Apple to halt Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 sales in the US this week
9to5mac.com
9to5mac.com
Worth to note that is not just some obscure small company coming out of nowhere to capitalize from Apple. Masimo is a decades-old medical equipment company, with several developments and patents for non-invasive PPG. Apple is obviously well-aware of their developments, and was in touch with them already in 2013, more than a year before the launch of the Apple Watch.
From the actual lawsuit filed by Masimo in 2020 [1]:
"In 2013, Apple contacted Masimo and asked to meet regarding a potential collaboration. Apple told Masimo that Apple would like to understand more about Masimo’s technology to potentially integrate that technology into Apple’s products. Apple and Masimo later entered into a confidentiality agreement, and Masimo’s management met with Apple. The meetings included confidential discussions of Masimo’s technology. After what seemed to Masimo to have been productive meetings, Apple quickly began trying to hire Masimo employees, including engineers and key management."
[1] https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/byvrlojrdve/...
My friend got poached, and that lab has none of their brains left to drain. They no longer supply Apple.
The aftermath is this lawsuit, which illustrates that Apple needed their hires to build something that was already existing in Masimo and would have been subject of that partnership.
I'm sure this "brainrape" strategy often works flawlessly, especially on smaller companies. But in this case the tech was already patented.
Its highly amoral. That may be fine (but clearly law may say otherwise), many companies do it. But then some folks not only here on HN preach Apple like second coming of Jesus also for its supposed 'high morality' and 'taking care of privacy'.
Nah, just another huge amoral corporation, this time with great marketing. As long as we can cca agree on that all is fine. Till then, I'll keep pointing to tens of cases like this to naive folks or paid PR posts worshiping them (the idea that there are none on such influential place like HN is... unwarranted)
I don't mean the people shouldn't chose to be compensated well but if you are up against practically infinite funds there is no realistic option for a counter offer.
a plurality of emitters configured to emit light, each of the emitters comprising at least two light emitting diodes (LEDs);
four photodiodes arranged within 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 protrusion comprising a convex surface including separate openings extending through the protrusion and lined with opaque material, each opening positioned over a different one associated with each of the four photodiodes, the opaque material configured to reduce an amount of light reaching the photodiodes without being attenuated by the tissue;
optically transparent material within each of the openings; and
one or more processors configured to receive one or more signals from at least one of the four photodiodes and output measurements responsive to the one or more signals, the measurements indicative of the oxygen saturation of the user.
I would like to assume good faith on behalf of the plaintiffs, but this seems like patent trolling by an otherwise legitimate company.
The design patent is very specific. It isn't about rounded corners in general.
Patent (incl. prior art): http://assets.sbnation.com/assets/1701443/USD670286S1.pdf
How to think about it: https://www.theverge.com/2012/11/7/3614506/apple-patents-rec...
Whether you think it is a valid design patent or not is a different question. There is no doubt that the outline of the iPhone was iconic, and Apple was trying to protect that, and Samsung was trying to ape it.
This kind of subtle differences matter quite a bit from a UI perspective. You could have a punch to zoom system where a pinching motion always resulted in fixed changes to zoom levels. You could describe both implementations as “pint to zoom” but one is a lot more user friendly than the other.
In any case, the rotation thing is also just pretty rudimentary trigonometry/linear algebra.
Masimo is not a small company coming out of nowhere to capitalize from Apple, they're a decades-old medical equipment company. The case outlines how Apple met with them in 2013 to discuss collaboration. After that meeting, Apple apparently hired away several key-members of Masimo with knowledge about their non-invasive biometric monitoring tech, including their "Chief Medical Officer and EVP for Medical Affairs", who already joined Apple in that same year...
The case claims violation of various patents for non-invasive blood data-collection via LEDs of specific wavelengths and photo-diodes in a specific geometry, patents to reduce power consumption of pulse oximeters as well as patents to detect when a pulse oximeter probe is misaligned on a patient.
But most of all, they can demonstrate in the evolution of the Apple Watch how Apple launched their initial generation without such optimizations but found them to be necessary later-on, so it seems Masimo's patents are not that obvious.
[1] https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/zdvxdyorxvx/...
"You launch a product that doesn't work and then you fix it later" is a common strategy but it really shouldn't be.
