Apple to halt Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 sales in the US this week Apple Watch

https://9to5mac.com/2023/12/18/apple-halting-apple-watch-series-9-and-apple-watch-ultra-2-sales/

3.2k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

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u/throwmeaway1784 Dec 18 '23 edited Dec 18 '23

Masimo is not a patent troll. They actually make medical devices and aren’t just sitting on patents waiting to sue big companies

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u/MC_chrome Dec 18 '23

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the key patent in dispute here essentially one that says Masimo created the idea of strapping an O2 monitor to your wrist?

I don't see how that can ever be logically upheld as an original idea, otherwise people would be able to say they "created" something simply by strapping it down to another object

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u/cleeder Dec 18 '23

I don't see how that can ever be logically upheld as an original idea, otherwise people would be able to say they "created" something simply by strapping it down to another object

Yeah. Welcome to the world of patents.

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u/MC_chrome Dec 18 '23

So we agree that there are a ton of bullshit patents out there that should be invalidated?

It is also worth pointing out here that Masimo already had several patents invalidated in the course of them pursuing litigation against Apple, so I don't know why everyone is acting like they have a rock solid standing here

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u/Fairuse Dec 18 '23

Because there is more to O2 reading on a wrist than just strapping an O2 sensor onto a watch (btw, Masimo has a lot of patents here too because they were one of the main developers of modern O2 sensors; however, a lot of those patents have expired because O2 sensor tech is pretty old).

2

u/UltraCynar Dec 19 '23

Patents like this are bullshit. It essentially delays tech from being adopted by the masses at affordable prices.

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u/TheDrunkenMatador Dec 22 '23

That’s the whole point of a patent. If you invent something, other people can’t just immediately undercut you having spent no R&D money.

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

[deleted]

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u/helixflush Dec 18 '23

Didn't Amazon try to patent 3 point lighting for photography?

1

u/red_brushstroke Dec 19 '23 edited Sep 21 '24

hospital work ossified hurry growth desert quicksand abundant plants adjoining

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

29

u/FBI_Open_Up_Now Dec 18 '23

Because, a majority of people have a poor basis of understanding legal matters.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '23

They're willfully stupid. Then double down or move the goalposts when called out. Typical reddit

1

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '23

Oh sure apples litigation team couldn't kill the "extremely obvious" patent but you're sure it's junk. Peak moron.

1

u/hzfan Dec 19 '23

Sure in a fair and just system, but that’s not the system we operate in.

And let’s not act like Apple doesn’t abuse the patent system in ways that hurt technological innovation. They successfully sued Samsung in the US over their patent on slide to unlock and even got a temporary ban on sale of certain Samsung devices in Germany. They also successfully sued Samsung over claims their smartphones infringed on their design patent on “rectangular devices with rounded corners.” They’ve also engaged in lawsuits over patents on pressure sensitive displays (which existed before 3D Touch) and basic video calling functionality. I’d argue all of those are just as bullshit as this is, and yet they still won.

There is no morally righteous party in this dispute. Just two companies using the system as it’s designed to be used, which is to favor profits over progress.

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u/DJ-Downspyndrome Dec 18 '23

The two Massimo patents in question are US 10,912,502 and US 10,945,648

This is not about Massimo having a patent on the "idea" of a pulse oximeter on the wrist - patent claims are far more specific than most people think, and requires a finding that the infringer (Apple in this case) meets every single limitation of the claim.

So one of the claims that the ITC found the Apple Watch to be infringing was claim 28 of the '502 patent:

28.A user-worn device configured to non-invasively measure an oxygen saturation of a user, the user-worn device comprising:

a first set of light emitting diodes (LEDs), the first set of LEDs comprising at least an LED configured to emit light at a first wavelength and an LED configured to emit light at a second wavelength;

a second set of LEDs spaced apart from the first set of LEDs, the second set of LEDs comprising at least an LED configured to emit light at the first wavelength and an LED configured to emit light at the second wavelength;

four photodiodes arranged in a quadrant configuration on an interior surface of the user-worn device and configured to receive light after at least a portion of the light has been attenuated by tissue of the user;

a thermistor configured to provide a temperature signal;

a protrusion arranged above the interior surface, the protrusion comprising:

a convex surface;

a plurality of openings in the convex surface, extending through the protrusion, and aligned with the four photodiodes, each opening defined by an opaque surface configured to reduce light piping; and

