Patents Examined by William J. Deane, Jr.
  • Patent number: 10715669
    Abstract: Managing contact transfer requests in a contact center with a processor of the contact center receiving a request to transfer a contact to a destination within the contact center. Next, the processor determines in real time, one or more first characteristics related to a source of the request and one or more second characteristics related to the destination of the request. Ultimately, based on the one or more first characteristics and the one or more second characteristics, the processor performs one of: a) transferring the contact to the destination, or b) preventing transfer of the contact to the destination.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 29, 2018
    Date of Patent: July 14, 2020
    Assignee: Avaya Inc.
    Inventors: Lakshmi Narayanan, Prem Kumar Bhavnani, Harshad R. Apshankar
  • Patent number: 10715667
    Abstract: Systems and methods of managing customer journeys are implemented using one or more processors in a computing system. Each journey may comprise a succession of interactions at interaction points such as telephone conversations, responses to an interactive voice response “IVR” system and viewing a web page. Customer journey scores are determined for customers at one or more interaction points along the customer journey and the customer journey score is used to determine whether and when an intervention should take place. Models for determining customer journey scores may be created for a set of customers based on one or both of subjective and objective data relating to a subset of the set of customers that have made some or part of the journey, e.g. customers that have responded to polls. An intervention may take place during the journey or after completion of the journey.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 10, 2020
    Date of Patent: July 14, 2020
    Assignee: Nice Ltd.
    Inventors: Natalia Beatriz Piaggio, Leonard Michael Newnham
  • Patent number: 10708315
    Abstract: Processing conference call communications may include receiving a request from a customer device to access the conference. One example method of operation may include receiving a conference call access request message from a user device, identifying an identifier included in the access request message associated with the user device, comparing content of the identifier to known identifier information, determining whether to authorize the access request, and responsive to authorizing the access request, transmitting a prompt to the user device to access the conference call.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 27, 2018
    Date of Patent: July 7, 2020
    Assignee: West Corporation
    Inventors: Gautham Pallapa, Santhosh Shetty, Karen Sue White, Mohammed Qurashi
  • Patent number: 10708421
    Abstract: A method includes producing a user profile in response to user data; obtaining context for estimating the duration of a down-time; estimating the duration of the down-time; determining experience enhancement factors in response to the user profile and the estimated duration of the down-time; determining an activity selection model in response to the context, the user data, and the experience enhancement factors; generating personalized engaging activities by applying the activity selection model to a plurality of potential activities; partitioning the estimated duration of the down-time into segments; sequencing the personalized engaging activities to fit into the segments; and presenting the personalized engaging activities to the user via a computing device. A computer readable medium embodies instructions for the method and an apparatus including a processor is operative to facilitate the method.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 24, 2018
    Date of Patent: July 7, 2020
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Abdigani Diriye, Shikhar Kwatra, Komminist Weldemariam
  • Patent number: 10701210
    Abstract: The present disclosure relates to a system and method configured for matching subjects that call into a call center where calls are answered by care consultants that provide health care or consult on health care remotely via the call center, wherein the matching is based on holistic information related to both the individual subjects and the individual care consultants. The method being performed by one or more hardware processors configured by machine-readable instructions, the method comprising responsive to receiving a call from a first subject, obtaining first subject information associated with the first subject, obtaining care consultant information associated with a plurality of care consultants associated with the call center including first care consultant information associated with a first care consultant, and analyzing the first subject information and the first care consultant information to determine whether a match exists between the first subject and the first care consultant.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 23, 2017
    Date of Patent: June 30, 2020
    Assignee: KONINKLIJKE PHILIPS N.V.
    Inventors: Murtaza Bulut, Paul Anthony Shrubsole
  • Patent number: 10699727
    Abstract: Noise filtering for an incoming signal is provided. The noise filtering method includes executing a transformation operation on the incoming signal by distributing energy corresponding to each of a plurality of components of the incoming signal into a two-dimensional representation. The noise filtering method also includes executing a filtering operation on the plurality of components to determine real objects and remove noise within the incoming signal. The filtering operation utilizing at least one of a plurality of noise detection matrixes based on time, frequency, or direction.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 3, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 30, 2020
    Assignee: INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION
    Inventor: Tobias U. Bergmann
  • Patent number: 10694026
    Abstract: A computer implemented method and system for routing a call based on characteristics of call data are provided. The method may include: receiving or retrieving a first data set representing a first set of plurality of call features relating to an on-going call from a database; generating, using a machine learning model, a suspiciousness score of the on-going call based on the first data set, the suspiciousness score indicating a probability of the on-going call being a fraudulent call; routing the on-going call based on the suspiciousness score; displaying the first suspiciousness score on a graphical user interface; continuously receiving or retrieving a second data set representing a second set of plurality of call features relating to the on-going call from the database; updating the suspiciousness score of the on-going call based on the second data set; and displaying the updated suspiciousness score on the graphical user interface.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 16, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 23, 2020
    Assignee: ROYAL BANK OF CANADA
    Inventors: Karthikeyan Chandrasekaran, Roobini Mathiyazhagan, Ruturaj Maheshbhai Patel, Sreenath Vazhayil, Domenico Pagniello
  • Patent number: 10674013
    Abstract: Control means of an exchange comprising connection means for accommodating a telephone and the control means for controlling the accommodated telephone, receives a dial signal from the telephone without causing the telephone to respond to an incoming call when the telephone that is performing incoming call ringing is hooked off, causes the hooked-off telephone to respond to the incoming call when the received dial signal is a first dial signal, and causes the telephone as a call source to make a call without causing the hooked-off telephone to respond to the incoming call when the received dial signal is a second dial signal. Thereby, it is possible to make a call even during incoming call ringing.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 12, 2017
    Date of Patent: June 2, 2020
    Assignee: NEC Platforms, Ltd.