Secondly, just because it's obvious, doesn't mean it doesn't take some time to figure it out. You can leapfrog by bringing in people who already know.
NTP had it's patents invalidated shortly after RIM settled for most of a $B, but it didn't matter since BB couldn't afford to have their email servers turned off. Apple probably can afford this. I'm not sure if the patents are in reexam or not, but I'd expect them to be.
https://www.computerworld.com/article/2562540/update--rim-se...
https://patents.google.com/patent/US10912502B2/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US10945648B2/en
They look identical to me btw? both files on 2020-02 and have title of "User-worn device for noninvasively measuring a physiological parameter of a user". From summary:
> light source comprises LEDs and super-luminescent LEDs. The light source emits light at at least wavelengths of about 1610 nm, about 1640 nm, and about 1665 nm. In an embodiment, the detector comprises a plurality of photodetectors arranged in a special geometry comprising...
there are 30 claims and some parts of them seem to definitely be a prior art ("a storage device configured to at least temporarily store at least the measurement").. I wonder what's the real innovation is there?
The standard is to consider ALL of the elements together in the specific configuration. If this were not the case, then any invention that incorporated any conventional element (e.g., a lever) would be invalid.
But also, judges and courts and all of this stuff exists because at the end of the day human beings look at the facts on the ground. There isn't some sort of magical turing machine that decides on exactitude here.
[1] https://cafc.uscourts.gov/opinions-orders/22-1631.OPINION.9-...
"The light source emits light at least wavelengths of about 1610 nm, about 1640 nm, and about 1665 nm."
vs
"The light source emits light at at least wavelengths of about 1610 nm, about 1640 nm, and about 1665 nm."
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Do you have examples where apple has aggressively used patents offensively like this?
> March 2010 Apple vs HTC:
Apple's suit alleged 20 separate patent infringements relating to the iPhone's user interface, underlying architecture and hardware. Steve Jobs exclaimed "We can sit by and watch competitors steal our patented inventions, or we can do something about it" The ITC rejected all but one of Apple's claims
> July 2008 Apple Inc. vs Psystar Corporation
Apple Inc. filed suit against Psystar Corporation alleging Psystar sold Intel-based systems with Mac OS X pre-installed and that, in so doing, violated Apple's copyright and trademark rights and the software licensing terms of Apple's shrink wrap license.
>2019, Apple v. Corellium
Apple sued security start-up Corellium for creating the first virtual iPhone-simulating software. The product was created with the intent of helping users research security issues in iOS. Apple's lawsuit argued that Corellium's product would be dangerous in the wrong hands as it would let hackers learn exploits easier, as well as claiming that Corellium was selling their product indiscriminately, even to potential competitors of Apple.
> Apple v. Samsung: Android phones and tablets
By August 2011, Apple and Samsung were engaged in 19 ongoing lawsuits in 12 courts in nine countries on four continents; by October, the fight expanded to 10 countries.
This doesn’t seem at all like a relevant example. Psystar was engaging in for profit piracy patents are secondary here
So you proved the point that since Jobs tome, they have not use their patents offensively.
> "I'm going to destroy Android, because it's a stolen product. I'm willing to go thermonuclear war on this"
And they did (try), although by proxy through Samsung.
filing patents for something you didn't invent is not the law working as intended.
Optical pulse oximeters are an obvious incremental thing, and with zero knowledge of the space I don’t think it’s crazy to believe these would have come into existence on the same time frame with or without the existence of patents.
Virtually everything humans create or “discover” is an inevitability. We’re all just memetic LLMs, remixing stuff with mildly differing levels of variance. Originality is quaint pre-industrial human myth.
That said, Apple would have absolutely done the same thing if they had the patent. So I have zero sympathy for either party.
Don’t hate the player, hate the “artificially granted ownership over progress” game.
While I don't think we should give courts and government-like agencies no scrutiny, I think I'm probably going to put greater weight on the ITC's decision than a random person on the internet who admits they have zero knowledge of the technology in question.
Even though it's inevitable that someone will invest a lot of time to get us better TFT displays in form of IPS, it's very much favorable that he can reap some reward for it.
It's a bit of a gamble and is therefore supplanted by the trade secret and research grant systems, still it's a useful incentive to do cool stuff.
