In the dispute over a patent for measuring blood oxygen, there has been an import and sales stop for the latest Apple Watch models in the USA since Tuesday. A court has now decided: The smartwatches can continue to be sold until the appeal process has been completed.
The US company Apple is allowed to continue selling its smartwatches in the USA for the time being. In the patent dispute with the medical technology company Masimo, a US court has initially suspended a ban on the import and sale of the latest Apple Watch models in the USA.
The import and sales ban came into force on Tuesday after US President Joe Biden’s administration decided not to veto an October decision by the US Foreign Trade Commission (ITC). Apple had already stopped sales of the Apple Watch models from the Series 9 and Ultra 2 series last week as a precautionary measure due to the patent dispute.
The decision has no impact on sales in other countries. At Apple’s request, an appeals court in Washington decided in an expedited procedure that the company can continue to sell the models until the appeal process has been concluded.
Allegation of license fraud
Masimo accuses Apple of using patented technology to measure oxygen levels in the blood in the new Apple Watch models without a license. The medical technology company appealed to the US International Trade Commission (ITC) in 2021 and accused Apple of having copied a technology for measuring oxygen using light beams.
The import of the affected Apple Watch models from the manufacturing countries into the USA was then banned by the ITC in October. The ITC justified its ban on the grounds that Apple had infringed two patents owned by Masimo Corporation and Cercacor Laboratories. The White House could have overturned the decision with a veto, but decided against it. As a result, the import and sales ban initially came into force on Tuesday.
Other US retailers were still allowed to sell previously introduced stocks of Apple Watches. Since last week, Apple itself has continued to sell the Watch SE model in the USA, which does not have a sensor for measuring oxygen levels in the blood.
Apple further announced that the company disagreed with the ITC’s decision and was pursuing various ways to continue making the watches available to consumers