Centralized Service Marketplace for Server-Based Services

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Solution Overview

Problem

Mobile application developers face challenges in determining the existence and licensing of server-based services, leading to unintentional duplication of efforts and difficulties in monetizing their services due to the lack of a centralized distribution platform.

Innovation Solution

A service development platform that acts as a central hub for server-based service developers to catalog, distribute, and monetize their services, providing a graphical user interface for service discovery, upload, and purchase, while also facilitating billing and payment processing through financial service providers.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Ease of manufacture

If application developers independently develop server-based services without a centralized platform, then they can meet specific application needs, but they unintentionally duplicate existing services and waste company resources

Engineering Contradiction:
ImproveService development efficiencyVSAvoidVisibility of existing services
Core Design Contradiction:
Ease of manufactureVSLoss of information

Solution Approach 1:

The patent introduces a centralized service marketplace as an intermediary between service developers and application developers. This marketplace catalogs available server-based services, enabling developers to discover and license existing services before developing new ones, thereby eliminating unintentional duplication while maintaining the ability to meet specific application needs.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

2Adaptability or versatility

If server-based services are sold or licensed independently without a centralized distribution platform, then developers maintain autonomy, but services are at a disadvantage in selling or licensing to other developers

Engineering Contradiction:
ImproveService distribution flexibilityVSAvoidService monetization efficiency
Core Design Contradiction:
Adaptability or versatilityVSProductivity

Solution Approach 1:

The centralized service marketplace serves multiple functions simultaneously: it acts as a catalog for service discovery, a licensing platform for legal transactions, and a monetization hub for financial exchanges. This multi-functional approach enables service developers to reach broader audiences and increase monetization efficiency while maintaining distribution flexibility through standardized interfaces.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #6Universality (Multi-functionality)

3Loss of information

If a centralized service marketplace is implemented, then service discovery and reuse become efficient, but the system complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
ImproveService visibilityVSAvoidPlatform structure complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Loss of informationVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The centralized service marketplace is segmented into distinct functional modules: a service catalog module for listing and discovering services, a licensing module for managing legal agreements, and a monetization module for handling financial transactions. This segmentation reduces system complexity by organizing functions into independent, manageable components that can be developed and maintained separately.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #1Segmentation

Data Source

PatentEP2629487B1Method and system for distributing one or more server-based services
Publication Date: 2015.11.04 BLACKBERRY LTD
  • EP2629487B1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP2629487B1 patent drawingFigure 2
  • EP2629487B1 patent drawingFigure 3

AI summary

Presented are systems and methods for distributing server-based services using a service development platform. The service development platform acquires server-based service data associated with a first server-based service, and parses the server-based service data. The service development platform catalogs the parsed server-based service data into a server-based service catalog that contains one or more server-based services different from the first server-based service. Additionally, the service development platform receives a request from a client device for the first server-based service indexed in the server-based service catalog, and provides the first server-based service to the client device.