A small Silicon Valley company, AliveCor, has filed an antitrust lawsuit accusing Apple of cornering the market for heart-rate monitoring technology for the Apple Watch, and endangering AliveCor users’ health.
In a complaint filed late on Tuesday night, AliveCor Inc said Apple shut out rivals by changing the heart-rate algorithm on its watch’s operating system, making rival technology incompatible.
AliveCor sells KardiaBand, an Apple Watch wristband capable of recording an electrocardiogram, and SmartRhythm, an app that alerts users to irregular heartbeats.
The privately held company accused Apple, whose market value exceeds $2 trillion, of quietly “working in the background” to copy its ability to record an ECG on the Apple Watch, and to provide a separate app for heart-rate analysis…
“The value of controlling such critical health data (with the accompanying ability to exploit it) was apparently too much of a temptation for Apple,” it added. “To gain an unfair competitive edge, Apple put countless AliveCor users’ lives in danger.”
MacDailyNews Take: So, Apple’s not allowed to add sensors and functionality to Apple Watch?
The fact is that AliveCor sells a bunch of finger-pad devices that cost more, are less convenient, and more likely to get lost versus an Apple Watch that’s strapped to your wrist. AliveCor is losing because their ECG solutions are less elegant, larger, bulkier than simply wearing an Apple Watch Series 4 (released in September 2018) or later with ECG.
There a reason why founding CEO, and former Google exec, Vic Gundotra left AliveCor in February 2018: The company has no real future as currently constructed.
Can’t compete? Litigate.
What is AliveCorpse?
“ So, Apple’s not allowed to add sensors and functionality to Apple Watch?”
Of course they are. They’re not allowed to block people from competing with them.
Sorry Worperfect, MS Word has private API’s that you can’t use…
History!
What’s to stop them competing?
They can start their own brand, work on it for 40+ years, become a world leader and run Apple into the dust of history.
Or, do they want it a) all and b) now?
I guess I’m missing something. AliveCor has their own device and their own app and they both work fine. What is the issue? AliveCor shouldn’t expect Apple’s app to work with AliveCor’s device nor Apple’s device with AliveCor’s app.