Patent Publication Number: US-7899748-B2

Title: Server wallet provider portal

Description:
CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS 
     This patent application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application. Ser. No 10/675,503 entitled DYNAMIC PROCESSING OF PAYMENT REQUESTS FOR MOBILE COMMERCE TRANSACTIONS filed on Sep. 30, 2003, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference. 
    
    
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
     1. Statement of the Technical Field 
     The present invention relates to the field of mobile commerce and more particularly to processing payment requests with mobile server wallets in a payment transaction management network. 
     2. Description of the Related Art 
     Mobile commerce transactions are those e-commerce transactions which can be initiated through a mobile pervasive device such as a cellular telephone, personal digital assistant or a digital pager. Typical mobile commerce transactions include the purchase of goods or services, travel tickets including airfare and admission to venues such as sporting events, motion pictures or musical concerts. In a conventional e-commerce transaction, payment for the transaction can be cleared through a third-party payment system communicatively coupled to a Web server hosting the transaction. In this regard, the conventional e-commerce transaction can include a simple scheme of content browsing client, content server and payment clearance system. 
     Mobile commerce transactions differ from e-commerce transactions principally by way of the mobility of the pervasive device. Specifically, in addition to a content server and payment clearance system, a wireless service provider will be required to act as a gateway between a network of pervasive devices and the Internet. Importantly, given the mobility of pervasive devices in mobile commerce, mobile server wallets have been deployed to facilitate the exchange of payment information from the pervasive device of the shopper and the merchant payment clearance system. Mobile Server Wallets can store shipping information, billing information, payment methods, payment information and the like for the convenience both of the shopper and the merchant. Individual Mobile Server Wallets can be accessed by the merchant at checkout to facilitate the transaction without requiring the manual intervention of the shopper. 
     To provide to the shopper the convenience of a Mobile Server Wallet, a relationship must be established between the Wireless Service Provider and the Mobile Server Wallet Provider. Yet, by its very nature individual ones of pervasive devices may enjoy relationships with Mobile Server Wallet Providers which remain unknown to the Wireless Service Provider. In this regard, the Mobile Server Wallet Provider can be disposed within the Wireless Service Provider, within a separate Internet Service Provider, within the content servers of financial institutions, within the transaction processing facilities of individual merchants, or within a content portal. Nevertheless, regardless of the identity of the Mobile Server Wallet Provider, the Wireless Service Provider must know this identity to properly route payment messages. 
       FIG. 1  is a schematic illustration of a well-known mobile transaction architecture in which payment messages can be routed through a Mobile Server Wallet Provider disposed within a wireless network. The architecture of the known art can include a wireless services gateway  140  coupled to a mobile service wallet provider (MSWP)  120  within a wireless service provider network. In operation, a user mobile device  110  can communicate with an on-line store  150  through both wireless and wire-bound portions of the global Internet. When consummating a transaction, the MSWP  120  can intercept the “checkout page” and can process the checkout page in association with the mobile server wallet (not shown) provided by the user mobile device  110 . Specifically, the MSWP  120  can route the payment transaction to a suitable payment issuer  160  disposed among a multitude of payment issuers  130 . The payment issuer  160  can process the transaction to produce a commitment of payment. Subsequently, the payment issuer  160  can route the commitment to the on-line store  150  through the MSWP  120 . 
     As it will be apparent to the skilled artisan, the conventional manner in which MSWP technology has been integrated into the mobile commerce paradigm remains deficient in several important respects. First, substantial infrastructure will be required to support the MSWP  120  within the wireless network. Minimally, the MSWP  120  must include a full-fledged operating system, a database management system and an application server. Yet, the foregoing architecture hardly represents a minimally invasive configuration. Additionally, the architecture of  FIG. 1  cannot scale to support the dynamic selection of different mobile server wallets through multiple MSWPs. 
     SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
     The present invention addresses the deficiencies of the art in respect to MSWP management and provides a novel and non-obvious method, system and apparatus for managing multiple MSWPs through a single MSWP portal in a mobile commerce system. In a preferred aspect of the invention, a MSWP portal can include . . . a configuration for communicative coupling both to a plurality of MSWPs and also to a content proxy. A composite profile generator further can be included which can be configured to combine a plurality of MSWP profiles into a single, composite profile for routing payment messages in the proxy to the MSWP portal. Finally, the MSWP portal can include selection logic configured to process a user selection of one of the MSWPs to process a payment transaction received through the proxy. In a preferred aspect of the invention, the content proxy can be a wireless service proxy (WSP). In this regard, the WSP further can include a filter plug-in configured to route the payment messages to the portal when the payment messages match rules specified within the composite profile. 
