ALEXANDRIA, Va., March 3 -- United States Patent no. 12,566,459, issued on March 3, was assigned to TOYOTA JIDOSHA K.K. (Toyota, Japan).
"Automated carrier" was invented by Hiroto Murata (Toyota, Japan), Kentaro Harada (Toyota, Japan) and Keigo Oishi (Toyota, Japan).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "An automated carrier includes a towing vehicle and a towed vehicle towed by the towing vehicle. The towed vehicle includes a marker associated with specification information of the towed vehicle stored in a computer mounted on the towing vehicle or in an external computer communicating with the towing vehicle. The towing vehicle includes a camera and a controller. The camera acquires a marker image by...