carnegie

This decision to deny cert on Epic's petition in particular is pretty important. It's going to make it harder for anyone - to include the DOJ - to establish that Apple has monopoly power in certain relevant markets and thus to establish that Apple has violated anti-trust laws.

One of the things the Ninth Circuit did in its opinion in this case is outline the circumstances under which a relevant antitrust market can be limited to a single brand. Under the guidelines the Ninth Circuit established it will be difficult to show that iOS distribution, for example, is a relevant antitrust market. The Supreme Court just decided not to review those guidelines and perhaps overrule or alter them. The Supreme Court didn't actually affirm them, so it's still plausible that it will in the future effectively overrule them. But for now it's a positive development when it comes to the likelihood that those guidelines, or something close, will live on.

What the Ninth Circuit said on this front is only legally binding in that circuit, but courts in other circuits may find it persuasive if they need to consider such matters themselves. At any rate, I think this cert denial makes certain kinds of antitrust actions the DOJ may bring in the future more difficult and may incline it to file such actions in a different circuit.

AppleInsider said:

...

That hold on the injunction is presumably now lifted, but neither the courts nor Apple have commented.

...

Pursuant to the Ninth Circuit's stay order from July, the mandate requiring Apple to cease its anti-steering policies should issue as soon as the parties notify the Ninth Circuit that the Supreme Court denied cert.

tht said:

carnegie said:

entropys said:

All articles I have read fail to specify exactly what patents Apple is supposed to have infringed. More interested in the controversy I suppose.

From what I can sort of gather, it is a general patent applying to blood oxygen sensors being on the wrist. Which tbh is a joke of a patent. Happy for more details in the next article please.

Masimo is a very large company. Whining about how much more Apple Pay’s its former staff is tragically sad, as Masimo clearly weren’t paying them what they were worth.

I'll post the verbiage of the 5 patent claims which the LEO and C&DO are based on. In order to infringe a patent claim, one must employ every element listed in that patent claim. Note that some of these claims are what are referred to as dependent claims. They include all of the elements of a previous numbered claim plus something additional. So, e.g., with the first claim I'll post - 22 of the 10,912,502 patent - there's only an enforceable violation because of the inclusion of the last item.

I'd also note that the original USITC ALJ (administrative law judge) only found enforceable violations as to the last 2 claims (24 and 30 of the 10,945,648 patent). The Commission effectively overruled that ALJ with regard to the first three.

This is not clear to me.

The ITC (commission) found Apple was in violation of which patents, which claims of which patents?

The ALJ (judge) found Apple was in violation of which patents, which claims of which patents?

I've read that Apple is only in violation of the 648 patent, claim 24 and 30. This was a patent that was granted in 2021, after Apple shipped the Apple Watch Series 6.

The administrative law judge (who is part of the USITC) initially found a 337 violation based on claims 24 and 30 of the '648 patent. That ALJ didn't find a violation based any of the other remaining claims (which spanned 5 different patents).

Then the Commission (the C in USITC) affirmed the 337 violation based on those two claims. But it also effectively reversed the findings of no violation when it came to claims 22 and 28 of the '502 patent and claim 12 of the '648 patent.

So the limited exclusion order and the cease and desist order are based on claims 22 and 28 of the '502 patent and claims 12, 24, and 30 of the '648 patent.

That said, it doesn't matter when a patent was issued. What matters is the priority date and that (for the '648 patent) goes back much further.

mike1 said:

BiggieTall said:

There were reported talks within Apple to buy Masimo but they decided not to. 

Prior to the Trade Commission ruling, Apple was one vote away in the jury trial from being found not guilty of patent infringement (5-1).  This resulted in a mistrial.  Apparently during the trial, Apple paraded its development team to the stand and each declared under oath how the Apple watch component was developed NOT using Masimo technology.  

Btw Masimo was originally claiming $3B in damages at the trial but the judge threw out a bunch and it was reduced to $1.xB. 

Don't think so. Civil trials do NOT need to be unanimous as in a criminal trial. So, Apple actually won that case. It's the ITC that still had a problem.

In federal court civil jury decisions generally need to be unanimous. The vote in the case being referred to was actually 6-1 and a mistrial was declared.

I'm aware that there has been inaccurate reporting on this point.

Claim 30 of 10,945.648

20. A user-worn device configured to non-invasively determine measurements of a user's tissue, the user-worn device comprising: