12 of the 23 claims invalidated by being "obvious", in light of previous patents.
The rest invalidated against Apple, through "alternative claim construction". That is, Apple's reading of the patent and its specific claims, showed it was narrower in scope than their particular usage.
None of this seems really surprising, and whilst it does open the door for Apple, it probably doesn't much open the door for other implementations to flourish - not without a lawyer guiding your particular tech choices.
I find it hard to believe that this patent was keeping Apple from adding blood glucose sensing. Yes, I know a patent on blood oxygen level sensing stopped Apple, but there is a huge difference between oxygen level sensing and glucose sensing.
For oxygen sensing there are numerous readily available inexpensive stand-alone sensors available at any drug store or online. They are non-invasive and painless. Yes, a continuously wearable sensor would be better for some people but most people don't need that. Accordingly it is something that while nice wouldn't really sell a lot of watches, and so something that might not be worth licensing if it is under patent.
Glucose sensing on the other hand is a literal pain to test and has ongoing costs due to consumables used for the testing. Non-invasive painless glucose sensing on a watch is a feature that would sell a lot of watches. I think demand would be high enough, even if they have to raise prices, that it would easily be worth it.
we're building an artificial pancreas for hospitals, so I know a good bit about CGMs. Noninvasive blood sugar sensing is horrifically difficult. Every few years, people come along and say "oh this is just some simple DSP on spectroscopic information, piece of cake" before inevitably running up against:
- skin conductivity changes over time
- the ways in which skin tone changes signal absorption (which itself changes over time)
- the ways in which different levels of fitness affect blood flow, material density etc.
You also can't use it in a hospital setting, due to how your skin and bloodflow changes during serious conditions like sepsis (though I'm guessing they're not thinking about that market).
Really smart people have been trying to use Raman spectroscopy to solve this problem for decades at this point (early patents go to early 2000s). Apple is an extremely strong hardware vendor, and I wish them luck, but I would not hold my breath for this. Plus, I'm guessing they will not open the signal up for looping, which would really leave the T*DM community out to dry.
I work in a related area. Non-invasive blood glucose has been a holy grail for analytical science, for decades, and remains a brutally difficult problem.
> Glucose sensing on the other hand is a literal pain to test
I’d be hard-pressed to believe that someone trying the newest Dexcom G7 CGM would find it more discomforting than a mosquito bite. And for that literal pain you get 10 days of constant readings on your phone.
> I think demand would be high enough, even if they have to raise prices, that it would easily be worth it.
This is probably correct but I don’t think many non-diabetic people would see an actual benefit from CGM data. It’s the kind of thing people love to think is useful but in reality it’ll be just one more thing to ignore.
Blocked by the International Trade Commission from being imported which is why watches prior to block still work. Patent case ended up in a hung jury trial with all but 1 juror siding with Apple.
Aside: I was surprised to read "dental caries" in the list of things detectable through similar methods in the court filing screenshot in this post. Is that about a device that could optically detect caries from tooth surfaces through similar principles?
If you've ever put a bright light up to your teeth in a mirror, it's pretty incredibly how translucent dental enamel actually is, and the level of internal detail you can see just by eye.
This is why patents are Regressive and should be done away with. They no longer protect small-time inventors, only corporations. They stifle all innovation.
I think that is a major problem with patents - all inventions are treated the same. However there is a big difference between something reasonably new that took a decade of r&d work to get right and a tiny change to an existing invention which took a day and is an obvious logical progession from what came before which everyone would have came up with.
I once attended a patent trial and it was interesting. The defendant claimed the patent was obvious.
The plaintiff had some pretty good evidence that it was in fact not obvious:
• The defendant was one of the largest companies in the field with a very accomplished and impressive R&D department. The plaintiff introduced documents they got from the defendant during discovery where the CEO had called solving the specific problem that the patent solved to be vital to the future existence of their company and made solving it a top priority. Yet they failed to make any progress on it.
• Two of the other largest companies in the field, also with impressive R&D departments, had also been working on this and failed to come up with anything.
The jury found that the patent was obvious.
What I think happened is that both plaintiff and defendant had presentations that explained to the jury what the patent did. Both presentations did a great job of finding a problem from everyday life that was kind of analogous to the problem the patent involved, and translating the patent's solution to that everyday life problem. The presentations made it easy to understand the gist of what the patent did.
There's a natural tendency to mistake easy to understand for obviousness, and I think that by explaining the invention in a way that made it easy to understand it also made the jury think it was obvious.
But if you don't explain the invention in a way that the jury can understand how are they supposed to be able to make decisions?
