Dispute over blood oxygen measurement: Apple Watch back in court in the USA
Apple has been at loggerheads with Masimo since 2021 over a possible patent infringement for the Apple Watch. An appeal has now been lodged.
Blood oxygen measurement on the Apple Watch.
(Image: Apple)
Even if no one in Europe, where the patent dispute does not exist, is aware of it, in the USA, Apple has already removed an important function from its Apple Watch since the end of 2023 – by order of the US International Trade Commission (ITC). And this is likely to remain the case for some time to come: The company Masimo, which had filed a lawsuit against Apple because it believes its patents in the area of blood oxygen measurement have been infringed, is still in the right, at least for now. But now Apple is making another attempt to overturn the import ban:
“Apple wants to rewrite the law”
This time it is an appeal that the iPhone company has filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. According to a Reuters report, Apple lawyer Joseph Mueller argued this week that the ITC's decision had “disadvantaged millions of Apple Watch users” because blood oxygen measurement, technically known as pulse oximetry, remains prohibited.
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Opponent Masimo, a medical device manufacturer and conglomerate, naturally sees things differently. Apple is simply trying to “rewrite the law” with its justification. According to Apple, the Masimo patents were “completely hypothetical” when the complaint was first filed with the ITC in 2021. Masimo also accuses Apple of industrial espionage, alleging that Apple poached employees and used their technology.
Back and forth on the ban
Apple had introduced blood oxygen measurement, which is generally considered to be rather inaccurate and above all not medical, in 2020 with the Apple Watch Series 6. Masimo itself then launched its watch with the technology two years later. In 2023, the company then succeeded in imposing an import ban on the Ultra 2 and Series 9 watches. Apple turned off the function to continue selling the devices in the USA, although it initially appeared that the ban on the function would be lifted after all. Meanwhile, however, the devices — and their successor models, such as the Series 10 — are still on the market in the USA without blood oxygen measurement.
What happens next in the case remains to be seen. The court has not yet indicated which way it is leaning. Apple argues, among other things, that the ITC decision should only have come if Masimo had a real product on the market when the complaint was filed. “But they only had prototypes,” says the company. The case is case number 24-1285 at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit.
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