Search Patents
  • Protection of Privacy in Connection with Shipment of Products
    Publication number: 20120143709
    Abstract: Disclosed are various embodiments for enhancing protection of privacy of purchaser contact details in connection with shipment of parcels. A shipping label can be generated that includes at least one contact detail that hides an actual contact detail associated with a purchaser. A carrier tasked to ship and/or deliver the product to an address designated by the purchaser can use the at least one contact detail to contact the purchaser. The attempts to contact the purchaser can be logged, and the contact details expired when no longer needed.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 22, 2010
    Publication date: June 7, 2012
    Applicant: AMAZON TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
    Inventor: Jonathan J. Shakes
  • Generating item recommendations
    Patent number: 8359285
    Abstract: Disclosed are various embodiments of generating item recommendations. A user submitted query associated with a category of items in an electronic repository is received, each of the items being associated with reviews. Reviews relevant to the user submitted query are identified. Reviews relevant to the user submitted query are displayed with a user voting element. The user voting element allows a user to vote whether the review is relevant to the user query. Further relevance to the user submitted query is determined based at least upon the vote.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 18, 2009
    Date of Patent: January 22, 2013
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Russell A. Dicker, Scott Allen Mongrain, Logan Luyet Dillard
  • High demand sale processing
    Patent number: 8255288
    Abstract: Item scarcity resulting from a high demand of the item is addressed by providing users a high demand sale process. In some aspects, users may opt-in to purchase the item in a sale by transmitting a mobile message to a host over a mobile device network prior to a sale of the item. If the user is eligible, the host then attempts to purchase the item on behalf of the user once the sale begins.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 3, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 28, 2012
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Diwakar Gupta, Paul C. Schattauer, Chih-Jen Huang, Philip Yuen, Ammar Chinoy, Kiran Kumar Meduri
  • Customizing gift instrument experiences for recipients
    Patent number: 8046266
    Abstract: Personalizing a gift instrument by customizing the presentation and redemption for a gift instrument recipient. A gift instrument purchaser or other data source associates customization information such as redemption recommendations, restrictions, or other content with the gift instrument based on the gift instrument recipient. The customization information is presented to the gift instrument recipient upon redemption of the gift instrument. In an embodiment, information about the redemption by the gift instrument recipient is provided to the gift instrument purchaser.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 28, 2008
    Date of Patent: October 25, 2011
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Michal Jonathan Geller, Terrance Douglas Hanold
  • Display of items from search
    Patent number: 8515830
    Abstract: Disclosed are various embodiments for determining categories of items to include in a search results page. Representative is a system comprising at least one computing device with a search engine and a network page build process that are executable therein. The search engine identifies a plurality of items to display in a network page in response to a request for search, wherein the items are classified in a plurality of categories. The network page build process applies one or more rules to determine one or more of the categories for which corresponding ones of the items are to be displayed in a network page.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 26, 2010
    Date of Patent: August 20, 2013
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Gagan K. Arora, Anand Victor
  • Data feed item classification
    Patent number: 8266003
    Abstract: This document relates to classification of items included in a data feed. For example, a feed of items is generated for provision to a referral network site. The feed includes some of the items sold through an electronic commerce network site. Item classification information corresponding to an item sold through the electronic commerce network site is identified based upon the taxonomy information of the referral network site and included in the generated feed of items.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 30, 2009
    Date of Patent: September 11, 2012
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Jeetendra Mirchandani, Matias H. Ganc, Mohit Gupta, Simon C. Vining
  • Seller to seller transactions
    Patent number: 8612304
    Abstract: Disclosed are various embodiments for facilitating seller to seller transactions. A seller can make products in the seller's inventory available to other sellers. Therefore, other sellers may list a portion of the seller's inventory as their own in-stock inventory. Upon the sale of such a product by another seller, embodiments of the disclosure can facilitate initiating and settling transactions between the sellers and the purchaser as well as fulfillment of the product from the seller's inventory to the purchaser on behalf of another seller.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 1, 2011
