Patents Assigned to ePlus Inc.
  • Patent number: 7716084
    Abstract: An inventive procurement system includes a requisition system for special item purchases that are not found when searching a catalog database. Using the requisition system the buyer is provided with the desired item while the information associated with the requisition is selectively added to a rule-based knowledge base as well as to an item database. In a preferred embodiment a common language generator has been used to normalize free form data using pre-determined rules to place the data into a class/attribute/value relationship. By having the item requisition follow the same relationship, the pre-determined rules may be updated and the free-form data associated with the item properly coded for inclusion into an item database.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 9, 2005
    Date of Patent: May 11, 2010
    Assignee: ePlus Inc.
    Inventors: William R. Van Etten, Corey Prator
  • Patent number: 7644015
    Abstract: An inventive procurement system includes a requisition system for special item purchases that are not found when searching a catalog database. Using the requisition system the buyer is provided with the desired item while the information associated with the requisition is selectively added to a rule-based knowledge base as well as to an item database. In a preferred embodiment a common language generator has been used to normalize free form data using pre-determined rules to place the data into a class/attribute/value relationship. By having the item requisition follow the same relationship, the pre-determined rules may be updated and the free-form data associated with the item properly coded for inclusion into an item database.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 3, 2006
    Date of Patent: January 5, 2010
    Assignee: ePlus, Inc.
    Inventors: William R. Van Etten, Corey Prator
  • Patent number: 7552134
    Abstract: A system and method for managing asset information is presented for both a standalone architecture and as a component of a total asset management system. The range of users for the system and method of the present invention spans single users to partners of a supply, chain and in the latter case, cross-organization asset detail information is provided to supply chain partners. The system and method of the present invention is intended to be interfaced with other components of a total asset management system, e.g., a procurement system for asset acquisition, and may be interfaced to legacy systems.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 31, 2001
    Date of Patent: June 23, 2009
    Assignee: ePlus, Inc.
    Inventors: Phillip G. Norton, Mindy I. Barton
  • Patent number: 6505172
    Abstract: An electronic sourcing system includes a computer that maintains a catalog database of data including product information (such as product identification and descriptive information) relating to catalog items available from vendor product catalogs, and a means for building (generating) a requisition including at least one requisitioned item. Information at least partially identifying an item desired to be requisitioned is entered by a user, and utilized by a means for searching the database for catalog items matching that information and for selecting at least one catalog item located as a result of the search. Text describing the catalog items, and images of the items, may be viewed. Data identifying selected catalog items are communicated to the requisition building means, which generates a requisition including entries for items corresponding to the selected catalog items.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 22, 2000
    Date of Patent: January 7, 2003
    Assignee: ePlus Inc.
    Inventors: James M. Johnson, Robert P. Kinross, Francis J. Melly, Douglas A. Momyer