Einstein upended every other human beings notion of space and time. Copernicus also proposed something preposterous for his time. Would you say they just remixed stuff with mild variance?
Except there doesn’t seem to be particularly innovative about those patents. Masimo just excepts to be rewarded for filling them..
Right, using US companies such as Samsung, TSMC, Sony, MediaTek...
That is a bizarre take.
When Apple is wrong, fixing the problem yourself isn't always an option. Reactions like this shouldn't surprise you if you've seen what HN has to say about Meta, Microsoft and Google.
Current patents attempt to claim: this thing I figured out is novel and nobody else should copy me.
Many times, they claim this so someone else can't claim it and thus avoid arbitration.
It would be nice if we could also file: this thing I figured out is not novel and is a natural progression to the current state-of-the-art.
I guess the only means of doing this currently is to attempt to invalidate a patent? Or maybe, a whole swath of patents?
There is nothing truly-novel here (IMHO.) This is like a toothbrush patent with a slightly different number of bristles than every other toothbrush patent in order to sell a toothbrush legally.
isn't this just publishing? no formal procedure required, no government, no patent office, no filing fees, put your a record of your work somewhere that people can find it and then it can be used as prior art in a dispute.
Yes publishing work will allow you to bring it up as a defendant. But by the time you’re called to a law office in west Texas you’re already out millions in legal fees and still run the risk of getting a judgement against you.
What I think they were asking for is something more formal.
See case study of a notable IP monopoly, Watt's steam engine: https://fee.org/media/5345/122008freeman-boldrin.pdf
"Joe Kiani, the chief executive of Masimo, said in an interview that Apple had not engaged in licensing negotiations. Instead, he said that Apple had appealed to President Biden to veto the I.T.C. ruling, which Mr. Kiani knows because the administration contacted Masimo about Apple’s request."
“If they don’t want to use our chip, I’ll work with them to make their product good,” Mr. Kiani said. “Once it’s good enough, I’m happy to give them a license.”
Super interesting case, thought Apple would be less sloppy than this.
I suppose you could argue that it's Apple violating the patent here, hardly a party to feel empathy for. But they just had the gumption to put skin in this game. We could have tons of competing devices that do this in their own wear-able products with distinct user experiences for each, but somebody beat them all to the patent house so why bother.
is that the patent that was violated??
Crazy.
LG could ignore trolls and morons - but if Samsung makes a good-faith, fair offer to license the technology, they should have to have a good reason for saying no beyond "we don't feel like it."
One company, Cobasys (owned by an oil company!) purposefully refused to license NiMH technology in transportation. The patent system was never intended to be used like a weapon to protect a market.
> To avoid a complete ban on sales, Apple had two months to cut a deal with Masimo to license its technology, or it could appeal to the Biden administration to reverse the ruling. But Joe Kiani, the chief executive of Masimo, said in an interview that Apple had not engaged in licensing negotiations
Doesn’t this quite plainly mean that they aren’t willing to just license the patent?
You can argue that it is somewhat moot here, as Apple was not showing any willingness to negotiate. But the post above is somewhat accurate, in that there is no guarantee that negotiations will end in a license.
Samsung makes most of the displays Apple uses in iPhones and it's probably the most profitable deal Samsung has. They have a messy relationship but neither of them is going to rock the boat too much because no one else can meet Apple's demand and Samsung can't afford to lose that much revenue.
From a user perspective, disabling a widely advertised/used feature after a user has bought something is probably worse than having new customers think it’s out of stock.
Will that still happen if you put in a single order to buy 51% of all the shares at a price a little above the current market value ?
That trade will be complete before the market "sees" you are trying to buy a ton.
That's not how the market works. There are not enough open sell orders at any price (let alone a little above most recent price) for someone to sweep in and buy 51% (or even just a few percent) at once.
As soon as more than a trivial (in the noise) amount of your buys goes through all the open sell orders will start to move up in price (since it's nearly all automated), so you'll be chasing that ever-increasing price a long way up.
For small-time consumers who are buying a few shares here and there - it will appear like there is always some available, but when you are talking about a majority share of the company there isn't that availability sitting there waiting to be just taken.
Also companies have an obligation to report once they have accumulated a certain percentage of a company.
Source: https://warren.law/blog/protecting-minority-shareholder-righ...