    Date of Patent: December 17, 2013
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Sandi S. Lin, Thomas Plaster, Jason William Vogrinec, Stefan M. Haney
  • Widget-based integration of payment gateway functionality into transactional sites
    Patent number: 9747621
    Abstract: Various embodiments of a payment service are disclosed. In some embodiments, a merchant can enable customer use of the payment service by adding widget code to a web page, such as a catalog or shopping cart page, of the merchant's site. Thereafter, a user can invoke the payment service and complete a purchase transaction directly from the merchant site, without navigating or being redirected to a separate payment service site. In some embodiments, the user can complete the transaction without having or creating an account with the payment service.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 23, 2008
    Date of Patent: August 29, 2017
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventor: Vinay Kuruvila
  • Method and system for manually maintaining item authority
    Patent number: 8671120
    Abstract: An item authority system is provided. The item authority system uses rules to identify item definitions that match or potentially match an item description. When a unique match is found, then the item authority system may indicate that the item description describes the same item as the item definition. If multiple matches or only potential matches are identified, then the item authority system may allow a user to manually indicate which item definition matches.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 22, 2003
    Date of Patent: March 11, 2014
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Nicholas Bicknell, Shawn Bohn, Anmol Paralkar, Anuvrata Arora
  • Service for adding in-application shopping functionality to applications
    Patent number: 8527361
    Abstract: An application management system modifies developer-submitted applications, such as mobile applications, to add various types of functionality before such applications are made available for purchase. The added functionality may, for example, enable end users to make in-application purchases of content items from an application store. As another example, Digital Rights Management (DRM) functionality may be added for controlling user access to content items, such as content items available in an application store.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 27, 2011
    Date of Patent: September 3, 2013
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Ameesh Paleja, Sunbir Gill, Matthew A. Jones, Alexander L. Rouse, Mekka C. Okereke, Yael Peled
  • Customized product display
    Patent number: 9076180
    Abstract: Technologies are described herein for customized product display. A data structure schema is defined for describing product graphics, such as product images, and for defining how aspects of the product graphics should be displayed. Through the use of the schema, a product manufacturer can provide product graphics to an e-commerce merchant along with product display data formatted according to the schema that provides instructions to the merchant regarding how the manufacturer prefers the product graphics to be displayed. The merchant can then utilize the product graphics and the product display data to generate a product page for the product.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 10, 2014
    Date of Patent: July 7, 2015
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventor: Sean M. Scott
  • Selecting prospective bidders to whom to promote an online auction based upon bidding history
    Patent number: 8065194
    Abstract: A facility for identifying users to whom to promote a selected auction is described. The facility maintains a representation of bidding histories of a plurality of users. At a point at which certain users have already bid in the selected auction, the facility identifies users that have not already bid in the selected auction that have bidding histories that are similar to those of users that have already bid in the selected auction. The facility then promotes the selected auction to the identified users.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 20, 2010
    Date of Patent: November 22, 2011
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventor: Paul Kotas
  • Generating parts bundles
    Patent number: 8185446
    Abstract: Disclosed are various embodiments for generating automobile parts bundles associated with maintenance events. A maintenance schedule is retrieved and various maintenance events are identified. Various maintenance tasks associated with maintenance events are also identified. Parts associated with these maintenance tasks are placed into parts bundles associated with the maintenance event and a unique identifier within a parts catalog.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 11, 2010
    Date of Patent: May 22, 2012
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Olga I. Kuznetsova, Michael R. Brauwerman, Vivek A. Shah, Roy N. Harkness, Alexander S. Borst, James C. Petts, Theodore H. Romer
  • Adaptive information regions displaying content associated with an electronic commerce system
    Patent number: 9070158
    Abstract: Disclosed are various embodiments for displaying content associated with a merchant selling items through an electronic commerce system. A display area includes multiple information regions presenting content associated with the merchant. Visual characteristics associated with the information regions adjust according to values corresponding to the to the information regions. For example, the sizes or positions of the information regions may adjust according to the values.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 24, 2012
