Managing the Digital Enterprise | Business Method Patents (print version)

BUSINESS METHOD PATENTS

Company	Selected Patents by Number and Description
Amazon	5,960,411 -- Method and system for placing a purchase order via a communications network (One-click purchase). 5,715,399 -- Secure method and system for communicating a list of credit card numbers over a non-secure network. 5,727,163 -- Secure method for communicating credit card data when placing an order on a non-secure network. 5,826,258 -- Method and apparatus for structuring the querying and interpretation of semistructured information. 5,963,949 -- Method for data gathering around forms and search barriers. 5,999,924 -- Method for producing sequenced queries. 6,029,141 -- Internet-based customer referral system (Affiliate program). 6,525,747 -- Method and system for conducting a discussion relating to an item.
America Online	6,393,469 -- Method and apparatus for publishing hypermedia documents. 6,385,656 -- Selective recompression of files in a network system. 6,381,599 -- Seamless integration of internet resources. 6,339,784 -- Self-policing, rate limiting online forums. 6,012,051 -- Consumer profiling system with analytic decision processor. 6,009,413 -- System for real time shopping.
Coolsavings	5,761,648 -- Interactive marketing network and process using electronic certificates (Distributing discount coupons over the web).
Counterpane	5,978,475 -- Event auditing system.
DoubleClick	5,948,061 -- Method of delivery, targeting, and measuring advertising over networks.
eBay	6,415,320 -- Information presentation and management in an online trading environment. 6,058,417 -- Information presentation and management in an online trading environment.
Monster (TMP)	5,832,497 -- Electronic automated information exchange and management system.
Netflix	6,584,450 -- Method and apparatus for renting items.
Overture	6,269,361 -- System and method for influencing a position on a search result list generated by a computer network search engine (Pay for performance search).
Priceline (Walker Digital)	6,356,878 -- Conditional purchase offer buyer agency system. 6,345,090 -- Conditional purchase offer management system for telephone calls. 6,332,129 -- Method and system for utilizing a psychographic questionnaire in a buyer-driven commerce system. 6,240,396 -- Conditional purchase offer management system for event tickets. 6,134,534 -- Conditional purchase offer management system for cruises. 6,108,639 -- Conditional purchase offer (CPO) management system for collectibles. 6,085,169 -- Conditional purchase offer management system. 6,041,308 -- System and method for motivating submission of conditional purchase offers. 5,897,620 -- Method and apparatus for the sale of airline-specified flight tickets. 5,797,127 -- Method, apparatus, and program for pricing, selling, and exercising options to purchase airline tickets (Walker Digital). 5,794,207 -- Method and apparatus for a cryptographically assisted commercial network system designed to facilitate buyer-driven conditional purchase offers (Walker Digital).
Yahoo!	6,381,594 -- System and method for personalized information filtering and alert generation. 6,359,633 -- Apparatus and method for abstracting markup language documents. 6,343,302 -- Remote web site authoring system and method. 6,216,157 -- Method and apparatus for a client-server system with heterogeneous clients. 6,205,469 -- Method for client-server communications through a minimal interface. 5,991,756 -- Information retrieval from hierarchical compound documents. 5,983,227 -- Dynamic page generator.
Source: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.