Apple could borrow a large amount of shares of Masimo and short the company.
They have enough cash for that, and the borrow fee might be less than the settlement costs, plus they could profit from the operation.
https://www.investor.gov/introduction-investing/investing-ba...
So if the ownership of the company (Apple Computer, in this case) takes a deliberate act that fails to honor the shareholder compact (taking a huge haircut on a patent license), then you sue them because they should have gotten you more.
> The Constitution establishes the President’s authority to grant clemency, encompassing not only pardons of individuals but several other forms of relief from criminal punishment as well.1 The power, which has historical roots in early English law,2 has been recognized by the Supreme Court as quite broad. In the 1886 case Ex parte Garland, the Court referred to the President’s authority to pardon as unlimited except in cases of impeachment, extending to every offence known to the law and able to be exercised either before legal proceedings are taken, or during their pendency, or after conviction and judgment.3 Much later, the Court wrote that the broad power conferred in the Constitution gives the President plenary authority to 'forgive’ [a] convicted person in part or entirely, to reduce a penalty in terms of a specified number of years, or to alter it with certain conditions.4
Despite the breadth of the President’s authority under the Pardon Clause, the Constitution’s text provides for at least two limits on the power: first, clemency may only be granted for Offenses against the United States,5 meaning that state criminal offenses and federal or state civil claims are not covered.6 Second, the President’s clemency authority cannot be used in Cases of impeachment.7
Beyond textual limits, certain external constitutional and legal considerations may act as constraints on the power. For instance, the Court has indicated that the power may be exercised at any time after [an offense’s] commission,8 reflecting that the President may not preemptively immunize future criminal conduct. In Schick v. Reed, the Court recognized that an exercise of clemency may include any condition which does not otherwise offend the Constitution,9 suggesting that the President may not make clemency subject to a condition that is prohibited by another constitutional provision.10 Other apparent limitations include not affecting vested rights of third parties, such as where forfeited property is sold,11 or proceeds paid into the treasury, which can only be secured to the former owner . . . through an act of [C]ongress.12 The Court in The Laura also alluded to an exception for fines . . . imposed by a co-ordinate department of the government for contempt of its authority,13 though a later case recognized that the President may pardon one who is subject to criminal punishment for contempt of court.14
Assuming the recognized limitations are not transgressed, a full pardon granted by the President and accepted by its subject15 prevents or removes any of the penalties and disabilities consequent upon conviction . . . .16 In several nineteenth-century cases, the Supreme Court suggested that a pardon broadly obviates all legal guilt of the offender, effectively erasing the crime from existence.17 Subsequent cases appear to have backed away from this understanding,18 suggesting instead that, although a full pardon precludes punishment for the offense in question, a prior and pardoned offense may still be considered in subsequent proceedings.19
https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artII-S2-C1-3...
Do bear in mind that I am not an attorney and this is my personal opinion.
I wonder if Apple has been importing like crazy, and selling to big retailers like Amazon and Walmart. That way customers can continue to purchase (albeit not from Apple) for the next several months. Then Apple can perhaps release a new version in May, using different technology that either doesn't infringe, or at least would require a new trial to establish infringement.
If this is the case, I think Apple could even continue to have AW showcases in their stores, where people could try them on, see how the features work, and see which size fits best. After all, this wouldn't violate the ban on importation (assuming the store models were already in the US), nor would it violate the ban on first-party sales (since Apple wouldn't be selling the store models).
It would be cool to build up an intellectual portfolio of stuff that you've thought of uniquely apart from everyone else. To me this would be like (1) a unique challenge of designing novel processes, systems, concepts (2) the reward of having a new IP which would be useful for your portfolio (and may lead to future business opportunities) (3) incentivising people to think more since intellectual work could be 'owned' and the result monetized (either directly or indirectly.)
But IMO - it would have to be cheap so that ideas could easily be registered; efficient - so that authorship could be managed fast (or revoked if 'prior art' is found); and those falsely claiming authorship could be pursed without the patent owners having to act as police for their IP. Ideally, registration fees would cover attorney costs, patent research, and policing the patents (am I being naïve.) Maybe a revenue sharing agreement between patent-owners back into the system could even make patent registrations free which would be massive? Governments could also help back this if it made more jobs (which seems possible to me.)
https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2023-10-05...