    Inventor: Kazuki Katsuta
  • Patent number: 10674253
    Abstract: This application describes a noise reduction apparatus (800) for a microphone device (100) having an acoustic port (110). The apparatus has a spectrum peak detect block (301) for receiving a microphone signal (SMIC) and determining, from the microphone signal, at least one characteristic of a resonance peak (202) associated with the acoustic port of the microphone. The at least one characteristic may comprise a resonance frequency (fH) and/or quality factor (QH). A noise reduction block (801) is configured to process the microphone signal based on the resonance characteristic so as to reduce noise in the processed microphone signal due to said resonance. The noise reduction block may apply a function which is the inverse of the determined resonance characteristic.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 26, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 2, 2020
    Assignee: Cirrus Logic, Inc.
    Inventors: John Paul Lesso, Emmanuel Philippe Christian Hardy
  • Patent number: 10666802
    Abstract: Technologies for scaling call center support staff include one or more local agent computing devices of a call center that includes an interaction management computing device communicatively coupled to one or more customer computing devices and one or more remote agent computing devices. The interaction management computing device is configured to receive inbound service calls and insert them into a respective service queue. The interaction management computing device is additionally configured to determine whether a service queue response threshold associated with the service queue has been violated as a function of each service call having been inserted into the service queue, identify, in response to a determination that the service queue response threshold associated with the service queue has been violated, one or more remote agents from a queue of available remote agents, and add the identified one or more remote agents to an agent pool associated with the service queue.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 27, 2017
    Date of Patent: May 26, 2020
    Inventor: Christopher Rumpf
  • Patent number: 10659612
    Abstract: A contact center includes: a microprocessor; a computer readable medium, coupled to the microprocessor, to retrieve, store, and manage desktop analytic data that describes the current state of an agent's desktop. The current state of the agent's desktop can be reported to a contact center where that information can be used as additional information in assigning contacts to the agent. The contact may be sent to the agent having documentation or information readily accessible to response to the issue associated with the contact.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 23, 2018
    Date of Patent: May 19, 2020
    Assignee: Avaya Inc.
    Inventor: Thomas Moran
  • Patent number: 10658988
    Abstract: A signal processing system may include a modulation stage configured to generate a modulated input signal, an open-loop switched mode driver coupled to the modulation stage and configured to generate an output signal from the modulated input signal, a voltage regulator configured to generate a supply voltage that supplies electrical energy to the open-loop switched mode driver, and a control subsystem configured to, when a magnitude of the modulated input signal falls below a threshold magnitude, control the voltage regulator to control the supply voltage such that the output signal varies non-linearly with the modulated input signal for magnitudes of the modulated input signal below the threshold magnitude.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 2, 2018
    Date of Patent: May 19, 2020
    Assignee: Cirrus Logic, Inc.
