Innovation Focus: Financial Sector Giants Like Patents Too

In recent months, much activity has been seen coming out of the business headquarters of many of America’s major financial institutions, including some interesting announcements regarding investment in American cities. Officials from JPMorgan Chase, the largest American bank, have announced a plan to invest $100 million over 5 years as part of a city redevelopment projects for Detroit. The corporation has dealt with regulatory scrutiny lately, however, over excessive pay packages for company executives. Elsewhere, the Bank of America Corporation, another major name in U.S. banking, has been making efforts to refocus its operations on profitable mobile banking and credit cards services.

But even as big financial institutions challenge already granted patents in post grant proceedings, they themselves have not cooled in their own desire to obtain patents.

Every time we look at innovations from companies in the financial sector here at IPWatchdog, we see an interesting assortment of computer-implemented systems and other tools for improving consumer banking, ease of transactions and more. We’re taking a slight detour in Companies We Follow schedule to take a look at technological innovations coming from a variety of companies that operate in the financial sector. Rather than profile a single company we looked at patents and patent applications from the likes of Bank of America, American Express, Capital One and more. Our recent review of the sector continues to show us some astonishing inventions.

Today’s featured patent application comes from Capital One and protects an attachment to mobile devices which establishes a network for handing digital transactions. This attachment would enable a user’s device to be retrofitted so that it can be easily operated as a digital wallet. Methods of tracking online payments through mobile devices, as well as a system for quickly processing loans for online auto sales, are discussed in other patent applications we discuss.

Many business solutions are protected by recently issued patents which caught our eye today, including one patent which protect methods of identifying market opportunities in a specific geographic region. Another patent is directed at protecting a system of identifying when a company may be in a position of strength to negotiate more favorable deals with suppliers. We also discuss a patent for a handicap-accessible ATM machine as well as a patent protecting a loyalty program for debit card users.

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System and Method for Providing Contactless Payment
U.S. Patent Application No. 20140074698

Financial transactions look much different in our digital age than they used to just a few decades before. Now, a person can engage in a multitude of payment options online, at retail establishments or in restaurants without ever once handing over cash. The idea of the “digital wallet” has developed as a result, allowing consumers to pay for most purchases through a variety of digital and networked means.

One issue in expanding on the ability of consumers to utilize digital wallets handle their payments involves the difficulty of obtaining the proper hardware to facilitate digital transactions. Most types of digital wallets typically rely on the use of a mobile device manufactured with hardware that can process payment data between financial servers. Millions of existing devices already owned by consumers cannot then be used to serve as digital wallet solutions.

The Capital One Financial Corporation of McLean, VA, filed this patent application with the USPTO in October 2013 to protect a contactless payment attachment for a mobile device that can establish a near field communications network. The contactless attachment connects to a mobile device through the use of a plug which connects to the device’s audio jack. This attachment could be used with PDA devices or smartphones and work in conjunction with an app to process payments.

We were intrigued by the system detailed by this patent application, but we also felt that now was an important time to highlight such a useful financial system relying on software technologies. The U.S. Supreme Court has yet to reach a verdict in Alice Corporation v. CLS Bank International, a landmark case which cause sweeping changes to the patent system for inventions like this which rely on the use of software. Some embodiments of this contactless payment attachment include an audio jack extension, enabling a mobile device user to continue using headphones to listen to device audio if they’d like.

Claim 1 of this patent application would provide Capital One with the right to protect:

“A contactless attachment, comprising: a near field communication antenna; a secure element to securely store an account number upon account provisioning that is used to identify an account and is transmitted from the contactless attachment when processing a transaction relating to the account; an input/output module to encode information related to the transaction as audio data and decode audio data, wherein the input/output module receives an account provisioning signal that includes the account number; and a plug, operably connected to the input/output module, capable of connecting the attachment to an audio jack on a mobile device.”

