2017 Patent-Pending Portfolio Summary by Siskin Capital
GraphR - Acquisition Opportunity - July 2017 .pdfPDF-Accessible graphR MVP Layout
Grapher.pdfGeneral Resources & FAQ
Who is behind graphR Applications, LLC / Insperion Technologies, LLC / graphR App?
Team graphR began with a group of like-minded high school students from Carnegie Vanguard High School in Houston, TX - Pawan Jajoo, Betsy Goodfriend, and Gilbert Martinez - brainstorming ideas to help students maybe less fortunate then ourselves not lose their passion for STEM subjects because of high costs of school equipment. 5 years later, we remain a tight-knit group of lifelong friends with a strong network of mentors across the world and a few family members acting as investors and advisors, as well as generous representation by Garlick & Markison's Bruce E. Stuckman in terms of the litigation behind our patent portfolio.
In addition to our intellectual property, we've launched crowd-funding campaigns for our early prototype launch on Indiegogo, been the youngest team EVER to present at Startup PITCH Houston, and worked with developers and marketing teams across the world to develop our minimum viable product for BETA testing in local area schools. We've also been a part of nationally-recognized incubator / accelerator's like Startup Aggieland and taken part in pitch competition's like the 2017 C.E.O. Conference in Tampa, FL.
What are you looking to divest?
As full-time seniors in college, we're looking forward to careers in separate fields and the real-world experience that is just as vital as the entrepreneurial one we've had a taste of. The source code of the graphR app across all platforms is useful only as a minimum viable product from 2016 and would be included in a potential sale of assets with the understanding that further development would be required but legally covered now across two granted and unsuccessfully-challenged U.S. patents. Thus, there are no limitations to which existing learning management systems are compatible with our anti-cheating detection method.
The intellectual property, however; the patents themselves, include our unique method allowing teachers or test administrators to make the final decision on whether a student or test-taker is cheating while monitoring their devices without sharing screens or personal info. or even access to their webcam by constantly pinging a server to ensure our app, or your learning management system's app / test is the primary application active on the student's device no matter what that may be. This bypasses not only the privacy and connectivity concerns raised by live proctoring or webcam monitoring software, but allows students access to their mobile devices unlike often incompatible or obtrusive lock-down browsers in case of an emergency inside or outside the classroom.
What can the intellectual property behind graphR do for my company or learning management system?
What we're really trying to sell is these two patents that cover the unique anti-cheating detection method of constantly pinging a server, at say like nanoseconds of intervals of time, to ensure the primary application on the student's device (whatever that is) is whatever the instructor on any of these platforms wants them to be i.e. our "Computer-Implemented System & Method for Administering An Exam." For our purposes as a startup in high school, we actually created an Minimum Viable Product with the use case of a calculator app that had its own independent learning management system to not only detect cheating but also engagement outside of an examination. So to answer your question - our solution attempts to make taking a test on say any smartphone or school iPad cart (no matter how outdated) a plausibility at least for in-school or in-class assessments to help take that hindrance of purchasing a $200 calculator from, for example, Texas Instruments for the most low-income students who are trying to pursue STEM courses.
However, that isn't the only use case for these patents. The calculator itself is not patented, or by any means anything out of the ordinary for any other calculator. It's the unique customizability of an unobtrusive Test Mode, because as you said locking down a mobile device is unideal, especially in case of an emergency in or outside of school. The patents also provide use cases for deep learning behavior to use these metrics over time to detect what really is cheating and isn't (and leaves that decision ultimately to the teacher or platform administrator after simply pausing the student's examination for review)... and simply provides an alternative to privacy invasive and extremely labor intensive or expensing eye-tracking or live webcam proctoring software.
Even if teachers do elect to use a more stringent protocol for actual test administration, graphR provides an opportunity for educators to at least ensure if students are going to use their phones they'll be paying attention without having to monitor them or their private text messages, etc. by simply preventing them from switching tabs outside of say Pearson MyLab on their iPads.
Are you patent-pending? Are you in any exclusivity periods with any other potential partners? What price range are you considering?
As of July 2, 2019, we received the first patent (U.S. No. 10,339,827) for our "Computer-Implemented System & Method for Administering An Exam" that we had filed provisional applications as early as Mar 2014- Nov 2016 for. We also successfully litigated against similar claims by Wolfram Alpha to clarify all the use cases of our anti-cheating detection technology, beyond just calculator apps or test administration, to include even drive detection scenarios, etc. and received confirmation of that patent (U.S. No. 10,839,708) on November 17, 2020.
Currently, we are NOT in any exclusivity periods with potential portfolio acquirers or active licensing / royalty agreements but are open to engaging with serious parties in their process. Our mutual commitment to Siskin Capital as our portfolio managers expired in early 2018 as we were still patent-pending, but we are looking to offer the entire portfolio for a 6-figure range combined based on independent valuations. We have listed our portfolio on Allied Securities Trust's (AST) I.P. marketplace as well. We would also be willing to work with standard Non-Disclosure agreements to protect the interests of all parties.
Please email either or both of our co-founders at PAWAN@GRAPHRAPP.COM (Pawan) or BETSY.GOODFRIEND@GMAIL.COM (Betsy) for more details or to set up a meeting to answer any inquiries and discuss next steps in your process.