System and method of data harvesting
First Claim
1. A method comprising:
- a customer of a manufacturer using a product provided by a manufacturer in the ordinary course of business of the customer and for the intended purpose of the product through at least a portion of the product'"'"'s lifetime;
selecting at least one type of the used product for evaluation, the selected product having been provided to the customer by the manufacturer and wherein the used product selected for evaluation is not defective or nonperforming;
physically removing a plurality of the selected products from respective installed locations of the customer of the manufacturer;
collecting the plurality of products at a predetermined location of the manufacturer;
the manufacturer physically sending comparable replacement products to the customer to replace the plurality of removed products;
establishing a test plan for members of the plurality;
conducting tests of the members of the plurality in accordance with the plan;
conducting an analysis of the test results, including comparing test results with test results of unused product of the same type provided by the manufacturer;
providing a mass storage device; and
storing results of the testing and analysis in the storage device.
1 Assignment
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
Data harvesting can be carried out relative to performance or reliability information associated with one or more groups of electrical units. Ambient condition detectors associated with a variety of industrial or commercial installations and subject to a variety of different conditions can be returned for performance and reliability testing after predetermined usage intervals. Analysis of test results can be maintained in a database. Customers can be provided multilevel access to the information in the database. Reliability and test results for a class of detectors can be provided to a number of customers that have provided samples for evaluation. Application specific information can be limited to a particular customer or customers.
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Citations
20 Claims
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1. A method comprising:
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a customer of a manufacturer using a product provided by a manufacturer in the ordinary course of business of the customer and for the intended purpose of the product through at least a portion of the product'"'"'s lifetime; selecting at least one type of the used product for evaluation, the selected product having been provided to the customer by the manufacturer and wherein the used product selected for evaluation is not defective or nonperforming; physically removing a plurality of the selected products from respective installed locations of the customer of the manufacturer; collecting the plurality of products at a predetermined location of the manufacturer; the manufacturer physically sending comparable replacement products to the customer to replace the plurality of removed products; establishing a test plan for members of the plurality; conducting tests of the members of the plurality in accordance with the plan; conducting an analysis of the test results, including comparing test results with test results of unused product of the same type provided by the manufacturer; providing a mass storage device; and storing results of the testing and analysis in the storage device. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
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11. A system comprising:
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product provided by a manufacturer and used by a customer in the ordinary course of business of the customer for the intended purpose of the product wherein the provided product has been used by the customer through at least a portion of the product'"'"'s lifetime and the used product is not defective or nonperforming; a test facility of a manufacturer to test used product of the manufacturer physically returned from a field installation of a customer; replacement product physically returned to the customer to replace the returned product; an analyzer to receive test results relative to at least one class of returned product and to generate outputs indicative of a predetermined analysis process; a storage apparatus which can store, for subsequent retrieval, test results and analyze outputs; a communications interface, coupled to the storage apparatus, which can receive at least one query from a displaced source of the customer seeking to obtain selected results and outputs of the used product returned by the customer and where the selected results and outputs are restricted to the tested used product returned by the customer. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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Specification