ALEXANDRIA, Va., March 5 -- United States Patent no. 12,240,409, issued on March 4, was assigned to TOYOTA JIDOSHA K.K. (Toyota, Japan).
"Vehicle occupant restraint device" was invented by Katsuya Shimazu (Toyota, Japan), Mitsuyoshi Ohno (Miyoshi, Japan) and Kaname Tanaka (Toyota, Japan).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A vehicle occupant restraint device includes: a seatbelt configured to restrain an occupant on a vehicle seat, the occupant sitting in the vehicle seat; and an upper-body restraint air-bag configured to perform expanding spread between a shoulder belt of the seatbelt and a chest region of the occupant and to restrain at least the chest region of the occupant, by receiving supply ...