Patents Examined by Daniel Felten
  • Patent number: 8185463
    Abstract: Systems and methods for performing insurance related activities are provided. Software can be implemented to provide an application that includes an interactive interface for use by insurance professionals in managing clients, marketing insurance, and storing information. For example, a network application can be implemented that a user can access via a web browser and which is intuitive for quick comprehension and interaction by users. The application can include multiple layers directed to particular stages of the insurance-client relationship. The application can include a Workflow Wizard® to aid the user in managing and maintaining client information and tracking progress. Aggregation services can also be incorporated into the application. Interactive insurance-and-client specific display pages can be incorporated to aid in understanding a client's current insurance information and to generate presentations.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 30, 2008
    Date of Patent: May 22, 2012
    Assignee: The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America
    Inventor: Robert Ball
  • Patent number: 8156027
    Abstract: An exemplary embodiment comprises a method for determining at an effective valuation time a fair value of an exchange traded fund comprising securities, at least one of the securities not currently trading in a liquid market, comprising: (a) for each security: (i) receiving historical price data, wherein the historical price data comprises data for price-related time-dependent variables; (ii) performing a regression analysis on the historical price data; and (iii) calculating at the effective valuation time a fair value of the security based on the regression analysis and on values of one or more of the plurality of price-related time-dependent variables; (b) multiplying the fair value by the security's weighting in the exchange traded fund to obtain a weighted fair value; and (c) aggregating the weighted fair values of the plurality of securities in the exchange traded fund to obtain a fair value adjusted price for the exchange traded fund.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 28, 2010
    Date of Patent: April 10, 2012
    Assignee: Interactive Data Pricing and Reference Data, Inc.
    Inventors: Robert N. Haddad, Peter L. Ciampi, Eric Zitzewitz
  • Patent number: 8145556
    Abstract: A method for automatically fulfilling lending conditions includes the steps of maintaining a database of a plurality of registered service providers, receiving a loan application having one or more conditions to be fulfilled for the loan application to be approved, evaluating the one or more conditions to determine one or more actions to be taken towards fulfilling the one or more conditions, and automatically executing at least one action of the one or more actions to be taken towards fulfilling at least one of the one or more conditions, wherein the at least one action includes automatically requesting information for fulfilling the at least one condition from a registered service provider of the plurality of registered service providers.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 9, 2001
    Date of Patent: March 27, 2012
    Inventors: Daniel A. Tealdi, Matthew S. DeArmey, Dickson Leung
  • Patent number: 8145549
    Abstract: A system and method for communicating an offer to apply for a credit instrument is provided. A processing allows for processing credit history data. A calculating step allows for calculating a first plurality of interest rates based on the credit history data. A determining step allows for determining a second plurality of interest rates based on the first plurality of interest rates, wherein the second plurality of interest rates corresponds to a plurality of credit risk scores. Finally, a communicating step allows for communicating the offer to apply for a credit instrument in an initial communication with an offeree, the offer disclosing the second plurality of interest rates. An apparatus that calculates the interest rates used in the offer is also provided.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 15, 2010
    Date of Patent: March 27, 2012
    Assignee: JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A.
    Inventor: Jayanta Das
  • Patent number: 8140433
    Abstract: The invention concerns a method for carrying out a transaction comprising prior steps of identifying the card by reading its number and authenticating the bearer optionally by writing in the secret code using a keyboard. The invention is characterized in that the secret code and/or the card number, comprise(s) in a specific position at least a character modified at each transaction. The modified character(s) (N) of the secret code and/or the card is/are modified in accordance with at least a character of a predetermined parameter.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 8, 2001
    Date of Patent: March 20, 2012
    Inventor: Sami Atig
  • Patent number: 8140432
    Abstract: A computer-implemented method for a trusted entity such as a Post Office to process bills from a plurality of billers includes generating aggregated listings of bills to be submitted each identified customer and making the aggregated listings available to each identified customer. The trusted entity may then receive orders to effectuate payment of selected ones of the bills in the aggregated listings from customers. The first trusted entity may request that a second trusted entity designated by each identified customer (such as a bank) guarantee availability of funds sufficient to cover payment of the bills selected for payment. A third trusted entity (a central bank) may then be instructed to carry out the payments specified in each of the received orders in batch mode by transferring the payments from the second trusted entities designated by the customers to respective fourth trusted entities (e.g., banks) designated by the billers.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 13, 2010
    Date of Patent: March 20, 2012
    Assignee: Oracle International Corporation
    Inventor: Richard C. Johnson
  • Patent number: 8126802
    Abstract: In a computer system and in a computer-implemented method for managing financial funding of a finite insurance policy provided by an insurer to an insured, a fixed amount of the financial funding is stored as an amount payable by the insured for a calculation period. In addition, a variable amount of the financial funding is calculated based on defined conditions and the variable amount is stored as an amount payable by the insured for the calculation period. Preferably, an index value based on a volatile indicator is stored. Depending on the index value, it is determined whether the variable amount is payable by the insured or whether an insured loss is payable by the insurer to the insured for the calculation period. The variable amount or the insured loss, respectively, is calculated based on the index value. Consequently, funding of the insurance can be accelerated in good calculation periods having no losses.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 1, 2004
    Date of Patent: February 28, 2012
    Assignee: Swiss Reinsurance Company Ltd.
