No CAFC 2026 docket activity for this patent was surfaced. My search of Federal Circuit 2026 scheduled-case lists, Rule 36 judgments, and opinion summaries returned cases involving other patents (e.g., U.S. 10,894,503; 9,665,705; 9,269,208; 7,290,864) but nothing referencing U.S. Patent No. 5,448,046. Since expired patents are rarely litigated, this is unsurprising — but I want to be explicit: I found no evidence of a 2026 CAFC appeal, and I searched only a limited slice of public web results. I cannot rule one out, and I do not have direct (authenticated) USPTO Patent Center / PACER access in this session.
2. One search returned completely irrelevant results (a Chinese investor-relations page); a separate query returned only generic Federal Circuit 2026 materials. Note also that in web text, a bare "5448046" is frequently not a patent number at all (could be a docket fragment, ZIP, serial, etc.), so no auto-correction or substitution was applied — the identifier was taken literally throughout.

For the substantive content below, I relied on the full patent text supplied in your message (Google Patents rendering of US5448046A, fetched 2026-09-27), which is authoritative over any conflicting search snippet.

US 5,448,046 A — Bibliographic summary

Prosecution/family chain (from the "Cross Reference" section of the specification): This application is a continuation-in-part of 07/921,414 (filed 1992-07-27, abandoned), which is a continuation of 07/553,559 (filed 1990-07-16, abandoned), which is a CIP of 07/392,207 (filed 1989-08-10, abandoned), which is a CIP of 07/138,563 (filed 1987-12-28, now U.S. Pat. No. 4,871,904). It is also said to be related to 07/966,906 (filed 1992-10-22, abandoned), a continuation of 07/553,558 (1990-07-16, abandoned). Later family members listed include U.S. 5,736,721; 5,883,373; 5,889,268; 6,131,814; 6,644,549; 6,340,115; 6,308,888; 6,937,998; and 6,736,315.

Abstract (verbatim, including its internal punctuation as printed):

"A method of and arrangement for updating inventory markings include printing an updated label containing updated information such as price obtained from the data base of a host computer on a real-time basis, The updated label is applied to a product identified by a scanner,"

(The abstract ends with a comma and reads as garbled in the source record — I am reporting it literally rather than correcting it.)

Plain-language overview of the independent claims

Claim 1 — Method ("integrated reader/printer unit")

A seven-step method of labelling products that have differing attributes:

• (a) Store product-identity information and attribute data (e.g., price) for each product in a common database of a host computer.
• (b) Place a tag with coded indicia (different light reflectivity, e.g., a bar code) next to each product, the indicia representing that product's identity.
• (c) Using an integrated reader/printer unit, a human operator visually selects a product and electro-optically scans its indicia by moving the unit relative to, and at a distance from, the indicia, positioning an externally emitted, movable light beam across the code — thereby automatically identifying the selected product to the host computer in real time.
• (d) On a real-time basis, access the database in response to the read and automatically retrieve the stored attribute data for the selected product.
• (e) Print, with the unit, a bar code symbol representing the retrieved data on a label.
• (f) Apply the printed label to the selected product.
• (g) Later, at a point-of-transaction terminal, automatically read the symbol on the printed label to complete the commercial transaction.

Essence: scan-at-selection → real-time database lookup → print a fresh bar-coded price/attribute label on the spot → stick it on the item → that same printed label is what gets scanned later at checkout. It is a closed "scan–print–apply–re-scan" loop, with the printed label as the pricing authority.

Claim 7 — Arrangement (apparatus counterpart to claim 1)

The same concept claimed as a system, comprising:

• (a) a computer with a database holding product identity + attribute data;
• (b) a coded-indicia tag adjacent each product;
• (c) means for electro-optically scanning/reading the indicia on an operator-selected product, including means for directing a light beam exteriorly of the reading means and for movably positioning that beam on the code, to automatically identify the product and produce a signal on successful identification;
• (d) means for accessing the database in real time and automatically, in response to that signal, to retrieve the stored attribute data;
• (e) means for printing attribute information on a label for each identified product on a real-time basis, concurrently with the database access;
• (f) adhesive means for adhering the printed label to the product; and
• (g) means for completing the transaction at the point-of-transaction terminal by electro-optically reading the attribute information on the printed label when the product is presented.

Essence: the apparatus recitation of the same workflow. Note that recital (c) is written in means-plus-function form ("means for…"), which under 35 U.S.C. § 112(f) would be construed to cover the corresponding structures disclosed in the specification (hand-held laser scanning head, workstation head, bendable arm, motor/mirror/scanner, photodetector, decode circuitry) and equivalents — I flag this as claim-construction commentary, not a legal conclusion.

Dependent claims (brief map)

• 2 — Print sequential coded data = total number of labels printed (anti-pilferage counter).
• 3 — Data is a base price; periodically change and store the price; print the changed price only if the base price changed.
• 4 — Reading, printing and applying done at a sales counter remote from the POS terminal (e.g., delicatessen/appetizing counter).
• 5 — Apply the printed label over the original indicia so as to obscure them (effectively updating the item's attributes).
• 6 — Apply the printed label adjacent the original indicia so both remain readable.
• 8–9 — Apparatus counterparts of claims 3 and 4.
• 10–15 — Receipt features: receipt printing means; printhead imprinting on a paper roll; printhead with tear-off edge; printhead connected to a portable data terminal; terminal has keyboard and display; printhead connected to the scanning means.

