- Apple fined $634 million in long-running lawsuit over Apple Watch
- This is the result of a legal dispute between Apple and Masimo.
- The medical technology company claims Apple infringes its patents.
Apple has been embroiled in a legal dispute for years over claims by medical technology company Masimo that the Apple Watch’s blood oxygen test infringes Apple patents. The lawsuit awarded Massimo a whopping $634 million in damages, which could have serious consequences for fans of the high-end Apple Watch.
The lawsuit dates back to 2020, when Massimo filed a lawsuit alleging that Apple infringed some of Massimo’s patents. The incident prompted Apple to ban blood oxygen-monitoring smartwatches in the US, a ban that is still in effect. This means that the feature will be available to Apple Watch fans around the world, but will be disabled on Apple smartwatches coming to the US.
Technically, this decision doesn’t prevent Apple from selling the Apple Watch altogether, and Apple can continue to charge the device as long as it has the blood oxygen feature. This prompted Apple to propose a solution in which the blood oxygen monitoring technology would remain in the Apple Watch but would be disabled in the software for US customers.
Thanks to Apple’s innovative workaround, there’s a way to monitor your blood oxygen levels on your Apple Watch, but you’ll need the help of your iPhone to do so. This means that it’s a far cry from the simplistic approach that Apple has pushed and the way the company clearly wants to run things.
However, all this was before the recent court decision. Now a jury has found that Apple violated Massimo’s intellectual property rights, and the $643 million damages would be one of the largest fines in a consumer technology case in the history of the U.S. District Court system in the Central District of California.
What will happen next?
The decision has been taken, but the matter is not closed yet. Apple said it did not agree with the decision and announced its intention to appeal. from statement apple insiderApple says:
“We do not agree with today’s decision and believe it is contrary to the facts. Massimo is a medical device company and does not sell products to consumers. Over the past six years, they have sued Apple in multiple courts and defended more than 25 patents, most of which were found invalid. The sole patent in this case expires in 2022, and it covers historic patient monitoring technology created decades ago. We plan to appeal.”
However, there is no major change at the moment. Apple Watch customers in the US will still not be able to use the blood oxygen feature of the Apple Watch, but it will have no impact on users in other regions.
It appears that neither Apple nor Massimo will back down until the appeal is filed and a decision is made, and it will likely continue that way.