    Date of Patent: June 30, 2015
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Sunil Singh Parihar, Stefan M. Haney, Tobin J. Weldele, Alexander Hristov, John E. Darrow, Stuart Ross Hobbie, Dylan Nooney
  • Buyer global search
    Patent number: 8533054
    Abstract: Embodiments for implementing a buyer global search in electronic commerce include a method of detecting, by a computing device, that a search query for a product item within a first marketplace is unsuccessful and in response to the unsuccessful search query, executing the search query for the product item within a second marketplace. The method further includes detecting that the search query for the product item within the second marketplace is successful; and in response to the successful search query in the second marketplace, offering a user that submitted the search query in the first marketplace to purchase the product item being sold by a seller.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 22, 2011
    Date of Patent: September 10, 2013
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Stefan M. Haney, Aravind Yalamanchi
  • Generating product feeds
    Patent number: 8548872
    Abstract: Disclosed are various embodiments for generating product feeds associated with a product catalog for a third party site. Entries in a product feed that are associated with products that are in turn associated with a price that is below a threshold specified by a minimum advertised pricing restriction can be flagged. A hyperlink can be provided through which a user can add the product to a shopping cart in an electronic commerce system, which can allow the third party site to display pricing information for the product.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 28, 2011
    Date of Patent: October 1, 2013
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Mohit Gupta, Swagath Kannan, Irfan M. Mohiuddin
  • Pre-configure and pre-launch compute resources
    Patent number: 10489175
    Abstract: Systems, methods and computer-readable media are described for pre-warming compute instances in datacenters. A service provider associated with the datacenters may expect a demand for the compute instances and pre-configure computing resources within the datacenters to pre-launch the compute instances. As such, when a user requests a compute instance, the service provider may satisfy the request by allocating a pre-warmed compute instance to the user.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 10, 2013
    Date of Patent: November 26, 2019
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Arjun Radhakrishnan, Christopher Richard Jacques de Kadt, James Alfred Gordon Greenfield, Jacobus Johannes Nicolaas van der Merwe
  • Object recognition and navigation from ongoing video
    Patent number: 9760778
    Abstract: A system for performing object recognition on images in an image series, for example from a broadcast television signal or video-on-demand source. The system buffers images from the image series and accesses the buffer when an indication is received to start object recognition. The buffered images are sent to a recognition server, which returns object data for objects found in the image. The objects are then navigable using a user interface, through which the user can obtain additional information about the objects, or perform additional functions, such as adding the object to a shopping cart, etc.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 11, 2015
    Date of Patent: September 12, 2017
    Assignee: AMAZON TECHNOLOGIES, INC.
    Inventor: Peter Anthony Wakim
  • Multi-channel order management
    Patent number: 10769736
    Abstract: A merchant system including an order management application and method of integrating orders received from multiple ordering channels is described. An aggregated order queue is established including multiple orders from multiple different ordering channels. The orders are processed for fulfillment and a delivery channel is selected from multiple delivery channels for delivery of the one or more items of the order. The multiple orders, regardless of the ordering channel originating the order, and delivery channels may be managed via a single user interface.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 29, 2016
    Date of Patent: September 8, 2020
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventors: Gustavo Eduardo Lopez, Ashraf AlKarmi, Kristin Whitney Baker, Matthew Brett Roemer, Pawan Lata Uppuluri
  • System and method for group gift exchanges
    Patent number: 8548865
    Abstract: Systems and methods for organizing and conducting group gift exchanges among two or more participants generally enable multiple participants to order an item and to receive an item in return. Items may be allocated on a random basis, or on some other basis, such as the cost or other characteristic of the respective items, or the known preferences or interests of the respective participants. The systems and methods may take the form of free-standing applications or may be incorporated into existing merchant web sites or social networks, and may include components or processes for receiving orders of items and for allocating items among each of the participants.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 29, 2011
    Date of Patent: October 1, 2013
    Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc.
    Inventor: Kevin Y. Ho