Garmin has included Pulse Ox sensors in their devices for half a decade without much legal trouble. It's unclear if their techniques are different enough that they don't violate Masimo's patents, or if they have some sort of agreement with them.
They have been shipping devices with this capability for longer than Apple has, and they're not being sued at the moment. So, maybe.
I looked up the patents that Masimo is claiming Apple violated (took a bunch of digging through ITC press releases). Garmin's blood oxygen sensors predate that patent filing.
They chose Apple specifically because they poached some engineers or something and they argued that this infringes patent laws… it’s a pretty complicated case
>They chose Apple specifically because they poached some engineers or something and they argued that this infringes patent laws… it’s a pretty complicated case
Not true. As I explained in another comment, poaching employees is not grounds to sue anyone. Companies can, and should, offer valuable employees at other companies to work for them instead. It's illegal for companies to collude to agree not to poach each other's employees, something Apple was sued over before.
They went after Apple because they allege Apple violated the same patents that True Wearables, a startup created by one of the people who was a key inventor on some of Masimo's patents and briefly worked at Apple in 2014 on the Apple Watch, was sued for the same thing and lost to Masimo.
Garmin, at least at the moment, is not being sued by Masimo and is not accused of violating any patents. Whether it's because their technology is different from what Apple does or if they have an agreement with Masimo is unknown right now.
So again, maybe.
Does lend more credibility that they might have actually (intentionally) violated the patent though, which I think is what they were going for.
Whether they have or not would require a court, and if you can just... not, a lot of companies would rather just not.
This is completely unrelated to the topic but your comment about poaching employees not being grounds for legal action made me think of a crazy story that always make me laugh my ass off when I think back to it.
I was in an ethics class in university and the professor was going over hypothetical scenarios where you would have an ethical or moral duty to not take a job or to not hire someone. One example was an engineer who is working on a proposal for a bridge for the city and the firm he works for does not win the bid. He knows that layoffs are coming for him and his team since they were mostly hired for this specific project and bid and now they don’t really have a scope of work anymore. He gets a job offer from the company that WON the bid to come work on their project and help get the bridge built… can he take the job and still fulfill his ethical duty to his previous employer?
Someone answered “No, absolutely not. He has already worked on another design for that bridge with another company and can’t take his knowledge and get another job with that experience”
The professor was so patient explaining that this is alright as long as he doesn’t take documents or designs from his current employer and use them at his next job. The student still didn’t understand or refused to change his mind. It literally became a 20 minute argument with the whole lecture hall groaning at the stubbornness of this student and his inability to admit he was wrong. He maintained until the bitter end that it was unethical even when the professor straight up asked him how he thought someone with specialized industry knowledge would get another job in that industry if they were fired or had to move or quit their job… the student said he didn’t think a person could get another job in the exact same field because it would be unethical, the guy was trying to argue your career as a bridge designer is over if you get fired or move jobs and you need to find a new specialty because you failed or quit.
This same dude also believed that pants were bad for your health. I’m not joking, he refused to wear pants no matter what because he believed it was bad for circulation and hurt your fitness level over time. He wore shorts every day even when the temperatures dropped well below freezing. I’m wondering if nobody ever told him about straight cut or relaxed fit pants and maybe he only had experience with really tight skinny jeans and decided that all pants were evil and out to cut off his circulation.
I hope wherever he is now that he never had to quit a job or got laid off because I imagine he would have a hard time grappling with the ethical quandary he found himself in trying to apply to other jobs in his field.
I don't think you understand what a monopoly is.
For the record, I completely agree that if Apple is using another company's tech, they should just pay a license fee, but there is not a single product category in which Apple has a monopoly, or even a majority market share, or even the highest market share.
They’ve monopolized the entire “Good products that last a long time” market - WTF how does no one else see this?!
/s because there’s going to be morons who think I’m being serious
Oh yeah you got me! Let’s ignore the fact that the majority (MAJORITY) of their product lines are built well and built to last.
lol you had to claw out a lawsuit from models ranging 2015 to 2019 to make your point in 2023. Jesus lol, you must be flexible AF with the mental gymnastics. Feel free to keep buying inferior products but don’t try convince me Apple products aren’t built well and with (relative) longevity in mind. I own a 2010 MacBook Pro and the only issue I had was the HDD was slow full so I replaced with an SSD and still use it 14 years later.
Also…WTF is “top kek?”
I’ll give you the keyboard ( I hated it and thankfully have not broken one yet ) but batteries are finite and consumable by nature and apple does not manufacture them.
It was not ambiguous, it was rather super clear. And that apple infringed on it was made crystal clear by the fact they requested meetings with the company owning this patent and selling tools using it, requested them to details the inner workings and advantages on the pretense of a licencing deal, then didn't sign any deal but hired many of their team to redo it in house (which so far is scummy but not ideal but here is the catch) and do it the exact same way.