Apple did precisely the sorts of things that big companies are reviled for, and the only good outcome is that this costs them an enormous sum of money, and every scumbag manager involved in this behaviour lose their jobs.
> In its initial filing with the ITC, Masimo accused Apple of 103 instances of patent infringement across five different patents. However, the ITC found that Apple infringed on only two patents, covering five different instances of patent infringements
This is a borderline case and a final decision has not been made. Patent decisions are often in a gray area.
The article you link to is extremely opinionated and it's just as easy to argue the opposite. I.e. Masimo complains that Apple poached some of their employees by paying them more. Well, why wouldn't Masimo pay them what they're worth? Companies try to hire experts away from other companies all the time, and this is good because it pushes up salaries for those experts and fairly rewards them for their expertise.
Masimo isn't some mom-and-pop shop. They have revenue of $1.24 billion. They know what they're doing.
That's like every ITC complaint in the history of ITC complaints. You throw everything at them and your best stuff sticks. They literally need one single complaint to stick, and they have 5. That is incredibly, overwhelmingly strong.
>Companies try to hire experts away from other companies all the time
Apple didn't just hire employees away from them. There would be nothing wrong with that (well, outside of the era of non-competes, which notably Apple was a big fan of and was a legal enforcer of, making that a humorous justification). Apple engaged in a classic "brain rape" to extract value without cost.
I'm a fan of Apple, but it is an extraordinarily greedy company. Maybe the greediest company in history. That is not a good trait, and it isn't beneficial to the industry as a whole.
Hyperbolic, sexualized language isn't helpful here.
Why didn't Masimo counter Apple's offers and pay their employees what they are worth? I don't see how this isn't Masimo's fault when they certainly had the money to do it.
I know lots of cases where rival companies tried to hire engineers with highly domain-specific expertise away from rivals and failed, because those rivals would counter offers and provided a great, supportive work environment. If Masimo failed to do that, then that's their own fault.
I side with the employees here. Good on them for knowing their worth.
This is not something Masimo invented themselves. The class of devices existed for decades before Masimo even existed. I'm not saying that Apple's in the right here -- I have no inside information giving me more perspective than anyone else reading this -- but it's far from clear that they did anything wrong.
..., headhunted Masimo engineers, and hired them to reimplement a pulse-ox device.
> Masimo and Apple began their relationship in 2013, when Apple discussed potentially integrating Masimo’s sensing technology into future Apple products. Internally, Apple executives debated the idea of buying Masimo and making its chief executive a vice president, according to documents made public at a later trial. But Apple ultimately decided against it because “acquisitions of this size aren’t our style,” an email reads.
> Instead of buying Masimo, Apple ended up hiring Masimo engineers and began working on the technology itself, Masimo later said.
https://www.wsj.com/tech/apple-to-halt-watch-sales-as-it-pre...
But I think it is something poetic about a company that sues and wins over Samsung for a "design patent" and uses the fact that Samsungs lawyers cannot see the difference as proof...
when that company gets hit by a ridiculous "intellectual property" lawsuit.
Said as an Apple user who has brought in a number of new Apple users, meaning I am not against Apple only against ridiculous "intellectual property" laws.
We've had easy fingertip pulse oximetry since 1977, and Masimo was founded in 1989. It's unclear to me what in their patent is novel.
Once again, this isn’t Apple stealing tech from Joe Shmoe. This is just standard legalistic BigCorp infighting, corporate backstabbing, brain drain/theft, etc.
Side note - I love the infant sp02 tape monitors they have, as they work incredibly well for use on adults with poor extremity perfusion. Earlobe usually works great.
Conversely, if Apple feels comfortable stealing from BigCorp, they will absolutely feel comfortable stealing from Joe Shmoe, which is why this issue should be treated seriously.
Apple needs to be incentivized so that if they're sitting down with a startup and considering if they should acquire and make the founder a VP or just go about stealing the technology that they should pick the former path because they've gotten burned in the past by doing the latter.
It isn't clear to me if Apple's internal team working on this was the original plan - think "embrace, extend, extinguish", or "we'll do the basics, everything else is a 'third-party opportunity'" - or if they were formed as a backstop in the event an acquisition or licensing deal didn't happen.
