On Friday, Apple successfully persuaded a U.S. appeals court to sustain its victory over medical device company AliveCor in a patent dispute that might have resulted in an import ban on Apple Watches. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld the decision, declaring AliveCor’s heart-rate monitoring patents invalid—patents that AliveCor claimed Apple had infringed. This ruling overturned a prior decision by a U.S. trade tribunal, which had found Apple in violation of AliveCor’s patent rights.
Mountain View, California-based AliveCor sought a ban on Apple Watch imports at the U.S. International Trade Commission in 2021. It accused the tech giant of infringing three patents related to AliveCor’s KardiaBand, an Apple Watch accessory that monitors a user’s heart rate, detects irregularities and performs an electrocardiogram to identify heart problems like atrial fibrillation.
The U.S. Patent Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board invalidated the patents at Apple’s request in 2022. The ITC determined weeks later that AliveCor would be entitled to an import ban on infringing Apple Watches if the patents were valid, but paused the ban while the Federal Circuit considered appeals.
The Federal Circuit agreed with Apple on Friday that AliveCor’s patents were invalid and dismissed the ITC case.
MacDailyNews Take: Good luck with those appeals, DeadCor. 😏
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.
Can’t compete? Litigate. – MacDailyNews, May 27, 2021
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AliveCor is not “DeadCor” by any means.
Its KardiaMobile® product gives a “single lead” heart cardiogram somewhat similar to the Apple Watch®. AliveCor was foolish to even try to say the Apple Watch implementation was the same as their patents. Now, if the patent invalidation stands anyone can build a single lead device and likely undercut their KardiaMobile® product.
However, AliveCor has the KardiaMobile® 6L, which does a “six lead” heart cardiogram. This is something impossible to do with an Apple Watch. For those people for whom a single lead monitor is not enough information (and there are millions of people like that) a six lead is the way to go, and sales of its KardiaMobile® will certainly keep the company going.
Additionally, for those who do not wear a watch of any kind, again there are millions upon millions of these people, the KardiaMobile® Card may be convenient to have in their purse or wallet.
To reiterate, AliveCor was foolish to go against Apple with Apple’s significantly different single lead implementation and now risk a flooding of the market for that specific type of device. However, AliveCor is nowhere near “DeadCor” based upon its other devices.
Apple’s win keeps the Watch in the market, but the battle over fair competition in health tech isn’t over.
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