Other Patent Applications 

In our look at other technological innovations from other giants in the financial sector, we noticed quite a few that focused on methods of processing payments and transactions through mobile devices. In addition to the intriguing mobile device outlined in our featured patent application today, we noticed a system for completing payments through mobile platforms in U.S. Patent Application No. 20140122301, which is titled Systems and Methods for Mobile Ordering and Payment. This patent application, filed by the JPMorgan Chase Bank of New York, NY, would protect a system that would process transactions through mobile platforms as well as provide a system for tracking transaction and order information. The Bank of America Corporation of Charlotte, NC, has also recently developed systems for mobile device transactions, as detailed in U.S. Patent Application No. 20140122333, entitled Method and Apparatus for Confirming a Transaction on a Mobile Device. Confirmation of payment, as well as reporting of available cash resources to a person through their smartphone, tablet computer or other mobile device.

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A couple of other patent applications continue this trend of computer-implemented innovations designed to provide positive impacts to the consumer experience. Capital One is trying to patent a system for offering increased flexibility for consumer financing of cars by filing U.S. Patent Application No. 20140143128, filed under the title Unsecured to Secured Loan Conversion in Automobile Finance. This innovation is meant to improve the speed at which financial institutions can process loans for automobile purchases through digital channels. The Bank of America has created a method for speeding the transfer of funds between accounts at separate financial institutions, described in U.S. Patent Application No. 20140129442, entitled Financial Institution Account Networking. This system would enable a user to conduct these fund transfers without operating two mobile banking applications by linking different accounts within a single network.

From U.S. Patent Application No. 20140129442, entitled “Financial Institution Account Networking.”

Issued Patents of Note

A number of financial institutions are heavily involved in the business of protecting technological innovations with patent grants from the USPTO. Atop this list are perennial giants like the Bank of America and American Express, although Visa, USAA, Goldman Sachs and others have been highly active in receiving U.S. patent grants in recent years. Whereas most of our focus on patent applications from these corporations featured technologies providing upgrades to consumer financial systems, many recently issued patents protect innovations are directed at corporate and enterprise financial services.

Companies can better identify situations within which they should negotiate discounter terms with suppliers through the computerized system protected by U.S. Patent No. 8719078, issued under the title Index for Assessing Discount Potential. This JPMorgan Chase Bank system is designed for large companies which have to handle negotiations with many suppliers by helping them identify factors for discount leverage during supplier negotiations. By contrast, the focus of U.S. Patent No. 8694435, entitled System and Method for Linking Point of Sale Devices Within a Virtual Network, is a technology which poses many more benefits to small businesses. This American Express Travel Related Services invention creates a mesh-like network structure for multiple point of sale devices, reducing networking costs and allowing merchants to conduct sales at trade shows at auctions more easily.

From U.S. Patent No. 8723941, issued as “Handicap-Accessible ATM.”

Businesses of all sizes may also benefit from the technology protected by U.S. Patent No. 8731992, which is titled Method and Apparatus for Evaluating Geographic Market Opportunity. This Bank of America Corporation invention creates scaled market index values that reflect data about the market opportunity for certain product types and industries within a specific geographic region. The original patent application for this technology was originally filed in May 2007 and faced its first non-final rejection under Section 101 of U.S. patent code in March 2011; this patent was issued after the applicant amended the claims in December 2013 to indicate that the system was implemented on a computer processing platform.

We’ll conclude our look at patented technologies from major financial corporations with a couple of novel inventions that further impact the consumer banking experience. A new style of automated teller machine (ATM) designed for people with physical disabilities is protected by U.S. Patent No. 8723941, issued under the title Handicap-Accessible ATM. This Bank of America Corporation innovation utilizes a lifting mechanism that changes the position of an ATM display screen relative to a user’s eyes. Finally, we were intrigued by a system of offering financial rewards to debit card customers outlined in U.S. Patent No. 8725633, entitled System and Method of Operating a Debit Card Reward Program. JPMorgan Chase Bank obtained this patent to protect a system of extending awards to debit card users as they accrue purchases on the card. The patent application for this system, first filed in February 2008, received four final rejections for obviousness under other patents, the last of which came in June 2013 and referenced another patent directed at an incentive program for debit card owners.