    Inventors: Miao Song, Xiaofan Franky Fei, Xin Zhao, Tejasvi Das, Lei Zhu, Jing Bai, Alan Mark Morton
  • Patent number: 10659614
    Abstract: A method for providing haptic feedback to participants of multi-party phone conversations that includes opening a communications session with a conference system for at least two users each having user specific communications devices, user specific conduct measuring devices, and user specific haptic feedback device registered with the conference system. Analyzing content of the communications session from content received by the conference system through the user specific communications device for at least one of the users; and capturing status for said at least two users from data measured by the user specific conduct measuring device for the at least two users. Determining with the conference system if the content of the communications session and the status of said at least two users calls for input by the user through said user specific communications device. Sending a feedback signal from the conference system to the user specific haptic feedback device.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 20, 2018
    Date of Patent: May 19, 2020
    Assignee: INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION
    Inventors: Michael Bender, Rhonda L. Childress, Minh Q. Pham, Kim A. Eckert
  • Patent number: 10631071
    Abstract: This disclosure relates to speakers and more specifically to an array speaker for distributing music uniformly across a room. A number of audio drivers can be radially distributed within a speaker housing so that an output of the drivers is distributed evenly throughout the room. In some embodiments, the exit geometry of the audio drivers can be configured to bounce off a surface supporting the array speaker to improve the distribution of music throughout the room. The array speaker can include a number of vibration isolation elements distributed within a housing of the array speaker. The vibration isolation elements can be configured reduce the strength of forces generated by a subwoofer of the array speaker.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 27, 2018
    Date of Patent: April 21, 2020
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Meiting Wu, Simon K. Porter, Glenn K. Trainer, Jacob A. Pfitsch, Rex P. Price, Samuel G. Parker, Ethan L. Huwe, Craig M. Stanley
  • Patent number: 10623569
    Abstract: A document is often the impetus for a customer to call a contact center. Customers may have access to a video camera which may be utilized to capture an image of the document without requiring the customer to take any action beyond positioning the document in view of the camera. The contact center then determines the video image comprises text, extracts the text, and matches the text to a document. An agent is then selected having an ability to process work items associated with the identified document. The call is then routed to the selected agent.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 8, 2017
    Date of Patent: April 14, 2020
    Assignee: Avaya Inc.
    Inventor: Thomas Moran
  • Patent number: 10623576
    Abstract: Systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for directing conferences to on-premises media agents and cloud-based media agents. A centralized controller and a plurality of cloud-based media agents are disposed within a cloud or other remote or virtual network, and a plurality of on-premises media agents are provided on-premises. The centralized controller manages the directing and forwarding of conferences and is in communication with the cloud-based media agents and the on-premises media agents.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 9, 2018
    Date of Patent: April 14, 2020
    Assignee: CISCO TECHNOLOGY, INC.
    Inventors: Jonathan D. Rosenberg, Keith Griffin
  • Patent number: 10623579
    Abstract: Measures are provided for use in establishing a telephony session between first and second telephony devices in a telephony network. Telephony network equipment in the telephony network receives, from the first telephony device over a signalling link, a telephony session establishment request. The telephony network equipment receives, from the first telephony device over a data link that is separate to the signalling link, a message comprising data useable by the telephony network equipment to identify the second telephony device. The telephony network equipment correlates the received telephony session establishment request and the received message. The telephony network equipment transmits, to the second telephony device, a telephony session establishment request on the basis of the correlating. The first telephony device is associated with a multi-persona user having a first persona associated with a first telephony identifier and a second persona associated with a second telephony identifier.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 14, 2019
    Date of Patent: April 14, 2020
    Assignee: Metaswitch Networks Ltd.
    Inventors: David Hotham, Richard Underwood, Andrew Robinson Hodges
  • Patent number: 10616676
    Abstract: The technology described in this document can be embodied in a method that includes receiving, at one or more processing devices of a headset that includes a sidetone generation circuit, an input signal representing ambient audio, and determining, by the one or more processing devices of the headset, that at least a portion of the input signal represents voice activity that satisfies a threshold condition. The method also includes, responsive to determining that the voice activity in the input signal satisfies the threshold condition, a control signal configured to cause the sidetone generation circuit to generate sidetone signals, and generating, by an acoustic transducer of the headset, an audio signal that represents, at least in part, the sidetone signals generated in accordance with the control signal.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 2, 2018
    Date of Patent: April 7, 2020
    Assignee: Bose Corporaton
    Inventor: Xiang-Ern Yeo
  • Patent number: 10614788
    Abstract: Systems and methods for enhancing a headset user's own voice include an outside microphone, an inside microphone, audio input components operable to receive a plurality of time-domain microphone signals, including an outside microphone signal from the outside microphone and an inside microphone signal from the inside microphone, a subband decomposition module operable to transform the time-domain microphone signals to frequency domain subband signals, a voice activity detector operable to detect speech presence and absence in the subband signals, a speech extraction module operable to predict a clean speech signal in each of the inside microphone signal and the outside microphone signal, and cancel audio sources other than a headset user's own voice by combining the predicted clean speech signal from the inside microphone signal and the predicted clean speech signal from the outside microphone signal, and a postfiltering module operable to reduce residual noise.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 15, 2018
    Date of Patent: April 7, 2020
    Assignee: SYNAPTICS INCORPORATED
    Inventors: Frederic Philippe Denis Mustiere, Francesco Nesta, Trausti Thormundsson
  • Patent number: 10602295
    Abstract: A method expedites processing and playing of binaural sound during an electronic communication between a first user and a second user. An electronic device of the first user convolves sound into binaural sound for the second user before the binaural sound transmits to the electronic device of the second user. In this way, the binaural sound is already convolved and ready to play upon receipt at the electronic device of the second user.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 14, 2019
    Date of Patent: March 24, 2020
    Inventor: Philip Scott Lyren