This reminds me of college. Many a time I'd read some theorem named after a mathematician and think "how the heck does this obvious theorem get named after someone?". The answer is that it wasn't at all obvious when that mathematician proved it 400 years ago. I'm seeing it after 400 years of people figuring out how to present the subject in a way that makes that theorem obvious.
That reminds me of a classic math joke: A professor says "It is obvious that" and writes an equation. Then he pauses, and says "...wait, is that obvious?". He goes to another board and starts deriving the equation, not saying anything while doing this. After 20 minutes he had gotten it, says "I was right! It is obvious!" and goes back and resumes his lecture.
The patent law definition of obvious is different from the common understanding.
Specifically, it only counts if it was obvious before the patent filing to a person of ordinary skill. It's actually really hard for a patent claim to be rejected for obviousness. A poking stick for pressing buttons on a TV without getting up counts as a non-obvious invention.
This is your daily reminder that patents stifle innovation. This was evident over a century ago and the poster child for this is the so-called Wright Brothers patent war [1].
The Wright brothers patented a method of flight control and then went on a litigation spree. The result was that the US was unable to build airplanes. This became a problem when the US entered World War One and the US military had to buy planes from France.
This situation was so bad that the Federal government stepped in to force the major players to create a patent pool, a situation that lasted until 1977.
How accurate is it. I loved having a cgm for a few weeks. It’s over the counter now.
The strangest thing was keeping my blood sugar spikes really low but still gaining weight. I didn’t think my body could really store fat without a spike but apparently it can.
And will those reading features be available in Apple Watches just by virtues of you owning (or buying) the hardware or it will be behind a subscription (partially or fully)?
I have always had the following idea. Show specificalists in the domain the end result and make them reproduce it without reading the patent. If they succeed - the patent is invalid.
Is this a software or hardware patent, because afaics the sensors on the newer Watches would already support this so it could just be a software update?
Going through BS patents would be a nice job for Musk’s DOGE. That would do more good than firing people and two days later noticing that this people actually were important.
Probably accurate enough to learn how your body responds to different foods and exercise, to help prevent pre-diabetes, to help with general weight loss, and to help endurance athletes in their training.
But there is no universe it will be accurate enough to make insulin dosing decisions. Insulin dependent diabetics will require CGMs or finger pricks for another couple decades.
I manage my diabete with a "sensor" (Dexcom), an insulin pump, and a "loop device."
I would NEVER use Apple Watch for therapy, and I don't think Apple wants to step into this minefield.
BUT I guarantee you that having your glucose level as an (instantaneous/statistical) data point is a game-changer.
There are "pre-diabetes" phases where even mild monitoring (and an alert) can be essential.
And for those already in the tunnel, knowing you can have an additional "backup" alarm for hypo/hyper is very interesting (though, thinking about it, another alarm… no, better not :-D).
Pretty accurate since this works of averages - discarding outliners and norming get you close to the actual number pretty quickly - also with glucose your're interested in fluctuations more than absolutes
[+] [-] shakna|1 year ago|reply
The rest invalidated against Apple, through "alternative claim construction". That is, Apple's reading of the patent and its specific claims, showed it was narrower in scope than their particular usage.
None of this seems really surprising, and whilst it does open the door for Apple, it probably doesn't much open the door for other implementations to flourish - not without a lawyer guiding your particular tech choices.
[+] [-] pjc50|1 year ago|reply
Note how similar this is to the pulse oximeter, which was invented in Japan in 1972 and patented in the US in 2004.
https://www.nihonkohden.com/technology/aoyagi.html
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20050049469A1/en
[+] [-] tzs|1 year ago|reply
For oxygen sensing there are numerous readily available inexpensive stand-alone sensors available at any drug store or online. They are non-invasive and painless. Yes, a continuously wearable sensor would be better for some people but most people don't need that. Accordingly it is something that while nice wouldn't really sell a lot of watches, and so something that might not be worth licensing if it is under patent.
Glucose sensing on the other hand is a literal pain to test and has ongoing costs due to consumables used for the testing. Non-invasive painless glucose sensing on a watch is a feature that would sell a lot of watches. I think demand would be high enough, even if they have to raise prices, that it would easily be worth it.
[+] [-] ijustlovemath|1 year ago|reply
- skin conductivity changes over time
- the ways in which skin tone changes signal absorption (which itself changes over time)
- the ways in which different levels of fitness affect blood flow, material density etc.
You also can't use it in a hospital setting, due to how your skin and bloodflow changes during serious conditions like sepsis (though I'm guessing they're not thinking about that market).
Really smart people have been trying to use Raman spectroscopy to solve this problem for decades at this point (early patents go to early 2000s). Apple is an extremely strong hardware vendor, and I wish them luck, but I would not hold my breath for this. Plus, I'm guessing they will not open the signal up for looping, which would really leave the T*DM community out to dry.
