PORTLAND, OR (March 28, 2016) – PayRange Inc., maker of the world’s simplest mobile payment solution for machines, was issued two additional patents by the United States Patent and Trademark Office covering inventive portions of their technology. The first covers the Offers platform that was announced last year at the 2015 NAMA OneShow. This method for providing offers on a vending machine via a mobile app includes a barcode scan to validate the selected offer. The second patent was issued covering a method for retrofitting an offline machine to accept electronic payments – without the need to add a network connection. These newly-issued patents join the 24 filed and/or issued patents for PayRange, demonstrating their truly inventive and innovative approach to the unattended retail industry.
Offers provides for discounts and promotions on specific vending machines and on specific products across the entire network of PayRange enabled machines. Product manufacturers can promote their products in the vending channel in much the same way they promote them in traditional attended retail. Operators receive full price for the vended item while the consumer receives a rebate for the discount once the offer is validated. Additionally, a machine operator can utilize the Offers platform to drive sales in their machines independent of manufacturer participation.
The ability to retrofit existing offline machines for electronic payment via mobile is crucial to updating an installed base of millions of machines throughout North America. It’s simply impractical to replace these machines, but as cash and coin usage continues to decline, the patented solution for a retrofit device allows machine operators to keep their machines economically viable. A key component of this method is that no network connection is required on the machine, thus saving operators the expense of a data connection on each one of their machines; a previously unavoidable fee that kept adoption of other electronic or cashless payment options in the single digit percentages.
