ALEXANDRIA, Va., Feb. 11 -- United States Patent no. RE50,789, issued on Feb. 10, was assigned to Salewa Sport AG (Denges, Switzerland).
"Front unit for a touring binding" was invented by Edwin Lehner (Aschheim, Germany) and Michael Zimmermann (Aschheim, Germany).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A front unit for a touring binding, comprising: two lateral bearing portions arranged on a ski transverse axis, wherein, when the front unit is in a closed position, the two lateral bearing portions are configured to engage lateral counter bearing portions of a ski boot to hold the ski boot on the front unit so that the ski boot can pivot about the ski transverse axis; and a longitudinal positioning port...