ALEXANDRIA, Va., Aug. 6 -- United States Patent no. 12,378,502, issued on Aug. 5, was assigned to KAO Corp. (Tokyo).
"Softening agent" was invented by Ryuuya Arata (Wakayama, Japan), Takako Igarashi (Wakayama, Japan) and Yuya Kitagawa (Tokyo).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A softening agent includes: a component (A) which is a compound represented by formula (1); and a component (B) which is an alcohol with 6 or more carbons. R1 and R2 each independently represent a hydrocarbon group with 6 or more and 24 or less carbons, with the proviso that at least one of R1 and R2 is a hydrocarbon group having a branch chain; A1O and A2O each independently represent an alkyleneoxy group with 2 or more and...