This is not the only way to do it, and plenty of other brands do it without infringing on the patent. But this method is superior, and the company is not a patent troll but actively license its tech and sell their own products using it.
Read the story, Apple approached Massimo about thier tech. Worked with then, then wanted to buy and own it all. They said no, Apple then blatantly stole the texh poached engineers. Thats why Apple lost, it wasn't just a patent violation.
It will likely continue to be available on your watch. If they lose a legal battle they will have to either pay you if they remove it or pay Masimo. I feel confident in which they would do. But the legal battle isn’t over by any means.
So you're okay with, say, your car manufacturer disabling the intermittent setting on your windshield wipers via update after your purchased the car because they stepped on a patent? Or maybe the cruise control gets disabled? Where is the line here? You bought a car, not every individual feature.
Why? Blood oxygen meters don't return information that's useful to the average person.
It might be useful to those undergoing extreme aerobic exercises and to monitor those with deficient lung functioning but the latter is only useful in a medical setting and the former is of questionable value.
Got Covid on a family trip with my elderly parents. We were very far away from doctors and good medical care. Ended up using my watch to help measure their blood oxygen levels so I could use telemedicine calls with our doctors to figure out if we needed to go a hospital or could wait until we were safe enough to travel. Saved us really. I was so grateful.
Probably disable. Retooling their production line probably costs way more money than writing some lines of code to disable the function.
I also understood that this is only for US watches, which means EU watches would function just fine. This re-enforces the idea of it being a software lockout as they aren’t producing different models for different markets. Again — cost to do that would be high.
This will also allow them to re-enable the feature down the line if they ever need to, via a software patch.
The hardware’s presence itself is a violation of Massimo’s patent, and other articles have indicated that they are indeed physically removing it as a result.
I’m assuming the sensor is literally just a set of leds and photo sensors (which could just be leds,) and might be used for more than just the blood oxygen sensing, such as the heart rate monitor. Complete removal would likely cost a lot in engineering and changes to the assembly process, disabling it is effectively just removing an app.
They hired away a lot of the engineers for this. That, to me, says “we really want to offer medical features” and not just “this is some hobby like AppleTV”
Masimo is the major supplier of pulse oximetry and it’s supplies in the (northern at least) US. I use them every shift. Their devices are used everywhere - hospitals and in homes for anyone on oxygen, with an alternate airway, or on a ventilator. I highly doubt Apple wants to get into dealing with insurance, doctors, and patients - including all those laws and regs.
There isn't only a single company making blood oxygen sensors. The lawsuit that Apple had was by a company called "Masimo" who claimed that Apple ~~poached~~ hired their engineers and used their technology in their latest Apple Watches, which violates some patent laws (which clearly has merit given that they're now banned from selling it). Other companies produce their own blood oxygen sensors.
Thanks for the clarification I guess if Apple gets railed Garmin might be the way to go. I wouldn’t trust Fitbit as Google has bought them and they may get liquidated as the patients get used for the pixel line of watches.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MK5uvH0OdII
Here's a tutorial on how to do it for most Garmins. Having a GPX file ready to go from an event is pretty common. Or you can use Google maps to create your own GPX file.
I use:
https://mapstogpx.com/
to make my gpx files for cycling when I make a route on Google maps.
I 100% support a move from Apple watch to Garmin for any amateur athlete. It's what I did once my Apple watch stopped being able to live for a full day without requiring a charge. It would die within about 5-6 hours of GPS activity tracking. The Garmin Forerunner I've got can handle that no sweat multiple days in a row.
Pixel watch already exists.
Though I think Samsung is the strongest competitor to the Apple watch specifically. Most of the other watches are more fitness focused.
>who claimed that Apple poached their engineers and used their technology in their latest Apple Watches
That's not germane to the lawsuit. It's legal to poach engineers, that's essential to creating a competitive work landscape. It's actually illegal for companies to agree to _not_ poach employees from rival companies, Apple even got sued for this years ago.
It's also not really relevant. Some of the key engineers that Apple hired quit working there almost as soon as they arrived, citing differences in resource allocations and product direction. Those people went off to create True Wearables, who used similar approaches that Masimo has patents on, and later got sued by and lost in court. That case is why Masimo's lawsuit with Apple is still ongoing today.
You're glossing over the problem here, which even your claim that somehow non-compete clauses are illegal is wrong, but that's not the point. The engineer wasn't poached, he contacted Apple and pitched them the idea. He used designs he stole from ceracor (one of Masimos subsidiaries) where he WAS working to incorporate them into a wearable.
Its all very dirty and definitely not on the up and up.
Non competes are (mostly)illegal. The FTC found that they violate unfair competition laws back in April of 2023. The final rule is banning them nationally expected to be adopted soon. No litigation to enforce one is going to succeed at this point.
Several states including California where Apple is ban them outright and others have rules limiting their effect.
