The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
May. 31, 2005
Filed:
Aug. 30, 2002
Richard J. Swan, Portola Valley, CA (US);
Peter S. Ebert, Menlo Park, CA (US);
Tao Lin, Mountain View, CA (US);
Jie Weng, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Hartmut K. Vogler, Foster City, CA (US);
Brian S. MO, Palo Alto, CA (US);
Richard J. Swan, Portola Valley, CA (US);
Peter S. Ebert, Menlo Park, CA (US);
Tao Lin, Mountain View, CA (US);
Jie Weng, Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Hartmut K. Vogler, Foster City, CA (US);
Brian S. Mo, Palo Alto, CA (US);
SAP Aktiengesellschaft, Walldorf, DE;
Abstract
Methods and apparatus, including computer program products, for providing multiple enterprises real-time access to information about items in a supply chain. Tags bound to items are read and information read from the tags and location information about the tags is provided by at least two enterprises and used to maintain disposition information about the items, which is made visible to enterprises in the supply chain. The tags can be radio-frequency identification tags having each having an ePC (electronic product code) as unique tag identifier. Visibility of the disposition information can be controlled through authorization. Visible information can include relationships between particular items and business documents such as order and shipping documents. With shipping documents visible, information read from item tags can be used to confirm the identify or completeness of a shipment.