Patent Issued for Geotagging Location Data (USPTO 10,445,817)

2019 OCT 29 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventors Briggs, Ryan M. (Glen Ellyn, IL); Johnson, Robert H. (Hoffman Estates, IL), filed on October 16, 2017, was published online on October 28, 2019.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 10,445,817 is Allstate Insurance Company (Northbrook, Illinois, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Vehicles, such as automobiles, may become disabled during a trip as a result of, for example, a vehicle malfunction, a flat tire, lack of fuel, and/or an accident. When these events occur, many drivers and/or passengers will attempt to call a tow truck company for assistance. In some cases, people do not know the name and/or telephone number of a tow truck company. In addition, some people might not be certain of their location at the time the vehicle becomes disabled. This may be especially true when people travel outside a region they usually travel. With the proliferation of smartphones (and other portable devices), many people can now look up the names and telephone numbers of tow truck companies. Still, people may have difficulty determining which tow truck company is closest to the vicinity where there vehicle is disabled or which tow truck company will be able to respond promptly. In addition, particular equipment might be needed to provide sufficient service to the vehicle. If the roadside assistance provider is not aware of the particular equipment in advance, servicing the vehicle may be delayed.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “In light of the foregoing background, the following presents a simplified summary of the present disclosure in order to provide a basic understanding of some aspects of the invention. This summary is not an extensive overview of the invention. It is not intended to identify key or critical elements of the invention or to delineate the scope of the invention. The following summary merely presents some concepts of the invention in a simplified form as a prelude to the more detailed description provided below.

“Aspects of the disclosure related to systems and arrangements for capturing an image of a vehicle or portion of a vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested. The image may be captured by a mobile device of a user and the mobile device may geotag location information to the image. The image and associated geotag location information may then be processed to determine a location of the vehicle and a roadside assistance issue for which service is being requested based on the captured image.

“In some examples, the image may be further analyzed to determine a context. For instance, the image may be further analyzed to determine or identify a make, model and/or year of the vehicle, whether special equipment is needed to service the vehicle, whether the vehicle is located in a particular situation (e.g., within a structure such as a garage, in a ditch, or the like).

“The information obtained from the image may be used to determine a type of service to provide to the vehicle and to identify one or more service providers to dispatch to the vehicle.

“Of course, the arrangements described may also include other additional elements, steps, computer-executable instructions, or computer-readable data structures. In this regard, other embodiments are disclosed and claimed herein as well. The details of these and other embodiments of the present invention are set forth in the accompanying drawings and the description below. Other features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the description, drawings, and claims.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“What is claimed is:

“1. A system, comprising: a mobile device having a first processor and first memory, the first memory storing computer-readable instructions that, when executed by the first processor, cause the mobile device to: capture at least one image of a vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested; embed geotag location data in metadata associated with the captured at least one image; transmit the captured at least one image and the embedded geotag location data to roadside assistance server; the roadside assistance server having a second processor and a second memory storing computer-readable instructions that, when executed by the second processor, cause the roadside assistance server to: receive, from the mobile device, the captured at least one image and embedded geotag location data; analyze the captured at least one image and embedded geotag location data to determine a location of the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested and a roadside assistance issue for which roadside assistance is being requested from the captured at least one image and embedded geotag location data; identify a service to provide to the vehicle based on the determined location and roadside assistance issue; identify a first roadside assistance provider available to provide the identified service to the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested; transmit, to a computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, a request for roadside assistance including the identified service; receive, from the computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, acceptance of the request for roadside assistance, the acceptance including an estimated time of arrival at the determined location of the vehicle; responsive to receiving the acceptance, generate, based on the received acceptance, a notification identifying the roadside assistance issue and including the estimated time of arrival; and transmit the generated notification to the mobile device for display on the mobile device.

“2. The system of claim 1, the roadside assistance server further including instructions that, when executed by the second processor, cause the roadside assistance server to: receive, from the computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, denial of the request for roadside assistance; responsive to receiving the denial, identify a second roadside assistance provider available to provide the identified service to the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested; and transmit, to a computing device of the second roadside assistance provider, a request for roadside assistance including the identified service.

“3. The system of claim 1, the roadside assistance server further including instructions that, when executed by the second processor, cause the roadside assistance server to: further analyze the captured at least one image to determine a context of the image, the context including at least one of: additional vehicle information and information associated with a surroundings of the vehicle in the determined location.

“4. The system of claim 3, the roadside assistance server further including instructions that, when executed by the second processor, cause the roadside assistance server to: based on the determined context of the image, identify special equipment to be used in providing the identified service to the vehicle, wherein identifying the first roadside assistance provider includes identifying the first roadside assistance provider based on the identified special equipment to be used in providing the identified service to the vehicle.

“5. The system of claim 3, wherein the additional vehicle information includes at least one of: a make of the vehicle, a model of the vehicle, and a year of the vehicle.