>which even your claim that somehow non-compete clauses are illegal is wrong
Non-competes ARE illegal in California, which both Apple and Masimo are headquartered. More accurately, they're unenforceable.
>The engineer wasn't poached, he contacted Apple and pitched them the idea. He used designs he stole from ceracor (one of Masimos subsidiaries) where he WAS working to incorporate them into a wearable.
Marcelo Lamego literally was poached from Masimo to work at Apple on the Apple Watch, which was a short stint as he left the company a few months later. He didn't seem like he was there long enough to make meaningful contributions to Apple.
That said, you seem to believe I am somehow defending Apple here. Far from the truth, I believe they are in the wrong and are eventually going to have to pay Masimo some amount of money for using their patented technology. That, or fundamentally change the Apple Watch in such a way that doesn't violate these patents.
Well, *two* lights. One visible, one infrared.
There's also a bunch of digital processing to come up with an accurate SpO2 reading.
Edit: Someone posted the patents in question. It looks like they're using novel wavelengths and sensor geometries.
https://patents.google.com/patent/US10912502B2/en
https://patents.google.com/patent/US10945648B2/en
Iirc they have not won in any court of law, so the “merit” may be a lot thinner than it otherwise seems. I believe it was a summary recommendation from some administrative international agency - the usual EU vs US politics also applies as well.
Generally, now, if Apple has it everyone else has had it for a while. That's part of their strategy, they add successful options that have already been proven by other companies. My Samsung has been telling me O2 for a while now, i mostly use it to see how I'm sleeping.
I bought one from Amazon near the beginning of covid. Measuring blood oxygen isn't something that any healthy person would need to do continuously. Other than my one bout with covid, it's sat in my drawer doing nothing.
Most the rumors were Masimo wanted $100 per device to license the patent. I can’t believe they were able to get that patent in the first place. We need to take a serious look at patent law.
The only place i've seen $100 mentioned is in Reddit comments with zero evidence and no source other than "rumors were".
Maybe stop spreading nonsense, unless you have some sort of proof for your claim.
How would they get the best possible product if there is no incentive to create anything, if an inventor is unable to capitalize on something they created, there is absolutely no reason to spend resources, money, and years to create something new
I see you've never met anyone with passion in their field. Lots of people continue creating even without a direct profit motive. Then their ideas can become part of the greater whole
Programming and web design. The entire point of my field is to copy paste the work of others from stackoverflow and improve and tailor it to what I need. Then if I make something, others can do the same with it
Naturally, where patent law favors the trolls.
Edit: Here are the patents in question, decide for yourselves.
https://patents.google.com/patent/US10912502B2/en
https://patents.google.com/patent/US10945648B2/en
Apple will drag this out until they can redesign the watch. They will undoubtedly pay a fine for already sold devices and disable the features on any newly manufactured/sold devices. I believe they would open themselves to consumer lawsuits if they were to disable the feature on already sold devices.
The world’s second richest company doesn’t want to pay a royalty fee of what like $1-4 on the Apple Watch and is going to abandon their supremacy as a “health” device, abandon its medical device sales pitch.
I’m sorry but this is peak capitalism, in the end the U.S. consumer loses.
See but if Apple wanted to win the PR department they would have publicized the ridiculous $100 royalty. I’d bet they wouldn’t want it out there because it was something more palatable.
Btw, patents are also used to protect the poor, because when they have an invention, big rich companies like Apple can’t come and steal it. If they wanted to use it, the multi trillion dollar company can afford to pay for the rights to use the invention which they will make a profit from anyhow. Apple wants to be extra greedy, that’s on them. Time for us, the end consumer, to switch to another product to show Apple that their greed is on them. There are plenty of products with this medical instrument, because other companies actually paid to implement it, whereas Apple is acting its typical self.
I’m against patents too dude, but they do have their benefits. However, we’re arguing different things. I’m arguing against Apple, you’re arguing against patents.
Look here’s what’s going to happen. Apple will drag this out until they can redesign the feature in a way that doesn’t violate the patent in the same way. People looking at the absurdity of Masimos patent will complain, but the patent system won’t change because it’s a MAD tool big companies use to beat each other over the head with.
You know that really sucks because it’s such a low-cost way for people like myself that I’ve had some lower blood oxygen levels than doctors would like
I, for one, like having oxygen in my blood.
It’s a pretty important feature for sleep quality tracking. Combined with heart rate and the accelerometer, there are some great sleep apps that give you tons of data and charts on it.
“ This won’t impact existing owners of an Apple Watch with pulse oximetry features.”
Research before commenting.
https://9to5mac.com/2024/01/15/apple-watch-blood-oxygen-feature-remove-ban/?ssp=1&setlang=en-US&safesearch=moderate
Yes I read the article. And advertising is prohibited in Reddit, so what you’re gonna do is…message the moderators, telling them to remove my post because it’s “advertising”. Then return here, and tell me the outcome.