Specification highlights that materially support the claims

• Scanning head 10 is a gun-shaped, hand-held laser scanner (<1 lb.), with laser diode 32, oscillating mirror 40/motor 46, photodetector 50, signal-processing 52, and decode/control 56 with microprocessor 30; cable or RF (antenna 36) link to host computer 60.
• Alternatives: workstation 100 with bendable gooseneck arm 108 and base 104 (FIG. 3); "zero footprint" lamp-like workstation 200 (FIG. 4); arm cabled directly to cash-register terminal 112 (FIG. 5); hand-held head 150 with on-board printer 62 (FIG. 6); integrated housing with keyboard/display and label slot (FIG. 7).
• Printer is preferably a thermal printhead on a journaled roll of tear-off, pressure-adhesive labels; optionally battery/rechargeable.
• Three modes: sleep / aiming / scanning; "automatic object sensing" with an inhibiting signal to prevent duplicate reads.
• Explicit scan–print–apply terminology in the FIG. 8 discussion, and the appetizing-counter example (FIG. 9) where a clerk scans a flag (232–240) to identify salami, fish, etc., prints a label, and applies it — with an optional magnetic-stripe credit-card slot 244 and optional tag deactivator (Ser. No. 236,249, filed 08/25/88, abandoned) for retail.
• Prior art cited in the specification includes U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,251,798; 4,387,297; 4,871,904; 4,794,239 (multi-track bar codes); 4,845.,350; 4,816,660; D-306,434; D-306,435; and numerous co-assigned applications. Note: several of these strings contain typographical artifacts in the source record (e.g., "4,845.,350," "4,816,660," "5,889,268" vs. "5,889,926" style spacing). Per your rule I have not auto-corrected them; treat them as printed.

Notable citing documents (same field): US 5,602,377 (Metanetics, scanning/labeling apparatus); US 5,679,943 (Norand, hand-held terminal); US 5,689,101 (Fujitsu, POS system); US 5,714,416 (NCR, price verifier); US 6,164,535 (NCR, price maintenance system and method); US 5,979,772 (Mold, merchandise checkout system); US 7,273,570 (NCR).

Explicit uncertainty / limitations

• Assignee naming is inconsistent in the record itself: the listing shows both "Symbol Technologies LLC" (original and current assignee field) and a 1995-03-03 assignment to "SYMBOL TECHNOLOGIES, INC.," plus a 2005-01-05 security interest to JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. The Google Patents page itself cautions that listed assignees "may be inaccurate" and that legal status is an assumption. I cannot independently confirm the current chain of title from this session.
• I did not verify the patent against a live USPTO Patent Center record, and the identifier was also searched as a bare numeric string (which produces noise). Treat the bibliographic data above as sourced from the supplied Google Patents text rather than as an official USPTO confirmation.
• No CAFC 2026 docket tie to this patent was found. If a specific 2026 appeal number is known, supplying it would let me check the docket directly.
• The patent is long expired (anticipated expiration listed as 2012-09-05), so current infringement litigation is unlikely — but I state that as inference, not verified fact.
• Claim-construction observations (means-plus-function treatment under § 112(f)) are analytic commentary, not a legal conclusion.

I'll research litigation involving US patent 5,448,046. Let me run several targeted searches.

Let me search litigation-specific databases and the Unified Patents portal.

Bottom line

My searches did not identify any litigation in which U.S. Patent No. 5,448,046 was asserted or challenged. I cannot affirmatively say "no litigation exists" — see the caveats below — but nothing I found supports a litigation hit on this specific number, and several apparent "hits" were false positives on unrelated identifiers.

What I searched and what came back

I ran targeted queries for "5448046", "5,448,046", the patent + litigation/case/docket terms, and the patent + Symbol Technologies. Results broke down as follows:

1. The patent itself (confirmed identity). US 5,448,046 A, "Arrangement for and method of expediting commercial product transactions at a point-of-sale site," inventor Jerome Swartz, original/current assignee Symbol Technologies LLC, priority 1987-12-28 (from US 07/138,563, now US 4,871,904), filed 1994-08-18 as a CIP, granted 1995-09-05, 15 claims. Google Patents lists legal status "Expired – Lifetime," with anticipated expiration 2012-09-05. Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/[US5448046A](/patent/US5448046A)

• Relevant note for litigation prospects: the patent expired roughly 14 years ago (term running from the 1987 priority date), and it is part of a large continuation family (US 5,736,721; 5,883,373; 5,889,268; 6,131,814; 6,308,888; 6,345,115; 6,646,549; 6,737,315; 6,937,998).

2. False positives — do not confuse these with the US patent:

• JP 特許第5448046号 / JP 5448046 B2 — a Japanese patent for tryptanthrin derivatives, filed 2009-04-10, registered 2014, owned by Hirosaki University (川上淳). Completely unrelated to bar-code POS systems. (e.g., https://jglobal.jst.go.jp/detail?JGLOBAL_ID=201403085809928595)
• U.S. Trademark Registration No. 5448046 (WINNPRIME), serial 87607512. Unrelated.
• Purchase Order No. 5448046 appearing in the Circuit City Stores bankruptcy (Bankr. E.D. Va. 08-35653). Unrelated.

3. Art-citation hits only. The US patent appears repeatedly as a prior-art citation in later patents/PCT search reports (e.g., WO 96/27852, Metanetics; WO 2010/041250, Stelzer "automated application of up to date price tags"; EP 1,023,689, Telxon shopping-cart reader). Citation as prior art is not litigation.

4. Symbol Technologies litigation I found — none of it on the '046 patent. The Symbol-centric cases that surfaced were:

• Symbol Technologies, Inc. v. Spectra-Physics — No. C-84-20051 (N.D. Cal., filed Jan. 27, 1984); consent judgment Jan. 6, 1986. Patents: US 4,387,297.
• Symbol Technologies v. Opticon, Inc. — No. 86-8736 (S.D.N.Y.); liability found for Symbol, aff'd, 935 F.2d 1569 (Fed. Cir. 1991). Patents: '297 and US 4,593,186.
• Symbol Technologies, Inc. v. Lemelson Medical, Education & Research Foundation, LP — No. 99-CV-0397 (D. Nev.), consolidated with Cognex Corp. v. Lemelson, CV-N-99-0533; Fed. Cir. 277 F.3d 1361 (Jan. 24, 2002) (laches defense available); final judgment Jan. 23, 2004 invalidating 14 Lemelson patents; aff'd and laches extended to all claims, 422 F.3d 1378 (Fed. Cir. Sept. 9, 2005), reh'g order Nov. 16, 2005. Patents in suit: Lemelson's (e.g., 4,338,626; 4,969,038; 5,067,012; 5,144,421), not the '046 patent.
• Metrologic Instruments, Inc. v. Symbol Technologies, Inc. — Civ. No. 03-2912 (HAA) (D.N.J.); Markman opinion 460 F. Supp. 2d 571 (Sept. 29, 2006). Patents in suit: Metrologic's 5,939,698 and related; not the '046 patent.
• In re Certain Laser Bar Code Scanners and Scan Engines — ITC Inv. No. 337-TA-551 (complaint by Symbol Technologies; respondents Metro (Suzhou) Technologies and Metrologic Instruments; initial determination Jan. 29, 2007). Again, not reported as involving the '046 patent.

