U.S. appeals court upholds patent tribunal rulings in Apple vs Masimo battle

A U.S. appeals court today upheld two earlier decisions by a patent tribunal that favored Masimo in its intellectual property dispute with Apple over blood oxygen sensors in newer Apple Watch models, reports Reuters.

The decisions by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit concern findings by the Patent and Trademark Office and come as Apple is separately fighting to overturn a ban on U.S. Apple Watch imports imposed by the International Trade Commission (ITC).

Masimo, a medical tech firm, and Apple are in an longing legal battle in which the former alleges the latter unlawfully incorporated its pulse oximetry tech into the Apple Watch. Apple removed the Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 from its online store on December 21. There was a brief ban on the import of such models into the U.S., but it’s been temporarily paused. 

And Bloomberg reports that Apple is plotting a “rescue mission” for the $17 billion business that includes software fixes and other potential workarounds. The article says that engineers at the company are racing to make changes to algorithms on the device that measure a user’s blood oxygen level — a feature that Masimo claims infringes its patents. They’re adjusting how the technology determines oxygen saturation and presents the data to customers, according to Bloomberg.