“6. The system of claim 3, wherein the information associated with the surroundings of the vehicle includes determining whether the vehicle is located within a structure.

“7. A roadside assistance computing platform, comprising: at least one processor; a network interface; and at least one memory storing computer-readable instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the roadside assistance computing platform to: receive, from a mobile device, at least one image of a portion of a vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested, the at least a first image including geotag location data embedded in metadata associated with the at least one image; analyze the received at least one image and embedded geotag location data to determine a location of the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested and a roadside assistance issue for which roadside assistance is being requested from the received at least one image and embedded geotag location data; identify a service to provide to the vehicle based on the determined location and roadside assistance issue; identify a first roadside assistance provider available to provide the identified service to the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested; and transmit, to a computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, a request for roadside assistance including the identified service; receive, from the computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, acceptance of the request for roadside assistance, the acceptance including an estimated time of arrival at the determined location of the vehicle; responsive to receiving the acceptance, generate, based on the received acceptance, a notification identifying the roadside assistance issue and including the estimated time of arrival; and transmit the generated notification to the mobile device for display on the mobile device.

“8. The roadside assistance computing platform of claim 7, further including instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the roadside assistance computing platform to: receive, from the computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, denial of the request for roadside assistance; responsive to receiving the denial, identify a second roadside assistance provider available to provide the identified service to the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested; and transmit, to a computing device of the second roadside assistance provider, a request for roadside assistance including the identified service.

“9. The roadside assistance computing platform of claim 7, further including instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the roadside assistance computing platform to: further analyze the received at least one image to determine a context of the image, the context including at least one of: additional vehicle information and information associated with a surroundings of the vehicle in the determined location.

“10. The roadside assistance computing platform of claim 9, further including instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, cause the roadside assistance computing platform to: based on the determined context of the image, identify special equipment to be used in providing the identified service to the vehicle, wherein identifying the first roadside assistance provider includes identifying the first roadside assistance provider based on the identified special equipment to be used in providing the identified service to the vehicle.

“11. The roadside assistance computing platform of claim 9, wherein the additional vehicle information includes at least one of: a make of the vehicle, a model of the vehicle, and a year of the vehicle.

“12. The roadside assistance computing platform of claim 9, wherein the information associated with the surroundings of the vehicle includes determining whether the vehicle is located within a structure.

“13. A method, comprising: capturing, by a mobile device, at least one image of a vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested; embedding, by the mobile device, geotag location data in metadata associated with the captured at least one image; transmitting, from the mobile device to a roadside assistance server, the captured at least one image and the embedded geotag location data; receiving, by the roadside assistance server and from the mobile device, the captured at least one image and embedded geotag location data; analyzing, by the roadside assistance server, the captured at least one image and embedded geotag location data to determine a location of the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested and a roadside assistance issue for which roadside assistance is being requested from the captured at least one image and embedded geotag location data; identifying, by the roadside assistance server, a service to provide to the vehicle based on the determined location and roadside assistance issue; identifying, by the roadside assistance server, a first roadside assistance provider available to provide the identified service to the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested; transmitting, from the roadside assistance server and to a computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, a request for roadside assistance including the identified service; receiving, by the roadside assistance server and from the computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, acceptance of the request for roadside assistance, the acceptance including an estimated time of arrival at the determined location of the vehicle; responsive to receiving the acceptance, generating, by the roadside assistance server and based on the received acceptance, a notification identifying the roadside assistance issue and including the estimated time of arrival; and transmitting, from the roadside assistance server and to the mobile device, the generated notification to the mobile device for display on the mobile device.

“14. The method of claim 13, further including: receiving, by the roadside assistance server and from the computing device of the first roadside assistance provider, denial of the request for roadside assistance; responsive to receiving the denial, identifying a second roadside assistance provider available to provide the identified service to the vehicle for which roadside assistance is being requested; and transmitting, to a computing device of the second roadside assistance provider, a request for roadside assistance including the identified service.

“15. The method of claim 13, further including: further analyzing the captured at least one image to determine a context of the image, the c: context including at least one of: additional vehicle information and information associated with a surroundings of the vehicle in the determined location.

“16. The method of claim 15, further including: based on the determined context of the image, identifying special equipment to be used in providing the identified service to the vehicle, wherein identifying the first roadside assistance provider includes identifying the first roadside assistance provider based on the identified special equipment to be used in providing the identified service to the vehicle.

“17. The method of claim 15, wherein the information associated with the surroundings of the vehicle includes determining whether the vehicle is located within a structure.”

For additional information on this patent, see: Briggs, Ryan M.; Johnson, Robert H. Geotagging Location Data. U.S. Patent Number 10,445,817, filed October 16, 2017, and published online on October 28, 2019. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=10,445,817.PN.&OS=PN/10,445,817RS=PN/10,445,817

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