So the prominent Symbol enforcement campaigns of the 1980s–2000s were built on other patents (the '297/'186 scanner patents and the Lemelson declaratory-judgment actions), consistent with the '046 patent never surfacing as an asserted patent.

Important limitations on this answer (please read)

• I did not actually reach the litigation databases you named. My only tool here is general web search; I could not directly query the Unified Patents litigation portal (https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/caselist), PACER, or the CAFC docket. These are largely paywalled/gated and are not well indexed by general search engines. A general-web negative is weak evidence for litigation, because district-court complaints are often not publicly indexed by patent number.
• Consequently, I cannot certify that no case exists. A suit in which the '046 patent was asserted could be missing from indexed sources.
• Unverified leads. I did not confirm the full list of patents asserted in ITC 337-TA-551 or in the various Symbol/Metrologic actions beyond what the retrieved opinions state; I also could not verify whether the '046 patent ever appeared in a licensing demand or an unindexed complaint.

How to verify definitively (recommended steps)

1. Unified Patents litigation portal — search "5448046" or "5,448,046" in the patent-number field at https://portal.unifiedpatents.com/litigation/caselist.
2. RPX Insight / Docket Navigator / Lex Machina — run the patent number against their litigation databases; these index complaints by asserted patent. (One RPX-insight document surfaced in my search, but it concerned Symbol's design patents D473,186 / D488,436 and US 6,730,432, not the '046 patent.)
3. PACER / CourtListener RECAP — full-text search for "5,448,046" and "5448046" across dockets.
4. USPTO Patent Public Search "Litigation" / Patent Center and the USPTO Assignment record (the Google Patents page shows a 2005 security interest to JPMorgan Chase and the 1995 assignment from Swartz to Symbol Technologies, but no litigation tag).
5. CAFC — search the Fed. Cir. opinions/docket for the number.

What I can state with confidence

• The only litigation activity I could attribute to this patent family traces to Symbol Technologies' enforcement of other patents, not US 5,448,046.
• Based on the evidence retrieved, there is no confirmed litigation involving US 5,448,046. Given the tool limitations above, treat this as "none found," not "none exists."

I'll verify whether any AIA trial proceedings exist against this patent before drafting.

Let me run additional targeted checks for CBM/PGR activity and confirm the patent's term status.

One more check for any PTAB docket trace before I finalize the "no proceedings" finding.

Proceedings overview

Total AIA trial proceedings on file for US 5,448,046: 0. Breakdown by status: active — 0; claims invalidated by PTAB — 0; claims sustained by PTAB — 0; settled — 0; institution denied — 0.

The structured "PTAB proceedings on file" block is the canonical source here and reports that the USPTO Open Data Portal returns no AIA trial proceedings for this patent as of the most recent ingest. My independent web searches (patent number in combination with IPR / PGR / CBM / PTAB / institution decision / final written decision) surfaced no petition, institution decision, FWD, or appeal naming US 5,448,046. I am flagging that explicitly rather than asserting proceedings I could not verify: I found no proceeding numbers to report, and I will not generate any.

Defensive posture: this is not "no PTAB activity yet" in the sense of a patent still ripening for challenge — it is a patent that was structurally beyond the reach of the AIA trial regime. Per the bibliographic data, US 5,448,046 issued 1995-09-05 with an anticipated expiration of 2012-09-05 and legal status "Expired - Lifetime." The AIA trial provisions (IPR, PGR, CBM) took effect 2012-09-16. The patent therefore expired eleven days before any AIA petition could have been filed against it. The absence of PTAB activity is a chronological artifact, not a signal that the patent is hardened by surviving challenges. The more consequential fact for a defendant is the expiration itself, discussed below.

No proceedings to report

No ### {PROCEEDING_NUMBER} entries follow, because no proceeding number exists to cite. Per the operating constraints, I will not fabricate one. For completeness, here is what each field would have required and what is actually on the record:

• Type: No IPR, PGR, or CBM docket identified. Note that CBM review (available 2012-09-16 through 2020-09-16 for patents claiming a "covered business method" tied to financial products or services) is the only AIA track whose window even overlapped the patent's post-issuance life, and only in its first four years — and this patent's claims (bar-code scanning + label printing at a POS counter) would face a threshold § 18(a)(1)(B) "technological invention" eligibility fight. No CBM petition appears on file.
• Filed: N/A.
• Status: N/A. The only status string in the structured data is the patent's own legal status: "Expired - Lifetime."
• Judge panel: No APJ panel identified.
• Petition grounds: None. No § 102 / § 103 / § 112 grounds were ever presented to the Board on this patent.
• Institution decision: None.
• Final Written Decision: None. No claim of US 5,448,046 has ever been canceled, confirmed, or adjudicated unpatentable by the PTAB. Claims 1–15 are all, in PTAB terms, untested.
• Settlement / termination: None.
• Appeal: No CAFC appeal traceable to a PTAB FWD on this patent. The court/ITC activity I did find (e.g., Symbol Technologies v. Metrologic, ITC Inv. No. 337-TA-551 and the D.N.J. Markman ruling of 2006-09-29, and Symbol v. Janam, D. Del. No. 08-340) is district court and ITC litigation, not AIA trial practice — and my search results do not establish that US 5,448,046 itself was the asserted patent in those cases. I am not treating them as PTAB proceedings, and I would not cite them as such.
• Defensive value: None in the IPR sense. There is no FWD to lean on and no § 315(e)(2) estoppel to exploit or fear.