a plurality of transmissive windows, each of the transmissive windows extending across a different one of the openings;

at least one opaque wall extending between the interior surface and the protrusion, wherein at least the interior surface, the opaque wall and the protrusion form cavities, wherein the photodiodes are arranged on the interior surface within the cavities;

one or more processors configured to receive one or more signals from at least one of the photodiodes and calculate an oxygen saturation measurement of the user, the one or more processors further configured to receive the temperature signal;

a network interface configured to wirelessly communicate the oxygen saturation measurement to at least one of a mobile phone or an electronic network;

a user interface comprising a touch-screen display, wherein the user interface is configured to display indicia responsive to the oxygen saturation measurement of the user;

a storage device configured to at least temporarily store at least the measurement; and

a strap configured to position the user-worn device on the user.

Are some of those elements generic? Sure - but plenty of them are quite specific, and again, infringement only occurs if you're found to be performing or implement each and every one of the claim clauses, the point being that this is not just Massimo having a patent on the idea of putting an oximeter on the wrist.

It's the same story with the other claims Apple was found to infringe: claim 22 of the '502 patent (which as a dependent claim, really means the combination of claims 19+20+21+22) and claim 12 of the '648 patent (combination of claims 8+12)

18

u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

yeah that's just straight up how apple's oximeter works. i wonder what's gonna happen, does massimo license the patent?

13

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '23

They do. I believe they even offered to license their tech to Apple. Also, mossimo O2 sensors are the gold standard. You will find them in 90% of patient monitors in hospitals and doctors office. Companies like Phillips and GE all have Mossimo sensors

11

u/West-Cod-6576 Dec 18 '23

yeah looks they they effectively patented the idea of a pulse oximeter on the wrist tbh

17

u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

This is literally just the written expansion of “put an O2 sensor on a wrist” by IP attorneys. One hundred percent of the hard problem being solved here is in the software. The rest of this is obvious.

41

u/DJ-Downspyndrome Dec 18 '23

One of the huge challenges with looking at patent claims and thinking that the invention is obvious is hindsight bias.

Yes, much of this might strike you as obvious when you're reading it today, because it's almost impossible to read it without applying today's knowledge -- but this patent dates back to 2008 (and expires in 2028, there's no trickery here with trying to run out the patent term).

Think back to 2008. The OG iPhone is barely over a year old. The latest groundbreaking announcement that has the tech world buzzing is that the next iPhone will now support...3G cellular.

Things that seem no-shit duh super obvious today would not have been viewed the same way 15 years ago. The anti-patent sentiment that's tossed around alot online tends to be very much along the lines of innovation good, patent bad, and focuses on the perceived innovation that hasn't happened because of some patent or another.

But if we acknowledge the innovation that has happened since the patent was filed, it's easier to see that something we think is super obvious today just wasn't all that obvious back when the patent was filed.

An 'omg duh I can't believe I didn't think of that' invention is still an invention...Because nobody else had thought of it first. Any problem looks trivial when you start from looking at the solution first.

Apple filed 2,961 patents in 2008. 2,513 patents the year before that; 1,410 the year before that. The tech and personal health industries collectively filed orders of magnitudes more during the same time period. But nobody else filed on a working implementation of "put an O2 sensor on a wrist" before Massimo did.

The first thing Apple would have done in an infringement suit is go looking for this supposed evidence (and this would be any written evidence whatsoever! as long as it was publicly available/published) that the invention was so obvious. The fact that this case has gotten to the point where Apple has been hit with an import ban for the Apple Watch strongly, strongly implies that there just isn't sufficient written material anywhere in the public record to support a claim that it was obvious to provide a wrist-worn oximeter - and it's not like Apple is a company to be stingy with its legal expenditures.

5

u/rockosmodurnlife Dec 19 '23

Thank you for your posts. I found them informative and enlightening.

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u/puterTDI Dec 18 '23

The key thing here is that pulse oximeters are very old tech with many patents already expired.

Much of what's being held up as "see, this is specific" is literally how pulse oximeters work.

1

u/duncecap234 Dec 18 '23

Okay, when did Masimo release their first O2 wrist band or watch?

3

u/i5-2520M Dec 19 '23

Doesn't matter if they figured out the tech on how to do it.

