Apple has once again triumphed in a high-stakes patent battle, securing a crucial win against AliveCor in a fight that could have led to an import ban on the Apple Watch. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit today upheld the invalidation of AliveCor’s patents, closing a chapter in a years-long legal saga that has pitted the Cupertino giant against a smaller medical tech company claiming Apple unfairly leveraged its innovations.

Federal Court Sides with Apple, Invalidating AliveCor’s ECG Patents

The dispute dates back to 2020, when AliveCor accused Apple of infringing its patents related to ECG technology, which was integrated into the Apple Watch starting with the Series 4. AliveCor, best known for its KardiaBand accessory that brought FDA-cleared electrocardiogram capabilities to the Apple Watch before Apple introduced its own version, claimed the tech giant copied its innovations while simultaneously blocking third-party developers like AliveCor from operating freely on its platform. The company sought an import ban at the U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC), which initially ruled in AliveCor’s favor, determining that Apple had indeed infringed its patents.

But Apple wasn’t going down without a fight. The company took the matter to the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s Patent Trial and Appeal Board (PTAB), which ultimately ruled in Apple’s favor, stating that AliveCor’s patents were unpatentable due to prior art. That decision weakened AliveCor’s case, and today’s ruling from the Federal Circuit cements the outcome: AliveCor’s patents won’t stand, and there will be no Apple Watch import ban.

AliveCor, unsurprisingly, isn’t happy. The company expressed disappointment over the decision, stating that it threatens smaller innovators by allowing corporate giants to dominate the industry unchecked. But for Apple, this is yet another victory in its battle to maintain the Apple Watch’s position as the go-to wearable for health tracking. Meanwhile, a separate Apple Watch import ban over Masimo’s blood oxygen technology remains in effect—at least for now.

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Earlier this week, a federal judge in the US said that Apple is facing a claim that states that it is illegally holding a monopoly over its heart rate monitoring apps on its Apple Watch in the United States market.

According to a Reuters report, US District Judge Jeffrey White stated that AliveCor Inc has claimed that it can prove that the Cupertino based giant has violated federal antitrust law. As per the claim, the iPhone maker allegedly has “complete control” on the market over similar apps. For those unaware, AliveCor Inc is behind the SmartRythm app that alerts the users to irregular heartbeats.

The judge added that “AliveCor alleges that Apple made changes to the heart rate algorithm that made it effectively impossible for third parties to inform a user when to take an ECG. Plaintiff’s allegations plausibly establish that Apple’s conduct was anticompetitive.” At the same time, Judge White also dismissed a separate claim for AliveCor, which claimed that Apple maintained an illegal monopoly over its ECG enabled smartwatches. Unfortunately, Apple has yet to provide any comments regarding this matter. Although, this isn’t the first time AliveCor has filed a complaint against the brand.

Back in 2020, the company had accused Apple for infringing on its patents based on its ECG features. In 2021, it also claimed that AliveCor was accused of changing the heart rate algorithm, which gave its proprietary system an “unfair competitive edge” over its competitors or possibly even putting “countless AliveCor users’ lives in danger” since they rely on their systems to offer them alerts. However, the American brand had countered this claim by saying that it was an “uncontroversial proposition that product improvement by itself” and did not violate the federal Sherman antitrust law.

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A Medical device and an AI company Alivecor has filed a lawsuit against Apple. The company claims that Apple has infringed three of its patents and gained an advantage on its ECG feature on the Apple Watch.

As reported by AppleInsider, Apple has reportedly infringed Alivecor’s following patents. You can take a look at the patent numbers and its designation below:

• 10,595,731- Methods and systems for arrhythmia tracking and scoring(state of the art diagnosis).
• 10,638,941- Discordance monitoring(limitations in techniques and equipment).
• 9,572,499- Methods and systems for arrhythmia tracking and scoring(inventors’ improvement in techniques and equipment).

Alivecor has filed the complaint in a District Court in Western District of Texas, U.S.A. Accordingly, Apple’s ECG feature on Apple Watch 4, (specifically) Apple Watch 5, and above infringes the above patents. It basically deals with how to use wearable sensors to improve cardiac monitoring using specific methods.

What is interesting here is the Alivecor’s claims of Apple being aware of the above infringement. As per the statement, the company says that the Cupertino giant is doing this purposefully. If you recall, Apple introduced the ECG feature with Apple Watch Series 4.

The ECG app uses a heart rate sensor to detect the electrodes built into the Digital Crown and a new electrical heart rate sensor in the back crystal. Thus, it can tell if a heartbeat is normal or is experiencing any Atrial Fibrillation (AFib). The Apple Watch Series 5, had the same feature but with an improved Always-on Display made possible by LTPO technology.

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Lawsuit

Coming back, the lawsuit says that Apple’s watches which detects irregular heartbeat(Cardiac Arrhythmia) is using the data the same way to diagnose the condition. For the unware, Alivecor is a well-known company that sells ECG hardware& software for mobile & wearables. And it is the first to get US FDA approval to be used as a medical-device accessory to Apple Watch.

The company, however, stopped selling the ECG-enabled Kardiaband after Apple introduced the feature for itself on Watch 4. Now, in the lawsuit, it says it needs compensation. Precisely, as per the prayer of the relief section on the lawsuit, it asks for enjoinment(prohibit from infringement).

Additionally, it is also asking for damages, attorney fees, and other equitable reliefs. Let’s wait and see how this pans out in the future.

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