Granted Patent B2

US 12,436,721 · App. 18/141,469 · Granted Oct 7, 2025

Inventors: Leore Avidar (San Francisco, CA); Ami Wang (San Francisco, CA); Manushika Yapa (San Francisco, CA); Andrew Nisbet (San Francisco, CA); Boa Khanh Tran (San Francisco, CA)

Assignee: Lob.com, Inc.

G06F3/1296G06F3/1291G06Q30/0283

Abstract

Claims (26)

1. A system for asset routing, comprising a processing system configured to:

receive an asset to be printed and a set of asset parameter values describing physical parameters for the asset;

determine a ruleset comprising a plurality of rules, wherein each rule of the ruleset is associated with a different asset parameter value permutation, wherein each rule of the ruleset comprises a set of partner weights for a set of print partners, wherein a print partner is associated with different partner weights in different rules;

select a rule from the ruleset based on the set of asset parameter values;

automatically determine a set of preferred print partners from the set of print partners based on the rule of the ruleset;

determine a set of available print partners from the set of preferred print partners based on a capacity of each print partner of the set of preferred print partners;

probabilistically select the print partner for the asset from the set of available print partners based on the partner weight for each available print partner as specified by the rule; and

route the asset to the print partner for printing.

2. The system of claim 1 , wherein the asset comprises a press ready proof.

3. The system of claim 2 , wherein the press ready proof is represented in a PDF format.

4. The system of claim 1 , wherein the ruleset is determined by estimating an asset volume of received assets for each asset parameter permutation.

5. The system of claim 1 , wherein the ruleset is periodically re-calculated based on a remaining daily capacity for each print partner.

6. The system of claim 1 , wherein the asset is specified by a set of HTML variable values.

7. The system of claim 6 , wherein the set of HTML variable values are determined for variables within a HTML template.

8. The system of claim 6 , wherein a PDF proof representative of the asset is generated from the set of HTML variable values.

9. The system of claim 1 , wherein the processing system is further configured to send a batch identifier to the print partner, wherein the batch identifier identifies a pre-existing batch of assets comprising assets from orders submitted by different entities, wherein the asset is printed in the batch of assets.

10. A method for routing an asset to a print partner, comprising:

receiving the asset, wherein the asset is associated with asset parameter values;

determining a ruleset comprising a plurality of rules, wherein each rule within the ruleset is associated with a different asset parameter value permutation, wherein each rule of the ruleset comprises a set of weights for a set of print partners, wherein a print partner is associated with different weights in different rules;

probabilistically determining a print partner based on the respective set of weights for the respective set of each print partners specified by a rule of the ruleset; and

routing the asset to the print partner for printing.

11. The method of claim 10 , wherein determining the print partner comprises:

determining whether an available print partner exists based on the rule of the ruleset; and

responsive to determining that an available print partner does not exist:

dynamically determining a new rule based on the asset parameters for the asset; and

based on the new rule, selecting the print partner.

Assignments (2)

Continuity (4)

References Cited (39)