Apple’s motion to pause an Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 sales ban for the duration of its appeal was denied today by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, according to a court document shared by MacRumors.
The sales ban interim stay will be lifted as of Thursday, January 18 at 2 p.m. Pacific Time, at which time the sales ban will once more be in effect.
Apple was first banned from selling the Series 9 and Ultra 2 in December. Apple then appealed the decision in court, resulting in the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit putting an interim stay in place while the court reviewed Apple’s request for a full stay for the length of the appeal. Apple was then allowed to temporarily resume sales of the affected Apple Watch mode
Masimo back in 2020 claimed Apple stole Masimo employees and stole trade secrets while the Cupertino firm was developing the Apple Watch. Masimo was seeking over $1.8 billion in damages and co-ownership of five Apple pulse oximetry patents that Masimo said used its technology.
Apple did indeed hire employees away from Masimo, hiring Chief Medical Officer Michael O’Reilly in July 2013, and then in 2014, it hired Cercacor Chief Technical Officer Marcelo Lamego (Cercacor is a Masimo spinoff company). Masimo claims that the two former employees shared Masimo’s intellectual property when they developed the Apple Watch, which Apple denies.
Apple will likely sell modified Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 models without the Blood Oxygen app in the U.S. to sidestep the sales ban, while it continues to appeal.
Apple engineers are reported to be “racing” to make changes to algorithms on the Apple Watch that measure a user’s blood oxygen level — a feature that Masimo Corp. has argued infringes its patents.