Vonage Holdings Corp. has been granted four new patents by the United States Patent and Trademark Office.
In all, Vonage has been granted 24 U.S. patents in 2014 and now owns 61 U.S. patents. The Company currently has 249 U.S. patent applications pending, along with numerous foreign patents and pending applications in jurisdictions worldwide.
The latest are as follows:
U.S. Pat. No. 8,897,177, “Systems and Methods of Conducting Conference Calls,” issued today, enables telephone users to set their phones into conference mode so that incoming calls are automatically added to a conference call. Users may disable this feature at any time to receive calls in a standard manner.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,892,748, “Systems and Methods for Enabling Data Communications to a Telephony Device,” issued November 18, provides a battery-efficient method for mobile devices using a VoIP service to maintain a connection when the user is not on a call. This ensures that the mobile device can reliably receive calls over the VoIP connection.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,885,457, “Systems and Methods of Improving the Quality of VoIP Communications,” issued November 11, enables VoIP operators to detect when a subscriber’s device may be having difficulty registering with the operator’s network, instructing their devices to reboot themselves to correct the problem.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,879,476, “Method and Apparatus for Performing Network Registration,” issued November 4, relates to a system where VoIP operators can partner with operators of other systems, such as social networking platforms or Wi-Fi hotspot networks, to help determine the current IP address of a VoIP user. Even if the VoIP user is not connected to a VoIP operator’s network, this technology allows the VoIP operator to complete a call request to the user by requesting the user’s IP address information from third-party operators as long as the VoIP user is connected to their systems.
“Conference calls have traditionally been inconvenient to set up, involving the distribution and use of conference bridge numbers and authorization codes,” said chief legal officer Kurt Rogers. “The ‘177 patent eliminates these steps, allowing invitees to dial the host directly and immediately join the conference call. The ‘177 patent complements a patent granted to Vonage last year, which provides a group ‘dial-out’ solution that also eliminates the need for bridge numbers or authorization codes.”
He added, “Vonage has also focused on improving consistency and quality in delivering incoming call requests despite challenges inherent in providing voice-over-data services, especially on mobile devices. The ‘748, ‘457 and ‘476 patents each address aspects of this problem, improving efficiency and reliability in connecting VoIP calls.”