One adjacent data point worth noting, and nothing more: third-party art citations to US 5,448,046 exist (e.g., WO 2010041250 A1, "A system and method for the automated application of up to date price tags"), and it is cited as family/background art on later Symbol filings. That establishes it as prior art to others — it says nothing about validity challenges to it.

Strategic summary

Claim status: all 15 claims UNTESTED, and all 15 claims EXPIRED. Nothing in the PTAB record narrows this patent, because there is no PTAB record. Claims 1–6 are method claims (scanning coded indicia on a tag adjacent a product, real-time database access, printing a bar-code label, applying it, then reading that label at the point-of-transaction terminal); claims 7–15 are the corresponding arrangement claims. There are no canceled claims and no sustained claims — the distinction the question asks me to draw simply does not exist for this docket. The controlling fact is that the patent's term ran out on 2012-09-05: the '046 patent cannot be infringed today, no injunction is available, and any recovery is limited to past damages, which 35 U.S.C. § 286 caps at six years before the complaint was filed — meaning a case filed today could reach back only to roughly 2020, by which time the patent had already been expired for nearly eight years. A demand letter citing US 5,448,046 is, on its face, asserting an expired patent.

Estoppel landscape: none exists. Because there has never been a PTAB petition, there is no § 315(e)(2) estoppel binding anyone as to this patent, and no petitioner/privy set. Conversely, a defendant gains nothing from the absence — there is no IPR record to cite for a § 282 defense and no Board construction to import. All § 102/§ 103 grounds (patents, printed publications, and — since no IPR petition was ever filed by these parties — public-use and on-sale system art, which is unavailable in IPR anyway) remain fully available in district court as they always were. Practically, invalidity is a secondary argument here; expiration and § 286 damages windows are the primary ones.

Pattern signals: there is no petitioner pattern to detect — no repeat filer, no defensive aggregator (no Unified Patents, RPX, or similar involvement traceable to this patent), and no Patent Owner appeal activity, because there was never a trial. The notable pattern is the opposite: US 5,448,046 sits at the head of a large continuation family sharing the 1987-12-28 priority date, and the family members filed later (US 5,736,721; US 5,883,373; US 5,889,268; US 6,131,814; US 6,308,888; US 6,340,115; US 6,644,549; US 6,937,998; US 6,736,315) carry substantially later expirations. If a current assertion campaign touches this subject matter, my expectation — flagged as inference, not verified fact — is that the live claims would be in those later-expiring continuations rather than in the expired '046. Those family members are where an IPR budget should be aimed.

Recommended next steps

• Lead with expiration, not with PTAB. US 5,448,046's anticipated expiration is 2012-09-05 (Google Patents legal status: "Expired - Lifetime"; https://patents.google.com/patent/[US5448046A](/patent/US5448046A)). Any assertion of this patent should be met immediately with a Rule 11 / § 285-expense letter noting that the asserted claims are expired and that no PTAB proceeding was ever needed to kill them. There is no FWD link to provide, because there is no FWD — I will not manufacture one.
• Do not expect a PTAB-based defense to materialize. A defendant cannot petition for IPR against these claims in a way that yields useful relief, and the statutory window closed before the AIA trials regime opened. Plan the defense around the expiration date, the § 286 six-year damages bar, and the absence of any injunctive remedy.
• Confirm the docket independently before relying on this. The structured ODP feed is authoritative for AIA trials and shows nothing; I recommend a parallel docket check of PTAB E2E (https://e2e.uspto.gov) and CourtListener (https://www.courtlistener.com) for the patent number and for the family members listed above, since family-member challenges are the plausible source of any activity misattributed to the '046.
• If served with a complaint citing a family member (e.g., US 6,644,549, US 6,308,888, US 6,937,998), the analysis changes completely — those are in different statutory territory and are IPR-eligible subject to § 315(b) timing. Send me the asserted patent number and I will run the same analysis on the correct docket.

Confidence statement: I have high confidence that the ODP structured block is correct and that no AIA trial proceeding exists against US 5,448,046; my negative web search results are consistent with the eleven-day gap between the patent's 2012-09-05 expiration and the 2012-09-16 AIA trial start date. I have not verified whether US 5,448,046 was ever asserted in the Symbol/Metrologic ITC and district court matters that appear in my search results, and I make no claim about that one way or the other.

I'll attempt to pull the actual assignment records before writing anything.

Let me try to pull the specific reel/frame records for these two entries.

Ownership & Assignment Reconstruction — US 5,448,046 A

Patent: "Arrangement for and method of expediting commercial product transactions at a point-of-sale site"
Appl. No. 08/292,584 · Filed 1994-08-18 · Granted 1995-09-05 · Priority 1987-12-28 (US 07/138,563 → US 4,871,904)
Legal status (per Google Patents): Expired – Lifetime, anticipated expiration 2012-09-05

Data-availability caveat, stated up front. I could not reach a live, record-level USPTO Assignment Center response for this patent from the working environment used here. The two legal events below are documented on the Google Patents legal-events feed (https://patents.google.com/patent/US5448046/en), which reports them without reel/frame or correspondent data. I have not invented reel/frame numbers, correspondent names, or executed dates. Where the record is silent, this report says "not retrieved" rather than guessing. The structured reel/frame + correspondent fields should be confirmed directly at https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search by patent number 5448046; legacy interface at https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html).

Inventors

Pattern notes:

• No inventor-departure signal. Swartz did not leave Symbol within 12 months of filing; he ran the company until retiring in 2000, i.e. ~6 years after this CIP filing and ~13 years after the 1987 priority date. There is no evidence of a pre-fire-sale inventor exodus on this record.
• Unusual concentration: the entire family (US 5,448,046; 5,736,721; 5,883,373; 5,889,268; 6,131,814; 6,644,549; 6,340,115; 6,308,888; 6,937,998; 6,736,315) traces to Swartz. Later family members add co-inventors (e.g. Daniel R. McGlynn on US 6,937,998), but this patent is a single-inventor instrument.
• Swartz also appears as inventor on the parent US 4,871,904 (multidirectional optical scanner) and on numerous Symbol filings (e.g. EP 0 513 530, EP 0 194 115) with a consistent correspondence address of 19 Crane Neck Road, Old Field/Setauket, NY — a personal residence used as inventor correspondence, not a shell-entity address.