1

u/elmarkitse Dec 19 '23

You mean when they invented a wristband? The tech already existed, even if they were involved, if the patent ultimately is just ‘wear this on a watchband’ it should not pass muster here

3

u/i5-2520M Dec 19 '23

I'm just describing how patents don't need a working product buddy.

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

Much like the text of a patent, you’ve written a lot of words without saying much at all.

It’s not that it wouldn’t be obvious in 2008 or 2023. It’s that if you sat down and said, “how do we add pulse oximetry to this device that already measures heart rate”, this is the solution you would readily come up with.

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u/chilidreams Dec 18 '23

That’s a really weak reply twice in a row. This is surely just low calorie trolling, because damn.

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

A stranger on the internet called me weak for calling out pseudoprofound word vomit, oh no :’(

1

u/-007-bond Dec 18 '23

It clearly was written with reason and had a point if you bothered to read it all

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

I thought it was an obvious observation inflated into several paragraphs as though it’s somehow insightful and applicable. Sometimes disagreement is based on a difference of opinion, not a failure to read or comprehend.

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u/GoSh4rks Dec 18 '23

a protrusion arranged above the interior surface, the protrusion comprising:

a convex surface;

a plurality of openings in the convex surface, extending through the protrusion, and aligned with the four photodiodes, each opening defined by an opaque surface configured to reduce light piping; and

a plurality of transmissive windows, each of the transmissive windows extending across a different one of the openings;

That's not obvious...

10

u/deong Dec 18 '23

Honestly, it is.

The purpose of patents is theoretically to encourage inventors to contribute their innovations to a growing shared body of knowledge. If you figure out how to do something amazing, we don't want to lose that knowledge when you die, so tell us exactly how it works, and in return, we'll make sure you still reap the benefits while you're alive to reap them.

In the modern world, we never need that disclosure. Whatever you're inventing, there are 50,000 other people equally able to invent it. Any company that knows how to make an O2 sensor would have known how to make one on a watch. They aren't reading patent disclosures to learn how to solve thorny technical problems that otherwise society might lose the knowledge of how to solve.

It's laughable to think that only Apple could have figured out how to make a phone without a keypad. They were the first to make it look like an amazing thing we all should want, and that's not nothing. But if you'd gone to Samsung, Motorola, Blackberry, Nokia, whoever, and said, "Hey, here's a crystal ball...I'm not going to show you what it actually looks like, but a company is going to make an all touchscreen phone, and it's going to make them the most powerful company in a century", any of them could have made it. Maybe they would have done a worse job. Maybe their apps wouldn't have been as nice. Whatever. But they didn't learn how to do it by reading Apple's patent disclosure and saying, "Oh that's how you make an on-screen keyboard". We simply don't need that level of disclosure anymore. If you do something useful, someone else will always figure out how to do it to.

And that's why patents should just die. Patents are an agreement where the public hands over tremendous power to large companies in return for the companies doing nothing that we actually need them to do, and because we don't need it, they barely even bother to do it anymore. Half of patents in the modern world are just a list of requirements. Amazon didn't submit any code showing how you'd make an ecommerce website where you could place an order with only one click. They just patented the very idea of it under this false understanding that what they did was so hard that we needed to bargain with them to learn how they did it.

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

Well-said. The public gets none of the value from the patent system that we were supposed to get.

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u/awgiba Dec 18 '23

This is just a woefully uninformed opinion as is the one above. Unfortunate. Big companies like Apple would LOVE for the patent system to be gone, in fact they spend immense amounts of money every year lobbying to weaken the patent system.

1

u/deong Dec 18 '23

It sucks for everyone, including Apple. It only really directly benefits the trolls, but even if both I and Apple think it sucks, Apple can mitigate the sucking by paying a massive team of lawyers. I can’t. So while Apple might often lobby for reform, they also are happy enough to leverage their massive advantage at other times as well.

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u/awgiba Dec 18 '23

Not everyone who has and enforces a patent is a troll. That is a narrative that big companies like Apple love for you to believe. The patent system does wonders for small companies and inventors who need protection from big companies ripping them off.

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

And Apple fills thousands of patents, they just operate in a system that has been just slightly updated since the colonial era. You can’t blame them for playing the game they are forced to play, but we can agree being unable to buy an Apple Watch as a consumer because of some medical company which never intended to sell a device like Apple Watch, and is also playing the game filling as many patents as possible, has a questionable claim and want money from Apple.

