iPipeline Awarded Patent for Computer Method for Insurance Applications

June 16, 2010

  • June 16, 2010 at 8:51 am
    matt says:
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    Can someone explain what this is?

  • June 16, 2010 at 1:59 am
    hallee says:
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    Click the “Patent” link in the beginning of the article for an abstract on the system.

  • June 16, 2010 at 2:47 am
    Rx says:
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    Prefilling an app. Let see, there are how many management systems in the United States doing this…oh maybe 40 or more! And Progressive, Geico, AIG, Hartford, Travelers….at least several hundred if not over a thousand insurance companies.

    Very original patent there….HAH! Waste of time and money for the patent office.

  • June 16, 2010 at 3:39 am
    matt says:
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    The article says the patent was granted.

    I shared your mindset and suspected a wide variety of prior art. But the IJ article is a bit vague, and most non legal professionals (myself included) cannot decipher the legalese of patent app wording.

    I always comment on intellectual property stories — I feel like the only people paying attention to what’s going on in IP litigation are the Non Practicing Entities (also known as “patent trolls”) who are securing billions of dollars in settlements on the basis of IP violations.

    I cannot tell if this is a pure software patent, a business model patent or something in between. I thought software patents were invalidated by the Bilski decision?

    The patent office needs to start really scrutinizing patents. Instead, in response to the vast increase in patent apps they want to create a patent “fast track”. Proponents of IP rights expansion say the increase in patent apps is evidence of the theory in action- that we have never been more inventive. They fail to contemplate that the increase in activity may in fact be a strong indicator that the patent system is broken.

    Patents are government granted monopolies. It’s time we stopped granting them, especially for software and business models.

    Remember Thomas Edison didn’t invent the light bulb. He merely patented it.

  • June 17, 2010 at 9:21 am
    Bob says:
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    I am no patent expert at all but I thought Bilski made it more difficult than it had been for business processes to win patents but not impossible.
    http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2008/11/18/95589.htm

  • June 17, 2010 at 11:54 am
    Rx says:
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    It does withstand the Bilski, is it a “machine-or-transformation test” as it is a transformation. Essentially taking data from a profile, and using that to pre-populate a form is what ACORD does with its forms, and every almost every management system and insurance company online.

    I have no idea why this was patented other than to create a “news item” maybe? As a marketing gimmick? Its like a car dealer saying, hey, we are going to sell a car with gas and oil already in it…DUH! How else would you do it? One of the tests of patent-ness is is it obvious and I think this one fails miserably. Another is prior art, which I think will it will fail even more. Perhaps to try and bilk clueless companies by selling to a patent troll?



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