{
  "patent_number": "US 9939279",
  "country": "US",
  "title": "How Uber Calculates Ride-Pooling Times to Keep Detours Reasonable",
  "original_title": "Method and system for shared transport",
  "summary": "Uber's 2015 patent on matching multiple riders into a single shared vehicle by calculating whether the detour will keep everyone's arrival times within an acceptable limit compared to a private ride.",
  "what_it_does": "The patent describes a system that coordinates shared rides by balancing driver locations and rider wait times. When multiple people request rides, the system identifies nearby, available drivers using GPS data. It then calculates two durations: how long the trip would take if a rider rode alone, and a range of times for a pooled trip with detours to pick up others. The system sets a strict limit on how much longer the pooled trip can take compared to the solo trip. It only assigns a driver to a shared pool if the estimated pooled travel time falls within this acceptable limit, ensuring no rider faces an unreasonable detour. For example, if a solo ride takes 15 minutes, the system might set a limit of 25 minutes for a pooled ride; it will only group riders if the algorithm predicts the shared route stays under that 25-minute cap.",
  "what_it_does_not_cover": [
    "Does not cover standard, non-pooled ride-hailing services where a driver only transports a single passenger or group from one point to another without detour calculations.",
    "Does not cover ride-pooling systems that group riders based purely on proximity without calculating or constraining the total trip completion time relative to a solo trip.",
    "Does not cover static transit routing systems like public buses or pre-scheduled shuttles that run on fixed routes regardless of real-time individual trip duration limits.",
    "Does not cover pooling algorithms that do not use real-time GPS data from the service provider's mobile device to determine proximity."
  ],
  "filed": "2015-11-16",
  "granted": "2018-04-10",
  "expires": null,
  "status": "active",
  "holder": "Uber Technologies Inc",
  "holder_url": "https://patentbrief.org/company/uber-technologies-inc",
  "inventors": [
    {
      "name": "Bin Pan",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/inventor/bin-pan"
    },
    {
      "name": "Hasrat Godil",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/inventor/hasrat-godil"
    },
    {
      "name": "Brian Tolkin",
      "url": "https://patentbrief.org/inventor/brian-tolkin"
    }
  ],
  "times_cited": 49,
  "tags": [
    "software",
    "ecommerce"
  ],
  "abstract": "A transport arrangement system operates to provide a service, which can receive a transport pool request from a rider. The transport pool request can specify a set of parameters, including a pickup location and a drop-off location. A candidate set of transport providers are identified that satisfy one or more criterion, including a criterion of proximity relative to the pickup location. One of the candidate set of drivers is selected to provide a transport pool for the rider. The selection can be based at least in part on determining which individual drivers of the candidate set satisfy one or more constraints, including a first constraint that relate to a predicted trip completion time for the rider.",
  "url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/9939279/uber-eta-prediction",
  "markdown_url": "https://patentbrief.org/patent/us/9939279/uber-eta-prediction/md",
  "google_patents_url": "https://patents.google.com/patent/US9939279",
  "relatedPatents": []
}