[+] [-] analog31|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] paulcole|1 year ago|reply
I’d be hard-pressed to believe that someone trying the newest Dexcom G7 CGM would find it more discomforting than a mosquito bite. And for that literal pain you get 10 days of constant readings on your phone.
> I think demand would be high enough, even if they have to raise prices, that it would easily be worth it.
This is probably correct but I don’t think many non-diabetic people would see an actual benefit from CGM data. It’s the kind of thing people love to think is useful but in reality it’ll be just one more thing to ignore.
[+] [-] zdw|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] jurmous|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] adrr|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] whycome|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] pyaamb|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] userbinator|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] silexia|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] bonestamp2|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] bschne|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] schiffern|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] benmccann|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] friendzis|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] drannex|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] bawolff|1 year ago|reply
I think that is a major problem with patents - all inventions are treated the same. However there is a big difference between something reasonably new that took a decade of r&d work to get right and a tiny change to an existing invention which took a day and is an obvious logical progession from what came before which everyone would have came up with.
[+] [-] tzs|1 year ago|reply
The plaintiff had some pretty good evidence that it was in fact not obvious:
• The defendant was one of the largest companies in the field with a very accomplished and impressive R&D department. The plaintiff introduced documents they got from the defendant during discovery where the CEO had called solving the specific problem that the patent solved to be vital to the future existence of their company and made solving it a top priority. Yet they failed to make any progress on it.
• Two of the other largest companies in the field, also with impressive R&D departments, had also been working on this and failed to come up with anything.
The jury found that the patent was obvious.
What I think happened is that both plaintiff and defendant had presentations that explained to the jury what the patent did. Both presentations did a great job of finding a problem from everyday life that was kind of analogous to the problem the patent involved, and translating the patent's solution to that everyday life problem. The presentations made it easy to understand the gist of what the patent did.
There's a natural tendency to mistake easy to understand for obviousness, and I think that by explaining the invention in a way that made it easy to understand it also made the jury think it was obvious.
But if you don't explain the invention in a way that the jury can understand how are they supposed to be able to make decisions?
This reminds me of college. Many a time I'd read some theorem named after a mathematician and think "how the heck does this obvious theorem get named after someone?". The answer is that it wasn't at all obvious when that mathematician proved it 400 years ago. I'm seeing it after 400 years of people figuring out how to present the subject in a way that makes that theorem obvious.
That reminds me of a classic math joke: A professor says "It is obvious that" and writes an equation. Then he pauses, and says "...wait, is that obvious?". He goes to another board and starts deriving the equation, not saying anything while doing this. After 20 minutes he had gotten it, says "I was right! It is obvious!" and goes back and resumes his lecture.
[+] [-] jjk166|1 year ago|reply
Specifically, it only counts if it was obvious before the patent filing to a person of ordinary skill. It's actually really hard for a patent claim to be rejected for obviousness. A poking stick for pressing buttons on a TV without getting up counts as a non-obvious invention.
[+] [-] ljsprague|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] ikekkdcjkfke|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] renewiltord|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] medhir|1 year ago|reply
Or are there still quite a few challenges ahead and this is merely one roadblock removed.
[+] [-] jmyeet|1 year ago|reply
The Wright brothers patented a method of flight control and then went on a litigation spree. The result was that the US was unable to build airplanes. This became a problem when the US entered World War One and the US military had to buy planes from France.
This situation was so bad that the Federal government stepped in to force the major players to create a patent pool, a situation that lasted until 1977.
[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wright_brothers_patent_war
[+] [-] unknown|1 year ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] bilsbie|1 year ago|reply
The strangest thing was keeping my blood sugar spikes really low but still gaining weight. I didn’t think my body could really store fat without a spike but apparently it can.
[+] [-] bobmcnamara|1 year ago|reply
The spikes don't help either.
[+] [-] crossroadsguy|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] ReptileMan|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] derektank|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] oliyoung|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] wdb|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] rqtwteye|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] rasz|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] tehjoker|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] rrrrrrrrrrrryan|1 year ago|reply
But there is no universe it will be accurate enough to make insulin dosing decisions. Insulin dependent diabetics will require CGMs or finger pricks for another couple decades.
[+] [-] UomoNeroNero|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] bythreads|1 year ago|reply
[+] [-] m463|1 year ago|reply
there's sort of a usefulness threshold, and then there's a "can calculate insulin" threshold.
I think a LOT of people could benefit from plain high, medium, low with the understanding that you wouldn't make insulin decision based on it.
[+] [-] arijo|1 year ago|reply
This will be a revolution in personalized medicine.
Ketones next please.
[+] [-] aitchnyu|1 year ago|reply