ALEXANDRIA, Va., April 15 -- United States Patent no. 12,600,578, issued on April 14, was assigned to Ishida Co. Ltd. (Kyoto, Japan).
"Supply apparatus" was invented by Toshiharu Kageyama (Ritto, Japan).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A supply apparatus (10) includes: a blocker (13) disposed at a fork (12) between a main conveyance path (11), a first conveyance path (12A), and a second conveyance path (12B), the blocker (13) making a switch between a first state where supply of articles from the main conveyance path (11) to the first conveyance path (12A) is blocked and a second state where supply of the articles from the main conveyance path (11) to the second conveyance path (12B) is blocked;...