Data processing: financial – business practice – management – or co – Automated electrical financial or business practice or... – Health care management
Reexamination Certificate
1999-11-24
2001-12-11
Cosimano, Edward R. (Department: 2161)
Data processing: financial, business practice, management, or co
Automated electrical financial or business practice or...
Health care management
C705S400000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06330542
ABSTRACT:
TECHNICAL FIELD
This invention relates to an improved form of e-commerce that is implemented on the Internet or other system of networked computers. More particularly, the invention relates to a system and process for managing the quoting and procurement of commercial printing. The system addresses inefficiencies that exist in both of these processes for both the buyers of commercial printing and the providers of commercial printing. Specifically, the system and process provides a graphical interface between buyers of commercial printing and the providers. The system allows buyers of printing to receive immediate quotes by selecting simple graphic representations of the product they wish to purchase and selecting any variable information for that product. This procedure saves the buyer significant time and also saves the printing providers significant time in having to prepare the quote.
BACKGROUND
The usual method in the industry for printing buyers is to contact several inside or outside sales representatives of printing companies to obtain quotes for projects. However, this is very time consuming and does not necessarily result in the best pricing for the buyer. Furthermore, this is very time consuming for the printing provider because quotes have to be prepared for every project. The other solution is for the buyer to use some of the other Internet sites that have been established for obtaining printing quotes.
One Internet site that provides quoting functions is PrintBuyer.com. However, this application does not provide the same solution as the invention. More specifically, this Internet application does not provide an immediate quote. The buyer first must provide the specifications by completing several lengthy forms and then this information is sent via email to the printing providers that subscribe to the service. The printing providers then prepare the quote manually and send the quote to the print buyer via email or fax. These Internet sites do not allow the buyer to simply choose a graphic of an item for which to receive a quote. Thus, the benefits to the buyer are questionable. Furthermore, this Internet site does not make any attempt to match the requested product to the best printing provider for that product. The result is that the printing providers submitting quotes for that project may not be the most competitive companies for that project.
Another Internet site, PrintAccess, allows printing buyers to find printing providers using a three step method. The first step allows the printing buyer to select among several general categories, which include printing providers, prepress firms, designers, and other categories. The next step provides a subcategory of the chosen category. The final step allows the user to select a company within the subcategory by geographic location. However, the solution does not provide any quoting functions of any type.
Another Internet application, PrintBid.com, is simply a nationwide database of printing companies that allows the printing buyer to find a company based on geographic location, equipment, and specialties and learn additional information about that company, including annual revenue, client profile, years in business, and number of employees. However, this application does not provide any quoting functions.
Another Internet application in the printing industry is offered by iPrint. iPrint primarily addresses the procurement of business cards, letterheads, certain advertising specialties, and labels. This Internet application does not, however, provide any quoting functions for regular commercial printing. This Internet site allows printing buyers to purchase the products mentioned above but not any additional products.
Another Internet application recently introduced is called Noosh Inc. Noosh provides an Internet application that enhances the communication between print buyers and print providers. It also helps both print buyers and print providers manage the printing process more easily. However, it does not provide immediate quotes or use the type of graphic interfaces used by the present invention. A similar application is provided by Impresse, but as with the Noosh application, immediate quotes are not provided.
Another Internet application currently available is an application called Collabria. Collabria is a subscription based software package available to print providers. This application is an Internet based printing workflow solution that automates the process of buying, managing, and producing reprinted or templated print applications. A difference between that application and this invention is that the Collabria application does not provide any quoting functions.
An auction based approach for providing printing and other document services is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,826,244, issued Oct. 20, 1998 to Huberman. While the system disclosed there utilizes a computer network to speed communication between a customer and a plurality of potential suppliers, it still relies on a conventional bidding process by the potential suppliers in response to a description of a printing job provided by the customer.
So while there are other applications that attempt to provide solutions to printing buyers by providing a more efficient quoting and purchasing mechanism, there remains a need to provide a more efficient system that not only addresses the needs of printing buyers, but also the needs of the printing provider.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
An objective of the invention is to provide a system and process for managing the quoting and procurement of commercial printing that provides the printing buyer with an immediate quote and that relieves the printing provider of preparing each quotation, thereby significantly reducing estimating costs incurred in the transaction for both the printing buyer and the printing provider.
It is another objective of the invention to provide the buyer with quotations that have been generated from multiple print providers based on criteria which the print buyer can easily change to determine the impact of those changes on the cost of the project.
It is a further objective of the invention to introduce multiple turnaround time options to print buyers. Shorter turnaround times generally equate to higher prices.
It is another objective of the invention to provide such quotations to the printing buyer with a minimal effort required by the printing buyer by using graphical interfaces that correspond with the products for which the printing buyer desires a quotation instead of more traditional methods.
It is another objective of the invention to provide an auto intelligence type function that will give the buyer all of the available options to produce a particular project at a given price which might include changing the paper selections, slightly altering the size of the project, or changing or omitting certain finishes to allow the buyer to make the most informed buying decision.
It is yet another objective of the invention to introduce cost savings into the printing marketplace by aggregating the demand for like products and sending those projects to printing providers that are the most economically efficient producers of those products based on equipment configurations and other economic considerations. Furthermore, it is the intent of the invention to generate these cost savings by increasing efficiency, not by lower profit margins for printing providers. Aggregating the volume of printed products results in greater operating efficiencies for printing providers, thereby allowing the printing providers to lower pricing without making any sacrifices in profit margins.
It is a further objective of the system and process to provide a more standardized approach to what has for many years been an industry in which each item was considered custom.
These and related objectives are achieved through the use of the automated Internet quoting and procurement system herein disclosed. The automated Internet quoting and procurement system described herein features a series of graphical interfaces which repres
Handler Katharine Woods
Johansen Jon
Sevcik Jan Joseph
Cosimano Edward R.
Ecorporate Printers, Inc.
Pennie & Edmonds LLP
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