Original assignee

Symbol Technologies, Inc., Bohemia / Holtsville, New York (named on the face of the patent as assignee; Google Patents currently normalizes the current-assignee field to "Symbol Technologies LLC" — I found no recorded assignment supporting a transfer to an entity of that exact name in the material available, so treat "LLC" as an unverified index artifact).

• Business: the dominant U.S. manufacturer of handheld laser bar code scanners, mobile/portable data terminals, wireless LAN infrastructure, and later RFID readers. Symbol was reported to hold ~910 U.S. patents and ~680 international patents at the time of the Motorola deal.
• Product embodiment: Symbol was an operating, shipping manufacturer throughout (handheld and fixed scanners, mobile POS terminals, portable printers). The claimed reader/printer "scan-print-apply" workflow is consistent with Symbol's scanner + portable thermal printer product lines, but I cannot confirm from this record a specific commercial SKU that practiced all of claim 1's steps (scan → real-time database access → print bar-coded price label → apply → re-read at POS). Treat product-embodiment of the claims as probable but unverified.
• Current status: acquired, not bankrupt. Symbol suffered a 1998–2002 accounting fraud (restatement of $234M revenue / $325M net income; $37M SEC settlement; ~$138M shareholder settlements; executives indicted 2004). It was acquired by Motorola, Inc. for ~$3.9B (announced 2006-09-19, closed January 2007) and folded into Motorola Solutions. In October 2014, Zebra Technologies acquired Motorola Solutions' enterprise business (including the Symbol line) for ~$3.45B. Symbol no longer operates independently.
• Assertion posture (context, not a recorded assignment): Symbol was itself a frequent patent plaintiff as an operating company — e.g. the Symbol/Metrologic royalty dispute (Metrologic stopped paying royalties in 2002; settled by Motorola in January 2008 with cross-licenses). That is classic operating-company assertion, not NPE activity.

Assignment timeline

Two recorded events appear in the Google Patents legal-events feed. Neither is exposed with reel/frame or correspondent in the sources I could access; I therefore mark those fields "not retrieved" rather than fabricate them.

• 1995-03-03 (recorded; executed date not exposed) — Reel not retrieved / Frame not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Assignment of assignors' interest ("ASSIGNMENT OF ASSIGNORS INTEREST (SEE DOCUMENT FOR DETAILS)")
  • Assignor: Jerome Swartz (individually)
  • Assignee: Symbol Technologies, Inc., Holtsville, New York
  • Correspondent: not retrieved — cannot be assessed for repeat-player recurrence on this record
  • Context: Ordinary original inventor-to-employer assignment, recorded contemporaneously with prosecution/issuance of the 1994 CIP. No consideration structure, no third-party involvement.

• 2005-01-05 (recorded; underlying instrument dated 2004-12-29) — Reel not retrieved / Frame not retrieved

  • Conveyance: Security Interest (see document for details) — collateral assignment, not a title transfer
  • Assignor: Symbol Technologies, Inc.
  • Assignee: JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. (administrative and collateral agent)
  • Correspondent: not retrieved
  • Context: Securitization / collateralization. This is the USPTO recordation of the patent-pledge schedule under the Credit Agreement dated 2004-12-29 among Symbol, JPMorgan Chase Bank N.A. (administrative + collateral agent), Fleet National Bank (syndication agent), J.P. Morgan Securities Inc. and Banc of America Securities LLC as co-lead arrangers — filed as an exhibit to Symbol's Form 8-K and incorporated into its FY2005 Form 10-K. JPMorgan is a general secured lender, not an asserter: the same bank appears as secured party across dozens of unrelated corporate patent liens, e.g. CommScope (Reel 049892/0051, recorded 2019-07-03), Visteon (Reel 022368/0001, instrument dated 2006-08-14), and multiple Energizer/MaxLinear/Alimea patent security agreements — a recurring credit-side correspondent whose appearance carries no NPE significance when it appears alone.

No other assignment is recorded against this patent in the accessible record. In particular:

• No release by secured party of the 2005 JPMorgan security interest appears in the legal-events feed (it may exist; I could not confirm it).
• No assignment to Motorola, Inc., Motorola Solutions, or Zebra Technologies appears against US 5,448,046. The 2007 and 2014 transactions were corporate-level mergers/acquisitions of Symbol's stock and business; no confirmatory per-patent assignment is indexed here. Title after January 2007 is therefore not established by recorded assignment in the sources I could reach — it is inferred from the corporate transactions, not from a reel/frame.

If the Assignment Center shows additional records (e.g. a JPMorgan release, or a Motorola→Zebra blanket assignment), they would slot between the 2005 and 2014 entries above; please verify at the search page before relying on the terminal-owner statement.

Timeline diagram

timeline
    title Ownership of US 5448046
    1987 : Priority application filed
    1994 : CIP application filed
    1995 : Patent granted 1995-09-05
         : Swartz assigns to Symbol Technologies
    2005 : Security interest to JPMorgan Chase
    2007 : Symbol acquired by Motorola
    2012 : Anticipated patent expiration
    2014 : Enterprise unit sold to Zebra Technologies

NPE / troll-pattern signals

Verdict

Insufficient data — the recorded assignment chain contains only the original inventor-to-assignee assignment (1995-03-03, Swartz → Symbol Technologies, Inc.) plus a security interest (2005-01-05, Symbol → JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A. as collateral agent), with no reel/frame or correspondent retrievable from the sources available to me. That is the "original assignment only" configuration, which also affirmatively shows no NPE transfer occurred on the record.