    Inventor: Juerg Trueb
  • Patent number: 8117121
    Abstract: A system and method for dynamically creating and presenting a network based application for any number of a plurality of products. The method and system upon receiving a request to apply for one or more of a plurality of products, dynamically creates an application pages that includes fields to input the specific information required to apply for the selected products. The application page is provided to the applicant through the network and the application data is received by the system. The method and system causes the application data to be processed and provides the results to the applicant. The applicant is provided the results of multiple specific applications in with minimal data input and in real time.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 5, 2010
    Date of Patent: February 14, 2012
    Assignee: JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A.
    Inventor: Robert J. Rosko
  • Patent number: 8108253
    Abstract: The present disclosure includes a system and method for identifying advertising specialist. In some implementations, a method includes receiving information associated with a plurality of advertising specialist. One or more profiles associated with each advertising specialist is generated. The specialist profiles are filtered based, at least in part, on criteria received from a user.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 13, 2008
    Date of Patent: January 31, 2012
    Assignee: Google Inc.
    Inventors: Andrew W. Poon, Walter Lee, Mircea Oancea, Juan C. Nuno, Robert Lee, Anton Koinov, Stacey Kapadia
  • Patent number: 8099323
    Abstract: A system of advertising on the Internet, including: an on-line system for sellers of future advertising space to create advertising contracts; an on-line system for presenting the advertising contracts to purchasers of advertising space; an on-line system for the purchasers of future advertising space to select the sellers' advertising contracts; a system to integrate purchased advertising contracts to a delivery mechanism that displays purchasers' advertising in the sellers advertising space; and a system for transferring funds from the purchasers to the sellers after completion and audit of the advertising contracts.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 10, 2007
    Date of Patent: January 17, 2012
    Inventor: Puthucode S Veeraraghavan
  • Patent number: 8099347
    Abstract: Object oriented design strategies and patterns are applied to financial data processing systems for processing and modeling of financial products (also referred to as financial instruments) with an emphasis being on derivative products. The system employs valuation independent, well-defined financial components (also referred to as financial events) that can be combined to build new financial structures. A general purpose software model is provided for representing the structure and characteristics of these products. A declarative specification language is provided to describe financial instruments in a consistent manner that lends itself to processing in such an object oriented system. A general traversal process is provided that can be applied to the macro structure of a financial instrument to implement various functions that produce results based on such information, such as the stream of financial events associated with the instrument, or the pricing or valuation of the instrument.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 15, 2009
    Date of Patent: January 17, 2012
    Assignee: JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A,
    Inventors: Michael L. DeAddio, Axel Kramer
  • Patent number: 8095463
    Abstract: A system and method for replenishing prepaid account balances is disclosed. Consumers are issued a prepaid account card similar to a credit card. Funds are added to prepaid accounts at retail locations by providing cash or equivalent to a clerk along with the prepaid account card. The clerk swipes the prepaid account card in an authorization terminal and rings up the transaction in a manner similar to a normal credit card transaction. The transaction is transmitted to a bank which processes the transaction and notifies a replenishment system that the customer has added value to the prepaid account. The replenishment system provides the customer with a confirmation number associated with the transaction. The replenishment system notifies a prepaid engine for the prepaid account. The prepaid engine updates the user's prepaid account balance, thereby making funds available for future purchases by the user.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 2, 1999
    Date of Patent: January 10, 2012
    Assignee: Openwave Systems Inc.
    Inventor: Peter Hartmaier
  • Patent number: 8088002
    Abstract: A first website earns rewards, e.g. points and items, for carrying out activities. Those rewards can be transferred to a second website. For example, a parent's website allows the parent to carry more adult tasks and also earn points. The points can be transferred to the child's website. A center of the universe website allows obtaining rewards for any of these websites. A social networking component operates across multiple websites.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 19, 2007
    Date of Patent: January 3, 2012
    Assignee: Ganz
    Inventor: Howard Ganz
  • Patent number: 8083140
    Abstract: A system for over-the-air provisioning is disclosed. The system comprises a processor and an over-the-air server application. The over-the-air server application, when executed by the processor, is configured to begin an over-the-air provisioning session, to request a log of an over-the-air client, to receive the log, to send a first plurality of action requests to the over-the-air client based on the log, to receive acknowledgments of the action request, to stop the over-the-air provisioning session when an acknowledgment is not received within a first time period, and to restart the over-the-air provisioning session after waiting a second time period when the over-the-air provisioning session has been stopped, wherein the first plurality of action requests comprise a first task.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 5, 2008
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2011
    Assignee: Sprint Communications Company L.P.
