Apple’s victories at an administrative tribunal that voided two patents Masimo Corp. alleged the Apple Watch infringes will stand, a U.S. federal appeals court ruled this week.
Maura O’Malley for The Global Legal Post:
Apple had argued successfully in its inter parties review petition at the Patent Trial and Appeal Board’s (PTAB) that the claims were unpatentable because, among other things, it would have been obvious over the prior art.
The opinion by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on 10 January, affirms this, with circuit judges Lourie, Prost and Reyna finding Masimo’s arguments to the contrary “unpersuasive” and two claims in Masimo’s patent relating to blood oxygen measurement unpatentable for obviousness.
The patent covers pulse oximeter technology that measures oxygen in the blood used in some models of Apple watches.
Apple is facing an import ban on certain models of Apple Watches after the International Trade Commission found in October that it had violated U.S. laws by incorporating Masimo’s patented light-based pulse oximetry technology in its products.
Apple is appealing the ruling, and as of 27 December, the ban had been temporarily paused allowing sales of watches to resume in Apple stores and on its website in the US.
MacDailyNews Take: Have a nice day, Masimo.
Please help support MacDailyNews. Click or tap here to support our independent tech blog. Thank you!
Support MacDailyNews at no extra cost to you by using this link to shop at Amazon.
I guess this is also good news for anyone developing a similar system but held up till now by those same patents to go ahead with their development with the full knowledge that even Apple would not be able to get on their case.