Justification in brief: the 1995-03-03 entry is an ordinary employee assignment to an operating manufacturer, and the 2005-01-05 entry is a collateral pledge tied to the 2004-12-29 Symbol credit facility (JPMorgan acting as administrative/collateral agent) — a lender recordation, not an asserter acquisition, as confirmed by JPMorgan's identical role in unrelated facilities such as CommScope (Reel 049892/0051, 2019) and Visteon (Reel 022368/0001, 2006). Every NPE signal above resolves to "not present" or "unclear"; the only genuinely unresolved item is post-2007 title, which is not evidenced by any assignment recorded against US 5,448,046 despite the 2007 Motorola and 2014 Zebra transactions.

Verify / extend this chain at:

• USPTO Assignment Center — https://assignmentcenter.uspto.gov/ (search patent number 5448046)
• Legacy Assignment Search — https://assignment.uspto.gov/patent/index.html
• Google Patents legal events (source of the two entries cited here) — https://patents.google.com/patent/US5448046/en
• USPTO Patent Center / PEDS for the application — https://patentcenter.uspto.gov/ (application 08/292,584)

Specific gaps to close at the Assignment Center: (a) the reel/frame and executed dates for the 1995-03-03 and 2005-01-05 entries; (b) the correspondent of record on each cover sheet (this is the only way to score signal #3); (c) any JPMorgan release of security interest; and (d) any Motorola Solutions → Zebra Technologies confirmatory assignment naming this patent, which would convert "Insufficient data" into a clean "Operating-company / non-asserting" verdict.

I'll research this carefully. Let me start by pulling the patent's citation record and the key references it cites.

Let me pull the patent's citation record (front-page references cited) and the "cited by" data.

Method, scope, and two up-front caveats

What I could actually retrieve. My only instrument in this session is general web search; I have no authenticated USPTO Patent Center / PAIR access. Two consequences:

1. The authoritative full text you supplied does not include the printed front page's "References Cited" block (the U.S. patent documents and foreign documents the examiner cited). That block is omitted/truncated in the Google Patents rendering you pasted. What the supplied text does contain is the list of references the specification itself recites in its "Description of Related Art" and in its incorporated-background passages. That list is what I analyze below. My list may therefore be incomplete relative to the printed patent's front page — you should pull the paper/PDF front page to capture the examiner-cited art.

2. Two different "citations" must not be conflated, and your instruction ("look at each patent citation for 5448046") is ambiguous between them:

   • Backward citations = references cited in / against US 5,448,046 → these are the prior art. Analyzed in Parts 1–2.
   • Forward citations = documents that cite US 5,448,046 ("Cited By" in the record, e.g., Metanetics US 5,602,377; Norand US 5,679,943; NCR US 5,714,416 US 6,164,535) → these are NOT prior art to '046; they post-date it. Covered briefly in Part 4.

Governing law/date. Application 08/292,584 was filed 1994-08-18 with a claimed priority of 1987-12-28. Pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. § 102 therefore applies, and for § 102(a)/(b) the relevant critical date is the 1987 priority date (or, to the extent the CIP claims are not supported by the 1987 parent, the 1994 filing date). Either way, essentially all of the 1980s scanner patents below qualify as § 102(b) art.

Legal standard reminder. Anticipation under § 102 requires a single reference disclosing every element of the claim, arranged as in the claim. A reference that discloses only the scanner sub-element does not anticipate a claim that also requires real-time database access, on-the-spot label printing, application of the label, and re-scanning at the POS terminal.

Part 1 — Backward citations (prior art), with verification status

The specification introduces these collectively with one sentence: "POS scanners and readers of this general type for electro-optically reading symbols have been disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. …" — i.e., the applicant characterizes all of them as bar-code scanner/reader hardware. It does not attribute any particular teaching to any particular one (except where noted for '904, '397, '798, and '239).

Patent numbers are reproduced literally as printed in the source, including the typographical artifacts 4,845.,350 and 265.,548.

Additional references cited within the '046 specification body (not in the "for example" list, but expressly relied on):

Part 2 — § 102 anticipation analysis, reference by reference

Two preliminary observations that drive every entry:

• The '046 independent claims require far more than a scanner. Claim 1 requires steps (a) common host database, (b) coded tag per product, (c) scan-by-selection of the tag, (d) real-time database access to retrieve attribute data, (e) printing a bar code label bearing the retrieved data, (f) applying it to the product, and (g) re-scanning that printed label at the POS terminal. Claim 7 is the apparatus mirror-image of the same seven recitals.
• Every backward citation here is scanner/reader hardware (or a barcode format). None discloses steps (a), (d), (e), (f), or (g), and none discloses the closed scan→print→apply→re-scan loop.

Therefore: on a correct, whole-claim § 102 analysis, none of the cited references anticipates claim 1 or claim 7. At most they are art against the scanning sub-element — i.e., claim 1(c) and claim 7(c) — and would be more naturally deployed under § 103 (obviousness) against those elements, not § 102. The mapping below states which element each reference could reach, and I flag that this is element-level, not claim-level, anticipation.

Bottom line for Part 2: the most relevant prior art in the backward set is (1) US 4,251,798 (because it alone adds a printer and on-head keyboard/display to a laser scanning system, making it the closest art to the "printing" element), followed by (2) US 4,387,297 / 4,496,831 / 4,760,248 (the hand-held aimable movable-beam scanners), with (3) US 4,871,904 (the parent scanner) as the family baseline. None anticipates claims 1 or 7. The references are element-level art at best, and the real § 102/§ 103 battleground is the scanning element and the printed-label format — not the overall workflow.

Part 3 — What the reference set conspicuously does not contain

Worth stating explicitly, because it is the strongest support for the '046 claims' novelty over its own cited art: not one backward citation discloses a printer that prints a bar-coded price/attribute label from a real-time database lookup for application to the product and later re-reading at the POS terminal. The applicant's own background section admits the gap — it complains that posted price signs are "sometimes removed and not replaced" and are "outdated from one day to the next," with the only reliable price being at checkout. That admitted problem is precisely what claims 1 and 7 answer.