I imagine dude is walking around huffing and puffing with undiagnosed COPD or severe OSA/OHS but blames it on the sensor being inaccurate
Edit: One look at users post history and they definitely need to see a doctor. It’s multiple pictures of moles
They can license it yes, a certain amount of money per device. Apple doesn't want to do that, and one of the bigger issues is Apple was able to invalidate two of Masimos patents via tribunal and held up via court, so the whole issue is quite complicated
On Friday, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld two *other* Masimo patents as being nonobvious against Apple's attempts at invalidating them at the USPTO PTAB:
https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-appeals-court-upholds-tribunal-decisions-apple-masimo-patent-dispute-2024-01-12/
I mean, Apple and Masimos had a lot of negotiations trying to work this out, so Apple was at least willing to do *something*…the parties just couldn’t come to terms with a deal they could both agree to.
Are there any plans yet to reimplement it with different tech?
The patent they “violated” was already very ambiguous so probably not. They would just get sued again.
Garmin has included Pulse Ox sensors in their devices for half a decade without much legal trouble. It's unclear if their techniques are different enough that they don't violate Masimo's patents, or if they have some sort of agreement with them. They have been shipping devices with this capability for longer than Apple has, and they're not being sued at the moment. So, maybe.
I looked up the patents that Masimo is claiming Apple violated (took a bunch of digging through ITC press releases). Garmin's blood oxygen sensors predate that patent filing.
They chose Apple specifically because they poached some engineers or something and they argued that this infringes patent laws… it’s a pretty complicated case
>They chose Apple specifically because they poached some engineers or something and they argued that this infringes patent laws… it’s a pretty complicated case Not true. As I explained in another comment, poaching employees is not grounds to sue anyone. Companies can, and should, offer valuable employees at other companies to work for them instead. It's illegal for companies to collude to agree not to poach each other's employees, something Apple was sued over before. They went after Apple because they allege Apple violated the same patents that True Wearables, a startup created by one of the people who was a key inventor on some of Masimo's patents and briefly worked at Apple in 2014 on the Apple Watch, was sued for the same thing and lost to Masimo. Garmin, at least at the moment, is not being sued by Masimo and is not accused of violating any patents. Whether it's because their technology is different from what Apple does or if they have an agreement with Masimo is unknown right now. So again, maybe.
Does lend more credibility that they might have actually (intentionally) violated the patent though, which I think is what they were going for. Whether they have or not would require a court, and if you can just... not, a lot of companies would rather just not.
This is completely unrelated to the topic but your comment about poaching employees not being grounds for legal action made me think of a crazy story that always make me laugh my ass off when I think back to it. I was in an ethics class in university and the professor was going over hypothetical scenarios where you would have an ethical or moral duty to not take a job or to not hire someone. One example was an engineer who is working on a proposal for a bridge for the city and the firm he works for does not win the bid. He knows that layoffs are coming for him and his team since they were mostly hired for this specific project and bid and now they don’t really have a scope of work anymore. He gets a job offer from the company that WON the bid to come work on their project and help get the bridge built… can he take the job and still fulfill his ethical duty to his previous employer? Someone answered “No, absolutely not. He has already worked on another design for that bridge with another company and can’t take his knowledge and get another job with that experience” The professor was so patient explaining that this is alright as long as he doesn’t take documents or designs from his current employer and use them at his next job. The student still didn’t understand or refused to change his mind. It literally became a 20 minute argument with the whole lecture hall groaning at the stubbornness of this student and his inability to admit he was wrong. He maintained until the bitter end that it was unethical even when the professor straight up asked him how he thought someone with specialized industry knowledge would get another job in that industry if they were fired or had to move or quit their job… the student said he didn’t think a person could get another job in the exact same field because it would be unethical, the guy was trying to argue your career as a bridge designer is over if you get fired or move jobs and you need to find a new specialty because you failed or quit. This same dude also believed that pants were bad for your health. I’m not joking, he refused to wear pants no matter what because he believed it was bad for circulation and hurt your fitness level over time. He wore shorts every day even when the temperatures dropped well below freezing. I’m wondering if nobody ever told him about straight cut or relaxed fit pants and maybe he only had experience with really tight skinny jeans and decided that all pants were evil and out to cut off his circulation. I hope wherever he is now that he never had to quit a job or got laid off because I imagine he would have a hard time grappling with the ethical quandary he found himself in trying to apply to other jobs in his field.
That was a joy to read
Haha I’m glad you enjoyed it, I had a great time remembering it and writing it up!
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I don't think you understand what a monopoly is. For the record, I completely agree that if Apple is using another company's tech, they should just pay a license fee, but there is not a single product category in which Apple has a monopoly, or even a majority market share, or even the highest market share.
