ALEXANDRIA, Va., Oct. 21 -- United States Patent no. 12,770,114, issued on Oct. 20, was assigned to BLAZER AND FLIP FLOPS INC. (San Diego).

"Building customer loyalty in a mobile environment" was invented by Murgesh Navar (San Jose, Calif.) and George McMullen (Sunnyvale, Calif.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A customer loyalty and gifting service may reward customers who show or are expected to show frequent patronage to a provider of a good or service. A vendor of a good or service may create and provide an offer to one or more existing customers who may choose to purchase, redeem, and/or recommend the offer to other users in the network. The customer may also gift the purchased offer. A re...