See also the current situation with AliveCor over ECG tech in the Apple Watch.
Bottom line, Masimo wants to be paid - which I get - but I think the case will also try to settle whether or not Apple (or anyone) can integrate these features in something that (legally speaking) isn't a medical device without paying licensing fees of some kind.
Sure, they acted scummy, but this is just typical BigCorp behavior where one huge corporation steals from another huge corporation.
> Apple, of course, is one of the largest and most powerful companies in history — it’s the first to hit a $3-trillion — that’s trillion, with a T — market cap.
Apple is at least 100 times bigger than Masimo, 500x based on the numbers in the article. Sounds David and Goliath to me.
Add in the despicable behavior and you've got a story where real life is more than fiction could do.
I don’t want to say Market Cap doesn’t matter, but man is it irrelevant to most discussions and mainly of use to PR agents that want to spin a David and Goliath story.
Apple is over 500x bigger than Masimo. 6B vs 3000B+
The amount I rounded down on Apple's market cap (32B) is over 5x bigger itself.
They're not even in the same ballpark to be just "two huge corporations"
If this were so trivial, Apple may not have needed to hire so many people that worked on the patented technology
I went from a series 0 (OG watch), to this series 9 it’s a pretty nice upgrade!
Personally I expect a Siri overhaul / replacement with an LLM. To me that would be a total game changer and I’d be first in line!
Will others be willing to pay more next month when that lock is in effect?
https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/apple-accused-of-rip...
I'm sure patents have a place in the modern world, but I rarely see a case where they are being used as intended - more often than not, it's as I said above : a measure of who from a bunch of peers who "invented" the same thing at the same time made their submission to a patent office first with the goal of squelching competition or building revenue streams via licensing. Basically, scummy practices abusing the system. Apple certainly is not innocent in this regard - I hate it when they play this game just as much as I hate it when others do too.
"The ITC's ruling upholds a January ruling that found that the Apple Watch infringed on a Masimo patent. The exclusion period recommended on Thursday is supposed to go into effect after 60 days, during which time President Joe Biden can overturn the ruling. Biden previously declined to veto an ITC ruling that found the Apple Watch violated patents of a different company, AliveCor."
"Masimo has accused Apple of entering discussions with it for a potential partnership, including a potential acquisition, in 2013, only to steal Masimo's idea and poach some of Masimo's engineers to implement it."
"As noted by Reuters, Apple and Masimo's legal battles are ongoing. In May, Masimo's lawsuit against Apple in California federal court ended in a mistrial, and Apple has also sued Masimo in Delaware. Flipping the script, Apple has accused [PDF] Masimo's W1 smartwatches of violating Apple Watch patents."
"Meanwhile, Apple is also in an Apple Watch patent battle with California-based AliveCor. AliveCor is currently appealing the revocation of three patents that it claims the Apple Watch infringes upon. Before then, the ITC ruled that the Apple Watch infringes [PDF] on electrocardiogram sensor-related patents. But there's no import ban in effect because the US Patent and Trademark Office revoked the patents in question. Like Masimo, AliveCor has accused Apple of initiating a potential partnership but ultimately poaching AliveCor workers and infringing on its patents instead."
Looks like the patent lawyers are going to do well...
https://9to5mac.com/2023/12/18/apple-halting-apple-watch-ser...
> In a statement to 9to5Mac, Apple has announced that it will soon halt sales of its flagship Apple Watch models in the United States.
> The Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 will no longer be available to purchase from Apple starting later this week.
And https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/18/tech/apple-halt-sales-apple-w... cleverly paired the story with a file photo of people lining up outside an Apple Store.
> The company confirmed to CNN it will no longer be selling its Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2, starting Thursday on Apple.com and from retail locations after December 24.
Get more people captive shoppers in their brick&morder stores during the shopping frenzy.
> In October, the International Trade Commission ruled that Apple was in violation of Masimo’s pulse oximeter patent, which uses light-based technology to read blood-oxygen levels. President Biden has 60 days to review the ruling before a ban could go into effect.
> “While the review period will not end until December 25, Apple is preemptively taking steps to comply should the ruling stand,” the company said in a statement.
It's nice for review of the ruling to drag its feet until after the Christmas shopping period.