     A payment transaction system incorporating the MSWP portal of the present invention can include one or more MSWPs coupled to respective on-line financial institutions. At least one content proxy can be configured for coupling both to on-line merchants and end user customers of the on-line merchants. Finally, at least one MSWP portal can be disposed between the MSWPs and the content proxy. Notably, the content proxy can include a WSP. Moreover, the content proxy further can include a filter plug-in configured to route payment messages to the MSWP portal when the payment messages match rules specified within a profile provided to the filter plug-in by the MSWP portal. 
     In a method for processing a payment transaction in a mobile commerce system, a payment message can be processed in a portal to identify one of a selection of MSWPs to handle an associated payment transaction. Subsequently, the payment message can be routed to the payment message to an identified one of the MSWPs. Preferably, individual MSWP profiles can be combined for each of the MSWPs into a composite profile. Once combined, the composite profile can be provided to a content proxy for use in trapping payment messages passing through the content proxy between an on-line merchant and a customer in the mobile commerce system. 
     The processing step of the inventive method can include the steps of identifying a customer associated with the payment message and parsing a profile associated with the customer to determine a selection a preferred MSWPs. A user interface can be rendered so as to present the selection of preferred MSWPs to the customer. Consequently, a particular one of the preferred MSWPs can be selected to handle the associated payment transaction based upon data provided by the customer in the user interface. Subsequently, payment transaction data produced by the selected one of the preferred MSWPs can be relayed to the customer. Similarly, payment transaction data produced by the selected one of the preferred MSWPs can be relayed to a merchant associated with the payment transaction. 
     Additional aspects of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows, and in part will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The aspects of the invention will be realized and attained by means of the elements and combinations particularly pointed out in the appended claims. It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory only and are not restrictive of the invention, as claimed. 
    
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
       The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute part of this specification, illustrate embodiments of the invention and together with the description, serve to explain the principles of the invention. The embodiments illustrated herein are presently preferred, it being understood, however, that the invention is not limited to the precise arrangements and instrumentalities shown, wherein: 
         FIG. 1  is schematic illustration of a payment transaction management system known in the state of the art; 
         FIG. 2  is a schematic illustration of a payment transaction management system incorporating a plug-in to a content routing proxy for routing payment messages to selected mobile server wallets supported by corresponding MSWPs. 
         FIG. 3  is a flow chart illustrating a process for filtering the management of a payment request in the payment transaction management system of  FIG. 2 ; 
         FIG. 4  is a schematic illustration of the payment transaction management system of  FIG. 2  which has been configured with an MSWP portal in accordance with a preferred aspect of the present invention; and, 
         FIG. 5  is a flow chart illustrating a process for filtering the management of a payment request in the payment transaction management system of  FIG. 4 . 
     
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS 
     The present invention is a MSWP portal. The MSWP portal can be coupled to a plug-in to a content routing proxy for routing payment messages to selected mobile server wallets supported by corresponding MSWPs. The routing proxy can be disposed in a wireless service provider network established to support a multitude of pervasive devices through wireless communications links. The plug-in can intercept payment messages sent between a merchant computing system and a pervasive device of a subscriber to the wireless service provider network. An association between the subscriber and the MSWP portal can be established. Subsequently, the plug-in can route the payment message to a corresponding MSWP portal which in turn can provide the subscriber with a selectable set of MSWPs from which the subscriber can select a particular one of the MSWPs to process the payment message. 
       FIG. 2  is a schematic illustration of a payment transaction management system disposed in a wireless service provider network in which the MSWP portal of the present invention can be disposed. The payment transaction management system can include a multiplicity of MSWPs  230  communicatively coupled to one or more payment issuers  220 . Each one of the MSWPs  230  can obtain a guarantee of payment from a payment issuer  260  among the multiple payment issuers  220  for a purchaser associated with a mobile server wallet managed by the MSWP  230 . The process of obtaining a guarantee of payment can be linked to the interception of a payment message  290  between a merchant  250  and a pervasive device  210  in the wireless server provider network. 