1

u/awgiba Dec 18 '23

The company who holds the patent does in fact sell a competing product. Apple had every opportunity to negotiate a license to the patent or work out a deal with the patent holder, but they didn’t.

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

Yes, my decades as a software engineer in the tech industry through which I’ve watched the destructive power of patent suits are irrelevant because you’ve called me woefully uninformed.

Just because some of the big guys support something doesn’t mean it’s bad.

2

u/awgiba Dec 18 '23

I guess my years studying specifically patent law mean nothing when it comes to understanding patent law when compared to your time working as a software engineer. Thanks for enlightening me.

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

It’s actually a great patent, someone may try to shape a wrist oxygen monitor as a hat, that’s the obvious shape to start with for something you want in wrists, but these geniuses figured out a concave shape would work better.

1

u/0x2B375 Dec 19 '23

I mean we still do have those kinds of disclosures in patents, but they are for very specific highly technical industrial applications such EUV lithography, not consumer electronics.

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

It’s obvious that you would use a convex surface, that the photodiodes would need an opening to do… literally anything. It’s obvious that you would need to reduce light exposure. Are you going to do that with something transparent, or something opaque?

IP lawyers are literally paid to take straightforward things and expand them into as many large words as possible.

4

u/One_Curious_Cats Dec 18 '23

Having written a patent in patent legalese and gotten it approved, I can confirm what you're saying is 100% correct. A lot of the text in patents is re-copied verbiage and is re-used in many different patents.

The main goal is not so much about making the body of text larger but to make it appear more sophisticated and encompassing. This is to cover many technical implementation angles so as to make it harder for technical workarounds to circumvent your patent.

3

u/SFW_username101 Dec 18 '23

Tbh, most problems seem obvious when you know the answer.

2

u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

Wow, insightful

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u/SFW_username101 Dec 18 '23

I guess you didn’t get the point. Stating something to be “obvious” doesn’t mean anything.

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

If you don’t understand why the surface would have to be convex as a very obvious requirement, maybe you are punching above your weight here.

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u/GoSh4rks Dec 18 '23

And the LED claims as well?

"Obvious" has a specific definition in the patent world.

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

Yes. Pulse oximiters use two wavelengths of light. LEDs emit one wavelength of light. So you need two.

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u/GoSh4rks Dec 18 '23

You're basically saying that any type of pulse ox measurement is obvious... Clearly it isn't.

5

u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

Except it’s been done for ages, and the original pulse oximetry patents are no longer valid. You say “clearly” as though the existence of a patent is evidence. It’s not. I work in an industry that chases patents. I have never seen one issued, even on my own teams, that had any business being patented.

This may be hard for you to understand, but the system as it exists was not well-designed or just.

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23 edited Dec 18 '23

They are manifestly not paid to do that. They are paid to write as broad a claim as possible so as to have their protection be as broad as possible while also being a valid claim. All of those big words are limitations that they would rather not have in the claim, but which are necessary to render the claim nonobvious to a practitioner of the prior art.

Maybe the examiner fucked up. That will come out in court or Apple will settle, but the extant patent claims went through the prosecution process and, having practiced patent law, I can tell you it’s not often a gentle process. The examiners are looking to invalidate obvious claims and for the prosecuting attorney to reform those claims based on the written description.

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u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

They are manifestly paid to do exactly that. Writing as broad a claim as possible while disclosing as little as possible is what they do (this is in the words of a patent attorney in my family, not my own).

Given that you’ve financially benefited from participating in the system, I think you may have an overly rosy view of its fairness.

1

u/subdep Dec 19 '23

To the layman, no it’s not. To the medical device engineers: super obvious.

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u/megablast Dec 18 '23

Can you not read? It explains exactly what config to put the leds.

3

u/garylosh Dec 18 '23

It says the LEDs need to be in a convex protrusion (duh, to contact the skin) with channels cut out for the LEDs and photodiodes (to reach the skin), using the wavelengths that are already established to be used to measure pulse ox, and with an opaque material to block light leakage.

The established, non-patent-protected science of pulse oximetry is to use two wavelengths of light (660nm and 940nm). To emit the light, you need two LEDs. To measure the light, you need two photodiodes. To put them in a watch, you have to cut out four holes in the back of the watch. To make the readings meaningful, you need the light to not pass through air.