    Inventors: Robin Dale Katzer, Kevin Zhu
  • Patent number: 8086532
    Abstract: A system that incorporates teachings of the present disclosure may include, for example, identifying a consumer account managed by a service provider to which purchases are chargeable, the identification of the account based on transactional information, enabling customer equipment to request a purchase of an electronically-purchasable item of a vendor via network equipment of the service provider, wherein the vendor is a party other than the service provider, charging the consumer account a fee for a purchase initiated by the customer equipment, and remitting a portion of the fee to an account of the vendor. Other embodiments are disclosed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 21, 2011
    Date of Patent: December 27, 2011
    Assignee: AT&T Intellectual Property I, L.P.
    Inventor: Andrew Egendorf
  • Patent number: 8073770
    Abstract: Systems and methods are illustrated for performing a person-to-person funds transfer. A person-to-person funds transfer process may be divided into a funds transfer initiation process to receive the funds to be transferred and recipient information from a sender and a funds retrieval process to provide the funds to a recipient. The funds transfer initiation process may include a customizable authentication step that provides the sender an opportunity to determine the level of authentication. The funds transfer retrieval process may include determining whether the recipient is authenticated based on the authentication level chosen by the sender.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 7, 2009
    Date of Patent: December 6, 2011
    Assignee: Bank of America Corporation
    Inventors: Kevin Cole, Wanda P. Wick
  • Patent number: 8055518
    Abstract: An insurance program for entities in the mortgage industry that provides coverage for financial loss as a result of material inaccuracies in the financial information provided by or on behalf of the borrower. The insurance program preferably includes the initial insurance application and establishment of an insurance agreement, periodic issuing of individual insurance coverages for particular loans handled by the lender, training and consulting on improved controls for lenders, maintaining an ineligible database of entities and a database of loan information, and handling of claims. Handling of claims includes attempting to minimize the potential loss suffered as a result of a misrepresentation of information in a loan file when coverage under the insurance policy exists.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 7, 2005
    Date of Patent: November 8, 2011
    Inventor: Arthur J Prieston
  • Patent number: 8055581
    Abstract: Methods and systems are disclosed of enrolling a customer to perform an action. A first piece of information is received at an authentication processor from an over-the-air processor. The first piece of information was provided to the over-the-air processor by the customer from a mobile electronic device. A second piece of information is received at the authentication processor from a server different from the over-the-air processor. The second piece of information was provided to the server by the customer. The first and second pieces of information are associated by the authentication processor to enroll the customer.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 22, 2007
    Date of Patent: November 8, 2011
    Assignee: First Data Corporation
    Inventors: Vijay Royyuru, Robert A. Freisheim, Jr.
  • Patent number: 8046278
    Abstract: A method and a system applying data mining techniques and artificial intelligence algorithms, namely neural networks, operating via an Internet data exchange site, allowing portfolio management companies to access an on-line, standardized questionnaire (Request for Proposal) and present their capabilities. The method then analyses a large number of these questionnaires and classifies managers, categorizing them and ranking their capabilities. In addition, sponsors such as pension funds, endowments, and private clients can submit their offer for the management of their assets. The site provides a Request for Proposal that is modular and continuously adapted to new financial market conditions, legal considerations and Sponsors needs. Once completed by each manager, the questionnaire is maintained in a central database allowing each manager to have an up-to-date and on-line version of questionnaire.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 31, 2002
    Date of Patent: October 25, 2011
    Inventors: Mohsen Sohrabi, Esfandiar Sorouchyari
  • Patent number: 8046300
    Abstract: An automated banking machine (12) is operative to conduct transactions in response to HTML documents and TCP/IP messages exchanged with a local computer system (14) through an intranet (16), as well as in response to messages exchanged with foreign servers (20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 96) in a wide area network (18). The banking machine includes a computer (34) having an HTML document handling portion (76, 80, 82). The HTML document handling portion is operative to communicate through a proxy server (88), with a home HTTP server (90) in the intranet or the foreign servers in the wide area network. The computer further includes a device application portion (84) which interfaces with the HTML document handling portion and dispatches messages to operate devices (36) in the automated banking machine. The devices include a sheet dispenser mechanism (42) which dispenses currency as well as other transaction devices.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 5, 2007
    Date of Patent: October 25, 2011
    Assignee: Diebold, Incorporated
    Inventors: Jay Paul Drummond, Dale Blackson, Bob A. Cichon, Joseph C. Ess, Mark S. Covert, Mark A. Moales, David W. Weis, Mark D. Smith, James Church