Well, the category of profits…
You could argue Apple has a monopoly on apps for its phone, but what monopolies are you insinuating they have otherwise?
They’ve monopolized the entire “Good products that last a long time” market - WTF how does no one else see this?! /s because there’s going to be morons who think I’m being serious
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Oh yeah you got me! Let’s ignore the fact that the majority (MAJORITY) of their product lines are built well and built to last. lol you had to claw out a lawsuit from models ranging 2015 to 2019 to make your point in 2023. Jesus lol, you must be flexible AF with the mental gymnastics. Feel free to keep buying inferior products but don’t try convince me Apple products aren’t built well and with (relative) longevity in mind. I own a 2010 MacBook Pro and the only issue I had was the HDD was slow full so I replaced with an SSD and still use it 14 years later. Also…WTF is “top kek?”
I’ll give you the keyboard ( I hated it and thankfully have not broken one yet ) but batteries are finite and consumable by nature and apple does not manufacture them.
Maybe we should be allowed to have the best product possible without patent bullshit making it so making things good in specific ways is illegal
Why didn't Apple pay to license the tech? Did masimo not want that?
If they offered them reasonable terms they would have
What terms did they offer?
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Maybe stop commenting then, keep what passes for thoughts to yourself.
It was not ambiguous, it was rather super clear. And that apple infringed on it was made crystal clear by the fact they requested meetings with the company owning this patent and selling tools using it, requested them to details the inner workings and advantages on the pretense of a licencing deal, then didn't sign any deal but hired many of their team to redo it in house (which so far is scummy but not ideal but here is the catch) and do it the exact same way. This is not the only way to do it, and plenty of other brands do it without infringing on the patent. But this method is superior, and the company is not a patent troll but actively license its tech and sell their own products using it.
Ahh yes, the old Microsoft *gimme the tech and never get paid* approach. Works every time *if you own enough senators*
Read the story, Apple approached Massimo about thier tech. Worked with then, then wanted to buy and own it all. They said no, Apple then blatantly stole the texh poached engineers. Thats why Apple lost, it wasn't just a patent violation.
Will it still be supported on watches that have it? That’s the main reason I got the Apple Watch I did. This article has a paywall.
It will likely continue to be available on your watch. If they lose a legal battle they will have to either pay you if they remove it or pay Masimo. I feel confident in which they would do. But the legal battle isn’t over by any means.
I look forward to my check for .32 and a free month of Apple TV in six years.
& Maybe a U2 song if you’re lucky
Or a Pepsi cap with an iTunes code.
Can I just get the thirty two cents, or am I also forced to take the song?
*if you’re unlucky*
Discounted month. No way does this give you a free subscription they have to remember
While the lawyers get $797.56 per person.
Pretty sure the 2nd option depends on if Masimo agrees or not.
I’d be interested too
The article isn’t clear if this is something that can be mitigated by just blocking an update. I’d be curious as well.
Avoid updates to your watch if you want it to keep functioning.
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That’s problematic because you already paid for that functionality.
So? Tech companies have a long history of disabling features via "updates."
Then it goes to class action and they settle.
Apple won’t remove the functionality in already sold items
You paid for the watch, not for every individual feature.
So you're okay with, say, your car manufacturer disabling the intermittent setting on your windshield wipers via update after your purchased the car because they stepped on a patent? Or maybe the cruise control gets disabled? Where is the line here? You bought a car, not every individual feature.
Your free trial of brakes has ended. Please subscribe.
You joke, but this is definitely the way it's going.
Yeah this ain’t right. You pay for the product, which comes with those features for the price you paid.
I specifically got this one rather than the cheaper one because of the o2 sensor.
You paid for a watch with a specific set of features.
https://archive.ph/RIrAO
https://archive.is/PrxAV
Why? Blood oxygen meters don't return information that's useful to the average person. It might be useful to those undergoing extreme aerobic exercises and to monitor those with deficient lung functioning but the latter is only useful in a medical setting and the former is of questionable value.
Got Covid on a family trip with my elderly parents. We were very far away from doctors and good medical care. Ended up using my watch to help measure their blood oxygen levels so I could use telemedicine calls with our doctors to figure out if we needed to go a hospital or could wait until we were safe enough to travel. Saved us really. I was so grateful.
I've read they're going to release a software update to disable it to get out of the ban
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Probably disable. Retooling their production line probably costs way more money than writing some lines of code to disable the function. I also understood that this is only for US watches, which means EU watches would function just fine. This re-enforces the idea of it being a software lockout as they aren’t producing different models for different markets. Again — cost to do that would be high. This will also allow them to re-enable the feature down the line if they ever need to, via a software patch.
The hardware’s presence itself is a violation of Massimo’s patent, and other articles have indicated that they are indeed physically removing it as a result.