This is really, really basic problem solving for “put an O2 sensor on a wrist”.

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u/helixflush Dec 18 '23

So what happens if Apple loses? They just owe royalties to Assimo?

1

u/One_Curious_Cats Dec 18 '23

As complicated as this may sound. Other than specifying the usage of LEDs to emit light, it's pretty much the "obvious" way of solving this problem.

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u/freaktheclown Dec 18 '23

It’s not the general “idea” of an O2 monitor on your wrist that’s patented. Ideas can’t be patented (in the US). It’s the specific implementation. Two companies could create a wearable O2 monitor with totally different implementations and each have a patent.

That’s not to say that there aren’t bullshit parents. Or vague ones. But this company actually does sell a product, so they aren’t simply a patent troll. They’ve been accused of stealing Apple secrets to make it though, so there’s been a lot of back and forth… It’s a mess.

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u/Sylvurphlame Dec 18 '23

Yeah. I got as far as verifying Masimo is a legit practicing entity and then realized I could not armchair this one. So we’ll see how it shakes out.

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u/freaktheclown Dec 18 '23

I wonder if they’ll remove the sensor in the US versions to put them back on sale. Would suck but also not like it would make the Watch unusable. I can’t imagine most people are buying it for that.

4

u/turtleship_2006 Dec 18 '23

remove the sensor in the US

Or software disable it

1

u/freaktheclown Dec 18 '23

I wasn’t sure if they would be in compliance just software disabling it, but if they can then probably so

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u/Practical_Cattle_933 Dec 18 '23

Would it not be the beginning of a huge customer lawsuit? They were sold a device that can do this and that. You can’t remove a feature you used to sell the device.

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u/freaktheclown Dec 18 '23

It would only apply to devices sold going forward. Existing devices aren’t affected.

0

u/Sylvurphlame Dec 18 '23

If they lose the decisions (and the investable trial and appeals process that will trigger) then removing any infringing tech from series 10 while software locking the series 9 would be an option for compliance

1

u/IPCTech Dec 18 '23

Better come with a partial refund for people who bought the watch with the feature

0

u/Sylvurphlame Dec 18 '23

Yeah right. We both know that won’t happen. Apple will spin it so people start a damn grass roots campaign at Congress.

1

u/puterTDI Dec 18 '23

What is different between the series 9 and prior series that makes this one an infringement?

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u/Sylvurphlame Dec 18 '23 edited Dec 18 '23

Not gonna lie, I didn’t read this specific article as I’ve read some on it in general.

Not really sure? But I thought that was odd as well. I would tend to think they’re either (in descending order of likelihood) 1. actually targeting all models with SpO₂ measurement or 2. Masimo did a tear down and found something on the Series 9/Ultra 2 that wasn’t reverse engineered cleanly enough or 3. just pissed about the failed partnership and unrealized revenue possibilities, and just trying their luck with the current model

Since Apple immediately discontinues previous Watch models (aside from SE and refurb) every year, it could be the S9/U2 is also just the only available target as it’s the only one being currently sold. Perhaps they don’t have the legal standing to seek software lockout on older models? People could just not update their devices as well so that might not be viewed as effective.

0

u/puterTDI Dec 18 '23

I'm pretty sure disabling functionality on existing devices would cause new legal troubles. I don't think that will happen.

My honest bet is that apple either ends up licensing the tech, or they take what they have and alter it in some way to make the patents not apply and then include that in the apple watch 10.

I do think it's pretty tough to argue this patent as being valid unless there's something about the patent that is necessary for it to work while worn on the wrist. SpO2 monitors that attach to the finger are VERY old and patents are well into the public domain. If this is really just basically a finger based SpO2 sensor strapped to the wrist then I question whether the patent should have been issued, which may be why apple is fighting it.

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u/Sylvurphlame Dec 18 '23

Yeah. I wasn’t properly considering that the SpO₂ measurement isn’t pure software. It gets stickier when it’s also a hardware feature.

They will likely alter the sensor enough to get around it for the Series 10. Would think they would have done so for Series 9. It seems odd that’s the only one called out specifically. Maybe the hypothetical/presumptive reverse engineering wasn’t quite clean enough?

I haven’t gotten too far into a research, but it could turn out to be an overly broad patent. Someone was commenting that Masimo has had patents invalidated before.