With the news hype, Apple might even come out ahead?
“Oh it’s a shame we have to shut sales off. But don’t worry, it’ll still be available until we can’t guarantee before-Christmas shipping.”
They’ll have a solution worked out by the beginning of Jan.
I mean obviously for now it makes more sense for them to wait and hope they win on appeal or get the import ban veto'd, but if it actually comes down to not being able to sell the device, surely the lost revenue would exceed the licensing cost?
Assuming a spherical cow, and that Apple's decision-makers aren't completely incapable of basic math, the logical conclusion would be...?
(Spoiler: I assume the patent-holder is asking some outrageous sum. Or there's a piece of the story we're missing. Or maybe some kind of game of chicken.)
Indeed, Apple has a reputation for going scorched earth on patent trolls and trying to invalidate your entire patent portfolio after you poke the bear (Masimo has already had several of their patents invalidated in the course of their litigation with Apple).
Do you have data on this? I think it's a pretty big deal.
> “If they don’t want to use our chip, I’ll work with them to make their product good,” Mr. Kiani said. “Once it’s good enough, I’m happy to give them a license.”
2) Because they're appealing the ruling, and
3) They're hoping POTUS might drag their ass out of the fire like Obama did in 2013.
TL;DR: the blood oxygen sensor is patent encumbered somehow.
Though it feels like an oversight to me. In this field, like in telecom modems, patents mean a lot, so I also wonder why didn't Apple seek to buy out the consumer part of Masimo along with their patent portfolio. Maybe they did the math and saw that fighting Masimo later in court over their patents is still cheaper.
- loss of sales of watches
- either battling in court for who knows how long or settling out of court for god knows how much money.
The real move would have been to just.. Grow a team internally. I mean come on, ox sensors? They couldn't have figured that out without poaching a well established med-tech company?
Yes and they would still be protected by those silly patents no matter who Apple hired
Why wouldn't they want to enter the the gym space at the least?
We're still waiting for Peloton to be profitable. Since Apple's fitness customers already have Apple hardware, they might as well sell you their own version of the service Peloton provides without occurring the expense of producing Peloton-equivalent hardware.
would have been better to see a criminal like jobs behind bars. Sadly they never found the courage
Hope cook goes
PS: Was all set with an app design for the Samsung devices a few years ago, but Tizen turned out to be not worthy of any mindshare and I don’t support Google’s surveillance capitalism business model (so no WearOS for me). Meanwhile, Apple doesn’t have a well known procedure for vetting app developers enough to trust some with full access to their crypto-locked devices. With no other similar platforms, there is no real opportunity to advance mankind in this regard at this time anyway…but dang, love those Activity reminders /not
It’s supposed to protect first movers, not randos who show up 10 years later and demand cash.
Not that I use the feature all that often, but if I did, I guess it would be time to turn off automatic updates until it gets sorted.
TFA is extremely light on details, given that Apple is effectively ordering a stop-ship on their hardware. Was there an attempt at negotiation? If so, that failed because...? If not, why didn't that happen? Apple has a bit of cash, but their pockets aren't infinitely deep; was Masimo asking too much?
Interesting take
Furthermore, is there any way to do anything without infringing on any patent ?
The patent system is really outdated, it's good for lazy people who want to live off royalties, but for end-customers and innovation, this is really bad.
(and it does a bad job at preventing foreign companies to launch clones)
Assuming those two statements to be true, what's your point?
EDIT: and I see parent pulled a ninja edit. Stay classy.
However, seeing this happen to Apple is a bit of schadenfreude, this is the company that filed lawsuits for smartphones having rounded corners.
EDIT: And to be clear, this isn’t a case of just having to pay the people who developed the tech for a license. The patent trolls who hold the license aren’t willing to sell Apple a license, unless Apple switches to use their hardware or partner with them to work on Apple’s hardware. There is no excuse. Markets can’t work when governments grant arbitrary legal monopolies on ideas like this.
I'm also usually strongly against patents, especially for software, but I think your characterization is completely off base here.
The company produces and sells watches with the technology. It's not a patent troll.
Technology that’s been around since the 30’s and has been put in many other devices including other fitness devices. Putting something in watch form is hardly innovation.