     More specifically, a filter plug-in  270  can be programmatically coupled to a routing proxy server  240  disposed within the wireless server provider network. For example, the routing proxy server  240  can be a caching proxy server such as the WebSphere™ Everyplace Server™ manufactured by IBM Corporation of Armonk, N.Y., United States. In any case, the filter plug-in  270  can read data flowing through the proxy server  240  to identify data of interest. In accordance with the inventive arrangements, data of interest can be a payment message associated with a particular subscriber, a particular pervasive device, a particular merchant, or any other identifying characteristic. Notably, by “keying” the filter plug-in  270  to specific subscribers, the routing operation of the plug-in  270  can be limited to those subscribers who use mobile server wallets. 
     Once a payment message  290  has been identified as meeting the criteria of a filter configured within the filter plug-in  270 , the payment message  290  can be routed to a specific mobile server wallet managed by a corresponding one of the MSWPs  230 . The corresponding one of the MSWPs  230 , in turn, can obtain a guarantee of payment from a specific payment issuer  260  from among the multiple payment issuers  220 . Once a guarantee of payment can be obtained, the MSWPs.  230  can return the payment information within a payment message  290  intended for the merchant system  250 . In this regard, the payment message  290  can be a completed “checkout” page. 
     Importantly, it will be recognized by the skilled artisan that unlike conventional payment transaction processing known in the prior art in which all payment messages are processed statically within a fixed MSWP within the wireless service provider network, in the system of the present invention the filter plug-in  270  can avoid the consumption of excessive overhead by filtering only those payment messages  290  which can be acted upon based on an association with a particular subscriber, particular merchant, particular content, or other such filtering characteristic. To that end,  FIG. 3  is a flow chart illustrating a process for filtering the management of a payment request in the payment transaction management system of  FIG. 2 . 
     Beginning in block  310 , a payment message can be detected as the message flows through a proxy server in the wireless service provider network. In block  320 , an aspect of the message, for instance a recipient address or sending address, can be compared to a filter to determine whether the payment message ought to be processed in the filter, or ignored. In decision block  330 , if the filter indicates a match between the aspect of the payment message and the filter, in block  340  a preferred mobile server wallet can be identified and in block  350  the payment message can be routed to the preferred mobile server wallet. Otherwise, in block  360  the payment message can be ignored by the filter. 
     Returning now to  FIG. 2 , a set of profiles  280  can be provided within the wireless service provider network. Each of the profiles  280  can reference a different merchant with whom a corresponding one of the MSWPs  230  is to be associated. Alternatively, each of the profiles  280  can indicate a commerce standard such as e-commerce markup language which can be processed by the filter plug-in  270 . For each one of the profiles  280  which specifies an associated one of the MSWPs  230 , the filter plug-in  270  can monitor message traffic originating from the associated one of the MSWPs  230 . In this regard, each of the profiles  280  can include a fully qualified uniform resource locator of a merchant Web site in addition to those form tags which can be processed in the merchant Web site. As message traffic flows through the proxy server  240 , the filter plug-in  270  can monitor the payment messages  290  for data which matches the filter condition specified in a relevant one of the profiles  280 . When the condition has been matched, the specified mobile server wallet can intervene to facilitate the payment transaction. 
     Notably, by requiring only a plug-in  270  to the proxy server  240 , the wireless service provider network can be partnered with other entities who can provide the mobile server wallet functionality to their respective subscribers. In consequence, the wireless service provider network need neither manage nor host the mobile server wallets themselves. Thus, the configuration of the wireless service provider network with the filter plug-in can give rise to several advantageous hosting scenarios. For example, the wireless service provider can host the mobile server wallet giving the provider the ultimate control over mobile commerce transactions through its network. Yet, with control comes responsibility and such a configuration will require the wireless service provider to manage the mobile server wallet. 
     In accordance with the present invention, the mobile server wallet can be hosted in a portal using a “walled garden” approach. Shoppers can be provided with a large number of mobile merchants and a mobile server wallet with which purchases can be transacted in the mobile merchants. In further illustration,  FIG. 4  is a schematic illustration of the payment transaction management system of  FIG. 2  which has been configured with an MSWP portal in accordance with a preferred aspect of the present invention. 