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u/biggsteve81 Dec 28 '23

There is no difference, besides that Apple no longer imports the series 6-8 watches that also infringe. Apple has been banned from importing technology that infringes on a US company's patent.

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u/fuckraptors Dec 18 '23

Not even just your wrist. It’s actually the idea of using reflective light to measure anything in the blood.

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u/Practical_Cattle_933 Dec 18 '23

I mean, that also sounds pretty patent trollish — spectograph is one of the standard scientific ways to analyze what are the constituent parts of a solvent. Sure, the concrete implementation may still be hard to achieve, but I don’t think any of them were first at anything in this regard.

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u/get_it_together1 Dec 18 '23

Yeah, but going from a lab spectrometer to blood oxygenation measurements via an attached device almost certainly counts as non-obvious.

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u/Thenadamgoes Dec 18 '23

Just because you don’t think it’s a novel idea. Doesn’t mean it’s not a novel idea.

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u/abrahamisaninja Dec 18 '23

Pulse oximeters have existed for decades. They are not a novel idea.

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u/Thenadamgoes Dec 18 '23

Improvements to existing things can also be patented.

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u/abrahamisaninja Dec 18 '23

Yes but that does not make it a novel idea

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u/Thenadamgoes Dec 18 '23

…the improvement is the novel idea…

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u/turtleship_2006 Dec 18 '23

novel: of a new and unusual kind; different from anything seen or known before

If it's just an improvement and does the same thing, it's not novel

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u/Thenadamgoes Dec 18 '23

Dude. The world functions on novel improvements of existing ideas.

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u/turtleship_2006 Dec 18 '23

I'm not saying that the improvements aren't useful, I'm just saying "novel" isn't the right word

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u/One_Curious_Cats Dec 18 '23

The only "novel idea" perspective that matters here is the one of the people at the patent bureau and, later, the one of the people who will re-examine your patent in a legal case. It's ridiculous what they let people patent as novel ideas.

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the key patent in dispute here essentially one that says Masimo created the idea of strapping an O2 monitor to your wrist?

And Apple tried to patent the concept of a rectangular phone with rounded corners and used that to sue Samsung and others for patent infringement.

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u/[deleted] Dec 19 '23

otherwise people would be able to say they "created" something simply by strapping it down to another object

What do you think are 99% of Apple patents? "Existing tech but on a phone"

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u/thinkscience Dec 18 '23

I am going to start the device on the d to measure o2 , sitting for a patent now

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u/funkiestj Dec 18 '23

Masimo created the idea of strapping an O2 monitor to your wrist?

There used to be a novelty requirement for patents. As far as I can tell, this requirement is no longer enforced.

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u/deong Dec 18 '23

There still is a novelty requirement for patents, but patent lawyers are better and hiding obviousness than examiners are at exposing it. And there's no incentive to failing a patent application, but a tremendous incentive for the company to get a patent, so the game is basically "I'll spend a billion dollars to get a patent, and the person I have to convince doesn't care either way". That's a system that will get you millions of trivial patents.

0

u/ImAzura Dec 18 '23

There’s also already a ton of sport watches out there that have had this feature. Look at Garmin as an example.

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u/deong Dec 18 '23

There's an entire category of patents that are just "Do a thing we've known about since the 1700s on a computer".

The USPTO could be replaced by literal monkeys and I'm hard pressed to think of a single act that would result is as much immediate improvement to global society.

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u/deten Dec 18 '23

I don't know one way or the other, but does it matter that its specifically a way of monitoring something via your wrist and not, say, strapping a fridge to your wrist for no other reason?

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u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

[deleted]

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u/MC_chrome Dec 18 '23

Apple systematically scalped all their staff instead of just licensing the technology

I was under the impression that California doesn’t have NDA laws precisely because staff transition between companies on a regular basis. How is this any different?

1

u/One_Curious_Cats Dec 18 '23

A patent should present a "novel idea" of doing something. You may argue what this means, but it shouldn't be something that is the obvious way of solving a problem or has prior art. However, the patent bureau frequently approves patents for ideas that were solved decades ago and where you can even prove that prior art exists.

1

u/PondRides Dec 19 '23

My Fitbit already does this, why is it only a problem for apple to use it?