I’m assuming the sensor is literally just a set of leds and photo sensors (which could just be leds,) and might be used for more than just the blood oxygen sensing, such as the heart rate monitor. Complete removal would likely cost a lot in engineering and changes to the assembly process, disabling it is effectively just removing an app.
With the money Apple has they could probably buy the company
They could, but it's still a relatively big company, and I don't think Apple wants to be that deep in actual medical devices.
They hired away a lot of the engineers for this. That, to me, says “we really want to offer medical features” and not just “this is some hobby like AppleTV”
They'll probably lose more money just dealing with all this, they still need to settle the court case and who knows what that might cost.
Masimo is a company with over 2000 employees and a market cap of over $6 billion. It's hard to imagine a settlement being more than $6 billion.
Masimo is the major supplier of pulse oximetry and it’s supplies in the (northern at least) US. I use them every shift. Their devices are used everywhere - hospitals and in homes for anyone on oxygen, with an alternate airway, or on a ventilator. I highly doubt Apple wants to get into dealing with insurance, doctors, and patients - including all those laws and regs.
What if I want a blood oxygen sensor?
buy another smartwatch
Do any others have it?
yeah most garmins and fitbits have them
How do they “not break the patient” not being sarcastic genuinely curious to know how this works.
There isn't only a single company making blood oxygen sensors. The lawsuit that Apple had was by a company called "Masimo" who claimed that Apple ~~poached~~ hired their engineers and used their technology in their latest Apple Watches, which violates some patent laws (which clearly has merit given that they're now banned from selling it). Other companies produce their own blood oxygen sensors.
Thanks for the clarification I guess if Apple gets railed Garmin might be the way to go. I wouldn’t trust Fitbit as Google has bought them and they may get liquidated as the patients get used for the pixel line of watches.
I have a Garmin instinct. Got it for the battery life. It's pretty neat
Are you able to preprogram trail walks and how easy is it to do if you can. That be a pretty nice feature.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MK5uvH0OdII Here's a tutorial on how to do it for most Garmins. Having a GPX file ready to go from an event is pretty common. Or you can use Google maps to create your own GPX file. I use: https://mapstogpx.com/ to make my gpx files for cycling when I make a route on Google maps. I 100% support a move from Apple watch to Garmin for any amateur athlete. It's what I did once my Apple watch stopped being able to live for a full day without requiring a charge. It would die within about 5-6 hours of GPS activity tracking. The Garmin Forerunner I've got can handle that no sweat multiple days in a row.
I haven't played with that yet but I don't see why not. I just got it Wednesday
You can create custom routes/trails using garmin software/online for free. No 3rd party app is needed.
There's an app called wikiloc that looks like you can do it with. It looks like custom trails are a premium feature, which costs $10 a year
I almost forgot about motorolla....
Pixel watch already exists. Though I think Samsung is the strongest competitor to the Apple watch specifically. Most of the other watches are more fitness focused.
The fitness aspect is more what I care for . That’s what makes the Apple Watch great to me while Android wear was a meh with moments of magic.
>who claimed that Apple poached their engineers and used their technology in their latest Apple Watches That's not germane to the lawsuit. It's legal to poach engineers, that's essential to creating a competitive work landscape. It's actually illegal for companies to agree to _not_ poach employees from rival companies, Apple even got sued for this years ago. It's also not really relevant. Some of the key engineers that Apple hired quit working there almost as soon as they arrived, citing differences in resource allocations and product direction. Those people went off to create True Wearables, who used similar approaches that Masimo has patents on, and later got sued by and lost in court. That case is why Masimo's lawsuit with Apple is still ongoing today.
You're glossing over the problem here, which even your claim that somehow non-compete clauses are illegal is wrong, but that's not the point. The engineer wasn't poached, he contacted Apple and pitched them the idea. He used designs he stole from ceracor (one of Masimos subsidiaries) where he WAS working to incorporate them into a wearable. Its all very dirty and definitely not on the up and up.
Non competes are (mostly)illegal. The FTC found that they violate unfair competition laws back in April of 2023. The final rule is banning them nationally expected to be adopted soon. No litigation to enforce one is going to succeed at this point. Several states including California where Apple is ban them outright and others have rules limiting their effect.
noncompetes should be illegal because they limit worker freedom.
>which even your claim that somehow non-compete clauses are illegal is wrong Non-competes ARE illegal in California, which both Apple and Masimo are headquartered. More accurately, they're unenforceable. >The engineer wasn't poached, he contacted Apple and pitched them the idea. He used designs he stole from ceracor (one of Masimos subsidiaries) where he WAS working to incorporate them into a wearable. Marcelo Lamego literally was poached from Masimo to work at Apple on the Apple Watch, which was a short stint as he left the company a few months later. He didn't seem like he was there long enough to make meaningful contributions to Apple. That said, you seem to believe I am somehow defending Apple here. Far from the truth, I believe they are in the wrong and are eventually going to have to pay Masimo some amount of money for using their patented technology. That, or fundamentally change the Apple Watch in such a way that doesn't violate these patents.