This IS NOT A PATENT TROLL. Please don't water down our language by lumping all patent licensors in with patent trolls. The phrase was created with a purpose in mind and you're harming that with your use.
But intellectual property goes way too far.
> I like trademarks which disallow other companies than Apple from selling products called “Apple Watch” or other companies than Samsung from selling “Samsung Galaxy S” series phones.
Why? It only serves companies to help them become larger companies. If you think it helps customers understand what they're buying, consider: customers are basically oblivious to what they are buying when it comes to technology. If that's actually the problem you want to solve, the solutiom to that is "technology nutrition facts" and spec sheets by law, not trademark.
> And I like that if I make a piece of music or some art or whatever, some giant company can’t just grab that and use it for profit without making some arrangement with me.
What're you going to do about it if they do? Sue Disney? Doesn't seem like you'll get a lot out of that.
Bonus points for additionally eliminating propriety software at the same time.
You’re describing intellectual property..
Literally a few days ago everyone here was telling us how important it is for beeper to stop working because they’re copying Apple.
When is copying and modifications okay and when is it not?
the company is being particular about how they want to get paid, maybe thats the anticompetitive practice that the government shouldnt be granting an exemption for
there are examples of the government mediating sells such as during bank failures
You can’t invent anything or push something to market without stepping on at least 1 or more vague patents.
Doesn't sound like they accidentally stepped on a vague patent to me.
What is this? Are they some form of slaves? If company doesn't want its employees "poached" they should pay them enough money so they don't think of "switching sides".
This notion that corporations can own people and their brains should stop.
(I don't think patents need to be entirely eliminated, but they need drastic reform. The patent system should be an incentive to small inventors, not a pay-to-play shield for big corporations. Obviously eliminating software/algorithm patents, eliminating "thing but with a computer" patents, shortening the entitlement period, mandating FRAND with full transparency around licensing fees, possibly even capping lifetime license fee revenue at $100m or so.)
Perhaps a page with business logic is needed. What you expect from the patent, what a license will cost, what roi they expect per unit sold. If the intend is to either exploit the patent themselves, have others do it or some combination of the two. (rule out patents intended to hinder development) A description of the effort and expertise it took to develop the application.
Perhaps one should submit a product for review and have the patent office list relevant patents along with the bill and/or contract. Like a modular system with a single check out. Add a 10-20% fee in case the patent office makes a mistake so that patent holders can still be paid. That would make sure the patent office would make an effort towards realistic fees.
Just some dumb ideas I came up with just now, I'm sure others have much better ideas for improvements.
Sure, but Apple has made an entire business out of making lowball offers to companies that produce tech they want. Then offering to pay more if they can just get more data on the tech, before ultimately pulling out of negotiations entirely and just copying that tech whether through internal resources, or hiring resources from the company in question.
They've decided it's cheaper to steal and then fight in court than to pay a fair market rate. Honestly given this has happened at least 10 times that I can recall off the top of my head, the Justice Department should be dropping a 50lbs sledgehammer of justice on them. At this point it's intentional and not just illegal but morally reprehensible.
Correct way would be to force Apple to split into separate independent entities. This should apply to all other businesses too big to fail.
Would you be willing to invest your own savings into tech-centric startups if they wouldn't be able to legally defend the tech they invented?
Capitalism is a few centuries old. Statistically speaking it's most likely not the economic system we end up with forever. Optimizing for innovation under that constraint only seems premature. To channel Le Guin:
"We live in capitalism, its power seems inescapable – but then, so did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art. Very often in our art, the art of words."
It is working exactly as designed.
Strict enforcement of patent laws ensures that capital will be invested in innovation.
If capital was allocated democratically rather than at the whim of companies (that end up chasing taxpayer subsidies anyways... SpaceX, Tesla, etc.) you wouldn't need to strictly enforce patent law. The risk is already being assumed mostly by the government for truly bleeding edge research. What we have in practice is a system where the cost is socialized and the benefit is privatized.
Considering most of my issues with patents is around trivial software patents and the abhorrent practice of slightly modifying a formula (coupled with paying generic manufacturers to not produce) to effectively extend the usable lifetime of a drug patent, if anything, it's the West that needs to change to make patents be actually good for innovation and not just a means to throttle competition.
I mean would fucking North Korea be a heaven of innovation if only they more strictly policed IP law??