Part 4 — Forward citations (NOT prior art to '046)

Documents in the "Cited By" list — e.g., US 5,602,377 (Metanetics, bar-code dataform scanning/labeling), US 5,679,943 (Norand, hand-held terminal), US 5,689,101 (Fujitsu, POS system), US 5,714,416 (NCR, "Price verifier"), US 5,979,772 (Mold, merchandise checkout), US 6,164,535 (NCR, "Price maintenance system and method"), US 7,273,570 (NCR), plus family members US 5,736,721; 5,883,373; 5,889,268 (as printed); 6,131,814; 6,308,888; 6,404,115(?); 6,644,549; 6,736,315; 6,937,998 — are later in time and therefore cannot be § 102(a)/(b) prior art against '046. For § 102(e)/§ 102(a)(2) they would also fail, because '046's 1987 priority date precedes them. They are useful only as evidence of the field and of how the '046 disclosure was later built upon.

(Note: I saw "6,340,115" and "6,345,115" rendered differently across sources for the same family member. Per your rule I have not selected one; treat the identifier as printed in each source.)

Part 5 — Honest limitations

• I could not retrieve the examiner's "References Cited" list from the patent's front page. My analysis rests on the applicant's own citation list in the specification. If the examiner cited additional art (common for scanner patents of this vintage — e.g., U.S. patents to Norand, NCR, MSI, or foreign equivalents), it is not reflected here and should be pulled from the PDF/Patent Center.
• Dates/titles for roughly two-thirds of the listed patents (items 2, 3, 6–18, 20, 21) were not independently verified in this session. The "~year" values are inferences from the patent-number series, clearly labeled as such; do not treat them as confirmed. The verification column is the honest status.
• § 102 conclusions are analytic, not legal advice, and element-level "reach" was distinguished from whole-claim anticipation on purpose.
• Nothing in the searches contradicted the authoritative patent text for the bibliographic facts already established in the prior summary; the only numeric anomalies (4,845.,350, 265.,548) are preserved literally rather than corrected, per your rule.

If you can retrieve or upload the patent's printed front page, I can extend Part 1 to the full examiner-cited set and re-run the § 102 mapping against it.

I'll ground this §103 analysis by pulling the key prior-art references named on the page. Let me run targeted lookups.

Obviousness analysis — U.S. Patent No. 5,448,046 under 35 U.S.C. § 103

Builds on the claim map, bibliographic table, and family chain set out in the Patent Summary and Litigation sections above. I do not repeat that material here; where I rely on it I cite back to it.

A. Framework and threshold caveat

I apply the Graham v. John Deere factors (scope/content of the prior art; differences from the claims; level of ordinary skill; secondary considerations) as refined by KSR Int'l v. Teleflex — i.e., a claimed combination is obvious not only where the prior art teaches, suggests, or motivates the combination, but also where the combination is of known elements performing known functions yielding no more than predictable results, or where it is a mere "application of a known technique to a known device ready for improvement."

Threshold issue — effective filing date. The §103 inquiry is date-sensitive, and the '046 file is a CIP chain (see the family table above): 07/138,563 (1987‑12‑28, now US 4,871,904) → 07/392,207 (1989‑08‑10) → 07/553,559 (1990‑07‑16) → 07/921,414 (1992‑07‑27) → 08/292,584 (filed 1994‑08‑18). The printing/applying subject matter that distinguishes claims 1 and 7 from a bare POS scanner is not something a "multidirectional optical scanner" parent would support. The specification's own FIG. 9–12 and "scan‑print‑apply" text most plausibly entered the chain at the 1990 or 1992 CIP, not in 1987.

That matters because it controls which of the references below qualify. I flag this as an open question I cannot resolve from the page: if the claims get the full 1987‑12‑28 benefit, the later Norand material is out; if the operative date is ~1990–1992, it is in. I therefore present the grounds using only references whose dates clear the most conservative reading (a 1992 date can only help a challenger), and separately flag the date‑sensitive ones.

B. Level of ordinary skill in the art (POSITA)

Based on the field (electro-optical bar-code scanning + POS data capture + small thermal printing), a POSITA at the relevant time would have: a bachelor's in EE/ME or equivalent; ~2–4 years' experience with optical scanning systems, POS terminals, or portable data-collection terminals; and working familiarity with (i) the installed base of UPC checkout scanners and host price files (expressly admitted in the '046 Background), (ii) hand-held laser scanning heads and their decode/signal-processing chains, and (iii) printer-equipped POS/portable terminals (receipt tapes and label printers). The named references themselves are all from this exact art — several are the patentee's own.

C. Scope and content of the prior art (from this page)

Notes on the record (no auto-correction applied). The '046 specification prints some citation strings with typographic artifacts (e.g., "4,845.,350," and the doubled "4,816,660"/"4,816,661"); I treat them as printed and do not rely on them. The '904's listed inventors (Metlitsky/Krichever per the Unified Patents portal) differ from the '046's sole named inventor (Swartz) — a point relevant to the pre‑AIA §103(c) common-ownership analysis, noted but not resolved here. The '904 portal record also shows priority 1987‑12‑27, one day off the '046 page's 1987‑12‑28; I report both literally.

D. Claim 1 — element mapping and proposed grounds

Claim 1 steps (a)–(g) are reproduced in the Patent Summary above. Mapping the proposed combination:

Ground 1 (primary) — "scan → look-up → fresh bar-coded label → re-scan"

Admitted prior-art POS system + US 4,251,798 + US 4,794,239 + (optionally) US 4,387,297 / US 4,871,904.

• '798 supplies the missing "print" element in the very same system type: a laser scanning system with an on-head keyboard/display and a printer that records the decoded data. One of ordinary skill in POS data capture, seeking to give the shopper an accurate price before checkout and to give the checkout lane a machine-readable price, would recognize that the printer of '798 can be adapted to imprint a bar-code label rather than (or in addition to) a plain record.
• '239 supplies the encoding step — how to turn a retrieved value into a printable symbol (including the multi-track format the '046 spec itself adopts for label 170).
• '297 / '904 supply the non-contact, aimable, moving-beam reading recited in step (c) and the multidirectional coverage the '046 spec praises for randomly oriented items.

Motivation: the '046 Background recites it aloud — price signs get pulled and not replaced, prices go stale between promotions, and "the only reliable price information is obtained typically only at the checkout counter." The problem and the goal ("advise a customer of the price … prior to checkout") are stated objectives, which supply the "known need." Printing a correct, current, scannable label is the natural, predictable retrofit.

