Brokered Service Delivery with Payment Extraction
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current solutions fail to provide a practical and effective method for configuring and delivering brokered services, as service providers lack the technical expertise to integrate payment functionality and service brokers lack business knowledge, leading to difficulties in commercializing services and limiting consumer access.
Innovation Solution
A computer system with a view generator and state manager that provides a service process model, allowing configuration options for service delivery entities with state machines, enabling service providers to focus on their expertise while service brokers handle commercialization without hosting services.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If service providers integrate payment functionality into their services, then payment processing capability is improved, but service complexity and risk of disrupting service functionality increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent extracts payment functionality from the service provider's core service and places it in a separate service broker system. The service broker independently handles payment processing, including configuring payment schedules, collecting payments, and distributing funds to service providers. This separation allows service providers to focus on their core services without the complexity and risk of integrating payment systems themselves.
2Adaptability or versatility
If service brokers modify services to incorporate payments, then payment integration capability is improved, but cost and effort of hosting services increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an intermediary payment gateway system that sits between the service broker and payment processing infrastructure. This gateway handles the technical complexity of payment transactions, allowing service brokers to integrate payments without directly modifying service code or bearing the full cost of hosting payment processing infrastructure. The gateway acts as a mediator that simplifies payment integration while distributing costs appropriately.
3Adaptability or versatility
If service providers configure payment timing for partial payments, then payment flexibility is improved, but difficulty of correct configuration with complex service processes increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements a self-service payment configuration system where the service broker automatically configures payment schedules based on service process definitions. The system autonomously determines when partial payments should be collected by analyzing service process steps, dependencies, and milestones. This eliminates the need for service providers to manually configure complex payment timing, reducing configuration errors while maintaining payment flexibility.
4Adaptability or versatility
If service brokers expend effort to modify services for payments, then payment functionality is improved, but loss of time and resources increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements preliminary action by pre-configuring payment processing capabilities and templates within the service broker system. Common payment scenarios are pre-defined with standard configurations for payment schedules, methods, and routing. When a new service requires payment functionality, the broker can quickly apply appropriate pre-configured templates rather than building payment systems from scratch, significantly reducing the time and resources required to add payment functionality to services.
Data Source
AI summary
A selected activity of a service process model displayed in a process view of a graphical user interface may be determined. The service process model may represent a software service to be provided from a service provider to a consumer by way of a service broker. At least one service delivery entity associated with the service broker and providing service delivery functionality to be included in a brokered service process model may be determined, the service delivery entity including a state machine comprising states and transitions between the states. Configuration options may be provided in a configuration view of the graphical user interface. The configuration options may include goal states of the states to be reached as part of the brokered service process model and in association with the selected activity. A selected goal state of the goal states may be determined. The brokered service process model may be provided within a brokered service process view of the graphical user interface. The brokered service process model may include at least one entity activity configured to cause the selected goal state to be reached in association with the selected activity.