PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 16039713
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-07
Publication Date: 2018-11
Patent Classification: ["198", "347100"]

Abstract:
A method and apparatus are provided for sorting or retrieving items to/from a plurality of destinations areas. The items are loaded onto one of a plurality of independently controlled delivery vehicles. The delivery vehicles follow a track that guides the delivery vehicles to/from the destination areas, which are positioned along the track. Once at the appropriate destination area, an item is transferred between the delivery vehicle and the destination area.

Claim (Index 1):
A material handling system, comprising:\n a plurality of destination areas; a plurality of delivery vehicles for delivering items, wherein each vehicle comprises:\n a plurality of rotatable drive elements; \n a motor operable to drive the drive elements; and \n a sensor operable to detect rotation of the motor; \n a track for guiding the delivery vehicles vertically and horizontally, wherein the destination areas are positioned along the track so that items can be transferred between the delivery vehicles and the destination areas, wherein during operation, one or more of the delivery vehicles are located on the track; a traffic controller for controlling the operation of the vehicles as the vehicles deliver items to the bins, wherein the traffic controller receives signals from each vehicle indicative of the rotation detected by the sensor for the respective vehicle and wherein the traffic controller monitors the vehicles based on the received signals from the sensors and calculates a safe distance for each vehicle and communicates the safe distance to the vehicles, wherein the safe distance for a vehicle corresponds to the amount that the motor can advance without interfering with another vehicle on the track; wherein the delivery vehicles receive the safe distance signals from the traffic controller and advance along the track an amount corresponding to the safe distance; and wherein the traffic controller iteratively calculates safe distances for each vehicle as the vehicles move along the track and the vehicles advance along the track no further than a distance correlating to the safe distance until receiving a subsequent safe distance signal from the traffic controller.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 2.0
- Percentile: 95.0
- Lexical Diversity: 1.65217
- Patent Class: 198.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: False
- Related Applications: ['15618744', '14149282', '14690541', '13361490', '13631817']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.7846788837716334
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.4987302172554955
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.7560840171200196
- Mean Citation Score: 327.059162
- Max Citation Score: 359.7335
- Similarity Product: 355.19980557137734

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 1
- Claim Label 103: 1
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 1
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test