Ground 2 (alternative/stronger) — integrated hand-held reader/printer

Admitted prior art + Norand US 5,679,943 (and/or US 5,484,991 / WO 90/16033) + US 4,387,297 + US 4,794,239.

• Norand's terminal discloses the exact structural predicate for the claimed "integrated reader/printer unit": a hand-held body with scanner module + attachable printer + keyboard + display + battery + RF link + magnetic card reader (the last item even matches the '046 FIG. 9 optional credit-card slot 244).
• Adding the POS price-file use case and label output to Norand's generic data-capture terminal is the kind of "use of a known technique … to a known device … ready for improvement" that KSR holds obvious.
• This Ground is decisive if the critical date is the 1990/1992 CIP; it is unavailable on a strict 1987‑12‑28 reading (see §A).

Ground 3 — label-printing scales / established deli practice

The '046's own FIG. 9 embodiment is the deli/"appetizing counter," where printing a bar-coded price label for a random-weight portion and applying it to the wrapper was long-standing scale practice. Combining that with the admitted POS scanner/DB lookup (and '798's scanning+printing system) is an application of known techniques to a known setting, with a predictable result — an independently sufficient §103 theory for claims 1 and 7.

E. Claim 7 (apparatus) — same grounds

Claim 7 is the means-plus-function counterpart; each "means" recital is disclosed by the mapping in §D. For the pre‑AIA §112 ¶ 6 construction noted in the Patent Summary, the corresponding structures are all in the '046 spec (head 10; workstation 100/200; bendable arm 108/202; oscillating mirror 40/motor 46; photodetector 50; decode/control 56; thermal printhead 61 on roll 63). Because every structural predicate was itself known — '297 ('scanning means … facing means,' 'directing means,' 'field-of-view' scanning), '798 ('printing means' in a scanning system) — the apparatus claim rises and falls with claim 1: obvious for the same reasons, and the means-plus-function form does not add patentable weight beyond the disclosed (and previously known) structures.

F. Dependent claims

Each dependent claim is either (i) a conventional programming/hardware detail, (ii) a mere design choice between known alternatives, or (iii) expressly disclosed by a single reference — none supplies non‑obviousness.

G. Motivation to combine (why a POSITA would have done it)

1. Stated problem and goal. The Background names the problem (missing/stale shelf signs; no pre-checkout price) and the goal (advise of price before checkout). Under KSR, a known problem supplies the motivation.
2. Express commercial motivation. Price-accuracy statutes, customer complaints/litigation over shelf-vs-scan price discrepancies, checkout bottlenecks, and shrink/pilferage (claim 2) all push a retailer toward scanning to generate the price and toward relabeling — exactly the '046's framing.
3. Reasonable expectation of success. Every sub-system was off-the-shelf: hand-held laser scanning ('297/'904/'798); decode/signal processing ('798); POS host price files (admitted); bar-code symbologies for labels ('239); and printers with scanner terminals (Norand/Telxon 1985–1987 printed references; the '046's own terminal receipt tape 120).
4. Predictability / known technique. Combining a scanner and a printer in one hand-held or counter-top unit is a mechanical/packaging exercise with predictable results; the printing of a symbol encoding retrieved data is a straight application of '239.
5. No criticality asserted for the "integrated" form. The '046 presents on-board vs. remote printers (head 10, workstation 100/200, hand-held, worn, counter-top) as interchangeable embodiments — i.e., the patentee treats the placement as non-critical, which undercuts any argument that integration itself is the inventive contribution.

H. Anticipated rebuttals / secondary considerations

• Closed-loop "the printed label is the pricing authority." The strongest non-obviousness argument is that no single reference teaches printing a new bar-coded price label and later re-scanning that label at checkout. Offsetting: the "loop" requires no new structure or method step beyond what '798 (scan + print) + '239 (print a symbol) + admitted POS scanning (re-scan) supply, and produces only the expected benefit (correct price at the lane). A mere arrangement of known steps with a predictable aggregate result is the KSR "combination of familiar elements" case.
• Long-felt need. The Background's own words ("some customers wish to know the price … before standing in line"; "no longer need the customer be faced with missing price signs") support a long-felt-need pro narrative — but the record also shows the solution was quickly arrived at once hand-held scanners and portable printers converged (the 1985–1987 Norand/Telxon artifacts), which weakens any "long-felt but unsolved" showing.
• Teaching away. I found none on the page: no reference disparages printing a price label at the point of selection or scanning a freshly printed label at checkout. Absence of a teaching-away is neutral-to-favorable to the §103 case.
• Unexpected results. None asserted on the page; the stated benefits (pre-checkout price, no missing signs, pilferage control, inventory control) are precisely the expected results.

I. Bottom line

• Claims 1 and 7 are, on the record here, vulnerable to §103 over: admitted POS prior art + US 4,251,798 (scanning system with printer) + US 4,794,239 (printing encoded symbols) + US 4,387,297 / US 4,871,904 (hand-held, non-contact, multidirectional scanning); and, on a critical date of ~1990–1992, additionally over Norand US 5,679,943 / US 5,484,991 / WO 90/16033 (hand-held terminal with scanner and printer, plus keyboard, display, and magnetic card reader).
• Dependent claims 2–6 and 8–15 are each obvious as conventional details, mere design choices, or single-reference disclosures — claims 10–15 (receipts, scroll/tear-off printer, portable terminal with keyboard/display) being the least defensible, given Norand and the '046's own admitted terminal hardware.
• The one point of genuine, if limited, tension is the specific closed scan→print→apply→rescan loop; it is likely surmountable by the challenger via KSR's "predictable use of prior-art elements," but it is the only element warranting primary-attack focus.
• Everything above is contingent on §A's date question, which I could not resolve from this page.

J. Limitations (please read)

• I relied on the full patent text supplied in your message (authoritative) plus general web-search snippets for the cited references. I did not retrieve the full text of most references; my characterizations of '798, '297, '904, '239, Norand, and US