     The payment transaction system illustrated in  FIG. 4  can include an MSWP portal  400  coupled to a filter plug-in  470  to a WSP caching proxy  440  as in the case of the system of  FIG. 2 . The filter plug-in  470  can be programmed to inspect payment messages  490  passing between an on-line merchant  450  and an end user  410  over a computer communications network. The filter plug-in  470  further can be programmed to identify specific messages for specific end users associated with the MSWP portal  400 . Unlike the configuration of  FIG. 2 , however, the filter plug-in  470  need not identify a specific one of the MSWPs  430  to process a particular payment message  490  based upon an appropriate one of the profiles  480 . Rather, the selection of one of the MSWPs  430  can be deferred to the MSWP portal  400 . 
     In this regard, the MSWP portal  400  can be coupled to one or more MSWPs  430  which in turn can be coupled to one or more payment issuers  420  over a secured computer communications network. The corresponding one of the MSWPs  430 , when required, can obtain payment guarantees from specific ones of the payment issuers  420 . The selection of the specific MSWPs  430  to process the payment messages  490 , however, can be handled within the MSWP portal  400 . In particular, the MSWP portal  400  can query the profiles  480  for each coupled one of the MSWPs  430 . The queried profiles  480  can be aggregated into a composite profile  460  provided to the filter plug-in  470  in the WSP  440  caching proxy  440 . 
     When a trapped one of the payment messages  490  matches one of the rules in the composite profile  460 , the filter plug-in  470  can pass the trapped one of the payment messages  490  to the MSWP portal  400 . The MSWP portal  400  in turn can query the end user  410  as to which of the MSWPs  430  ought to handle the transaction associated with the trapped one of the payment messages  490 . Additionally, the MSWP portal  400  can determine from the trapped one of the payment messages  490  whether the trapped one of the payment messages  490  represents a new transaction, or merely a component of an ongoing transaction. 
     In more particular illustration,  FIG. 5  is a flow chart illustrating a process for filtering the management of a payment request in the payment transaction management system of  FIG. 4 . Beginning in block  505 , one or more MSWPs can be registered on behalf of a user or class of users in the MSWP portal. Each registered MSWP can include a stored profile specifying one or more preferred payment mechanisms and payment data for the user or class of users. The stored profile of each MSWP can be combined in a single composite profile for use in processing payment transaction messages received in the WSP. Subsequently, in blocks  510  and  515  the MSWP can await a transaction. 
     Once a transaction is requested in the MSWP portal, in block  520  the payment message can be received and the user or class of user associated with the payment message can be identified in block  525 . Based upon the identity of the user or class of user, the profile for the user can be retrieved which can indicate which MSWPs are preferred by the identified user or class of users. In block  535 , the user can be presented with a choice of MSWPs as specified in the profile. Subsequently, in blocks  540 ,  545  and  560 , the process can await the selection of a specific MSWP to process the payment message. 
     In decision block  545 , if a selection of a particular MSWP is received, in block  550  the payment message can be passed to the selected MSWP. The selected MSWP in turn can process the payment message, for instance by requesting that the user select a preferred payment method from among a selection of known preferred payment methods. The selected MSWP further can present to the user pre-established payment data for verification by the user, including billing address and shipping address data. Finally, in block  555  the selected MSWP can forward the pertinent payment transaction data to the WSP via the MSWP portal. In this regard, the pertinent payment transaction data can include data required to complete a purchase transaction form provided by a merchant, or the pertinent payment transaction data can include an actual payment guarantee or a unique account number useful for guaranteeing payment for the transaction. 
     The present invention can be realized in hardware, software, or a combination of hardware and software. An implementation of the method and system of the present invention can be realized in a centralized fashion in one computer system, or in a distributed fashion where different elements are spread across several interconnected computer systems. Any kind of computer system, or other apparatus adapted for carrying out the methods described herein, is suited to perform the functions described herein. 
     A typical combination of hardware and software could be a general purpose computer system with a computer program that, when being loaded and executed, controls the computer system such that it carries out the methods described herein. The present invention can also be embedded in a computer program product, which comprises all the features enabling the implementation of the methods described herein, and which, when loaded in a computer system is able to carry out these methods. 
     Computer program or application in the present context means any expression, in any language, code or notation, of a set of instructions intended to cause a system having an information processing capability to perform a particular function either directly or after either or both of the following a) conversion to another language, code or notation; b) reproduction in a different material form. Significantly, this invention can be embodied in other specific forms without departing from the spirit or essential attributes thereof, and accordingly, reference should be had to the following claims, rather than to the foregoing specification, as indicating the scope of the invention.