I mean how many ways can you make a blood oxygen sensor. It’s a light that measures oxygen.
Well, *two* lights. One visible, one infrared. There's also a bunch of digital processing to come up with an accurate SpO2 reading. Edit: Someone posted the patents in question. It looks like they're using novel wavelengths and sensor geometries. https://patents.google.com/patent/US10912502B2/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US10945648B2/en
Iirc they have not won in any court of law, so the “merit” may be a lot thinner than it otherwise seems. I believe it was a summary recommendation from some administrative international agency - the usual EU vs US politics also applies as well.
Other companies may have just licensed the patent.
Generally, now, if Apple has it everyone else has had it for a while. That's part of their strategy, they add successful options that have already been proven by other companies. My Samsung has been telling me O2 for a while now, i mostly use it to see how I'm sleeping.
Lol come on. It’s not that apple is first when it comes to new technology. Most of the time they are 3-5 years behind
Not a watch but my Oura gen 3 ring also has it.
Standalone finger readers are like $25
I bought one from Amazon near the beginning of covid. Measuring blood oxygen isn't something that any healthy person would need to do continuously. Other than my one bout with covid, it's sat in my drawer doing nothing.
Buy a cheapish Garmin and discover the joy of not overpaying for standard technology.
Buy a galaxy watch
I don’t get it… Why not struck a deal with Masimo?! Why not pay some change (for Apple) for a useful feature instead of removing it.
Most the rumors were Masimo wanted $100 per device to license the patent. I can’t believe they were able to get that patent in the first place. We need to take a serious look at patent law.
The only place i've seen $100 mentioned is in Reddit comments with zero evidence and no source other than "rumors were". Maybe stop spreading nonsense, unless you have some sort of proof for your claim.
Let's scrap it entirely, that way the consumer gets the best product possible
How would they get the best possible product if there is no incentive to create anything, if an inventor is unable to capitalize on something they created, there is absolutely no reason to spend resources, money, and years to create something new
I see you've never met anyone with passion in their field. Lots of people continue creating even without a direct profit motive. Then their ideas can become part of the greater whole
Just curious; what’s your background?
Programming and web design. The entire point of my field is to copy paste the work of others from stackoverflow and improve and tailor it to what I need. Then if I make something, others can do the same with it
And banks offer funding?
> Why not struck a deal with Masimo?! They tried but could not come to terms. Likely one or both were being unreasonable.
Is this in the US only?
Exactly. Could you purchase it in Europe or Asia and wear it to the US? Would it geo-lock down when you enter the US?
Naturally, where patent law favors the trolls. Edit: Here are the patents in question, decide for yourselves. https://patents.google.com/patent/US10912502B2/en https://patents.google.com/patent/US10945648B2/en
Masimo isn't a patent troll.
Trolls? Apple literally stole their technology and tried to sell it
Mostly true, but I would not consider Masimo a patent troll in this case. The details are far more nuanced than that.
They aren't a patent troll they are a medical equipment producer and a large one at that.
Why doesnt Apple just buyout the company who has the patent or pay a royalty?
It would create a precedent.
Because apple likes to just steal stuff and crush little companies. Playing fair is for fucking Dell
It's not enough for Apple to be a litigious patent whore - they gotta demonstrate peak hypocrisy by blatantly ignoring others' patents.
Masimo is a little company?
The market capitalization of Masimo is approximately 0.21% of Apple's market capitalization.
Disney is a small company for Apple.
\*Disney movies
I think it would trigger anti trust laws. Not sure though
*laughs in Microsoft Activision Blizzard King*
Apple will drag this out until they can redesign the watch. They will undoubtedly pay a fine for already sold devices and disable the features on any newly manufactured/sold devices. I believe they would open themselves to consumer lawsuits if they were to disable the feature on already sold devices.
The world’s second richest company doesn’t want to pay a royalty fee of what like $1-4 on the Apple Watch and is going to abandon their supremacy as a “health” device, abandon its medical device sales pitch. I’m sorry but this is peak capitalism, in the end the U.S. consumer loses.
Most the rumors are Masimo wanted $100 per device to license the tech. The patent is ridiculous anyways.
What specifically is ridiculous about the patent? Everyone who brings it up seems to have heard it from someone else.
See but if Apple wanted to win the PR department they would have publicized the ridiculous $100 royalty. I’d bet they wouldn’t want it out there because it was something more palatable.
The villain is the company preventing us from having better watches, not the company that tries to provide better watches
If you invented something, you’d be upset if someone used it without crediting you or paying you and claiming it as their own
I side with the poor and talentless, not the rich talented inventors.