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u/caedin8 Dec 18 '23

Medical device companies are as bad as pharmaceutical companies, they want to lock live saving devices behind $5000 of payments from insurance companies and make it inaccessible to regular people and they literally prevent us from saving lives.

There is zero technical reasons that my Apple Watch shouldn’t be able to detect a heart attack and alert the police which might save my life, but instead Apple has to just ignore the data because of patents and medical device companies legal position. It’s fucked up

8

u/GoSh4rks Dec 18 '23

zero technical reasons that my Apple Watch shouldn’t be able to detect a heart attack

There are plenty of technical reasons. One of them is that a single lead ECG is only about 90% accurate for a single type of MI.

Results: The single‑lead ECG strategy was able to provide an accuracy of 90.5% for STEMI detection https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34801613/

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u/Kimantha_Allerdings Dec 18 '23

This is pretty much what Masimo claims - that Apple's healthcare tech/apps are basically toys which aren't accurate enough to give genuine medically useful information and so actually make people less safe because they trust them to be accurate more than they should.

How true that is and how much of this is genuinely for the benefit of people, as opposed to Masimo's pocket, I don't know. But it is a valid point, and it's only the ECG in the Watch that's got FDA approval and which Apple can thereby actually claim is medical data.

2

u/CrestronwithTechron Dec 18 '23

90% is still pretty good.

-5

u/upbeat_controller Dec 18 '23

“only”

3

u/GoSh4rks Dec 18 '23

Sorry, I should have also highlighted that the 90% was with Lead II, not Lead I that the watch measures.

In comparison with Afib:

The ability of the ECG app to accurately classify an ECG recording into AFib and sinus rhythm was tested in a clinical trial of approximately 600 subjects, and demonstrated 99.6% specificity with respect to sinus rhythm classification and 98.3% sensitivity for AFib classification for the classifiable results. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT208955

1

u/DragonSon83 Dec 19 '23

One lead is usually enough to pick up atrial fibrillation, which a lot of people ending up suffering strokes from before they realize they have it. Apple Watches have also detected people having runs of SVT, which can turn fatal if they don’t break.

3

u/Kimantha_Allerdings Dec 18 '23

I have no particular dog in this fight, but between "the world's highest-valued company in an industry well-known to steal tech from small businesses, and who release 'health' devices which (almost exclusively) haven't been tested enough and aren't accurate enough to get FDA approval" and "small company that makes medical devices with FDA approval" I'm not sure my first instinct would be "Apple just want to help people, but they're being prevented from doing so by the bad guys who are only interested in profit".

0

u/caedin8 Dec 18 '23

Bunch of incorrect bias there

20

u/[deleted] Dec 18 '23

[deleted]

-7

u/leftbitchburner Dec 18 '23

It’s the broadest patent possible, even if they’re a serious company, the absurdity of the patent still stands

9

u/Interesting_Candy766 Dec 18 '23

recommend you read a bit more about the specific claims before talking so confidently on the subject

0

u/[deleted] Dec 19 '23

Idiot. Literal idiot. Your photo should be next to the definition

5

u/lopezerg Dec 18 '23

Masimo's 2021 complaint said the 2020 Apple Watch Series 6, the first model with blood-oxygen monitoring capabilities, infringed its patents.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/1-us-trade-tribunal-issues-220143095.html?guccounter=1#:~:text=Masimo's%202021%20complaint%20said%20the,monitoring%20capabilities%2C%20infringed%20its%20patents.&text=Masimo's%20complaint%20said%20the%20infringing,Apple%20Watch%20production%20to%20Vietnam.

Apparently this is not their first time... and possibly won't be the last time either.

2

u/muffdivemcgruff Dec 18 '23

Yes, yes he is.

-12

u/NotLawrence Dec 18 '23

Anything that obstructs Apple’s god given right to build and sell products is a patent troll

-1

u/vr_driver Dec 18 '23

Apple could buy them if they really wanted. Small fish, relatively speaking...

1

u/chris415 Dec 19 '23

hell, why doesn't apple buy them? They have $6B marketcap and a good business, buy them and and license the patent to apple. That's what Elon would do :)

1

u/imaginary_num6er Dec 19 '23

They are equivalent to the Asatek pumps to the pulse oximeter industry. Their main source of revenue is patent royalties.

One of the competitors I used to work at mentioned that Masimo spends more in litigation than their entire R&D department.