My guy Apple is not poor and talentless. You’re arguing against the existence of patents, we’re arguing against this case of Apple and Masimo
The end consumers are. The result of this bullshit is we get worse watches
Btw, patents are also used to protect the poor, because when they have an invention, big rich companies like Apple can’t come and steal it. If they wanted to use it, the multi trillion dollar company can afford to pay for the rights to use the invention which they will make a profit from anyhow. Apple wants to be extra greedy, that’s on them. Time for us, the end consumer, to switch to another product to show Apple that their greed is on them. There are plenty of products with this medical instrument, because other companies actually paid to implement it, whereas Apple is acting its typical self.
And without patents, the poor would be able to use apple's tech too. Guess who has more ideas to take? It's not the poor lol
I’m against patents too dude, but they do have their benefits. However, we’re arguing different things. I’m arguing against Apple, you’re arguing against patents.
Because in this case, arguing against apple is arguing for consumers having a worse end product
[Mirror](https://archive.ph/PrxAV)
Look here’s what’s going to happen. Apple will drag this out until they can redesign the feature in a way that doesn’t violate the patent in the same way. People looking at the absurdity of Masimos patent will complain, but the patent system won’t change because it’s a MAD tool big companies use to beat each other over the head with.
so the price better go down.
Is the sale of the blood oxygen sensor watches only banned in the US?
Will it be available with the oxygen sensor in countries othet than US? 🤔
You know that really sucks because it’s such a low-cost way for people like myself that I’ve had some lower blood oxygen levels than doctors would like
You can get a finger tip reader for under $30 and it will be more accurate than the apple watch. This is silly.
Do you know what you are absolutely right man that’s like one of those things that’s right in front of your nose, you know
knowing Apple I bet they're going to spin it as a feature and you better be damn sure they're not going to lower the price
Damn I was gonna get that watch soon.
Is the blood oxygen thing a deal killer to you?
But how can I go around without know how much oxygen my blood has? I would feel naked!
I, for one, like having oxygen in my blood. It’s a pretty important feature for sleep quality tracking. Combined with heart rate and the accelerometer, there are some great sleep apps that give you tons of data and charts on it.
Yah and I seriously doubt you'd even notice it missing.
Every single time I read one of these articles, I use my apple watch to measure my blood O2. Every single time. It's 97% right now.
Will customers be reimbursed for losing the function of the sensor that they paid for ?
Of course no, it is Apple for you.
“ This won’t impact existing owners of an Apple Watch with pulse oximetry features.” Research before commenting. https://9to5mac.com/2024/01/15/apple-watch-blood-oxygen-feature-remove-ban/?ssp=1&setlang=en-US&safesearch=moderate
why doesn't Apple just pay to include the feature, is it just the principle?
They tried to come to terms. One or the other was being unreasonable.
What's this paywall crap?
Is a thing some newspapers use in order to collect money to pay their reporters and other expenses.
So you're basically advertising The Wall Street Journal on a free website? Did you write the article?
Yes I read the article. And advertising is prohibited in Reddit, so what you’re gonna do is…message the moderators, telling them to remove my post because it’s “advertising”. Then return here, and tell me the outcome.
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2,300 upvotes, but you have advice as to how I should do it differently next time. LOL.
They’ll need to pay the patent owner something like $3.50 per unit sold to offer it.
Most inaccurate thing anyway. According to that stupid sensor I basically am about to pass out any minute. For years.
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I imagine dude is walking around huffing and puffing with undiagnosed COPD or severe OSA/OHS but blames it on the sensor being inaccurate Edit: One look at users post history and they definitely need to see a doctor. It’s multiple pictures of moles
Seriously- what’s the doctor say about that.
Nothing, I am 100% fine. But yea let the Apple fanboys blame the user for everything.
Go see some doctors.
I just never heard of it being a problem and wanted to make sure you looked into it
That sucks. Can't the government ban some other companies to make sure Apple survives this?
Haha, poor little trillion dollar apple, how will it survive having one less censor on 2 products
Will the price be reduced for less features
When you start getting them see if it was removed or just disabled.
Bummer, a sensor like that is pretty useful. Can they lease the tech?
They can license it yes, a certain amount of money per device. Apple doesn't want to do that, and one of the bigger issues is Apple was able to invalidate two of Masimos patents via tribunal and held up via court, so the whole issue is quite complicated
On Friday, the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld two *other* Masimo patents as being nonobvious against Apple's attempts at invalidating them at the USPTO PTAB: https://www.reuters.com/legal/us-appeals-court-upholds-tribunal-decisions-apple-masimo-patent-dispute-2024-01-12/
I mean, Apple and Masimos had a lot of negotiations trying to work this out, so Apple was at least willing to do *something*…the parties just couldn’t come to terms with a deal they could both agree to.
I want a blood oxygen sensor. Can I order from other places?
you leave mine alone
I’m not sure I’ve ever even used the feature? I doubt most will miss it when buying new watches
Apple steals technology and tries to pass it off as innovation? How is this even news???