In 2016, during WWDC Apple presented a feature that many people use today: unlocking their computer (here a Mac) with their connected watch (an Apple Watch). If both devices have the same Apple ID, it is possible to unlock one using the other.
Very practical, this functionality has since found its place in many homes, and inevitably, the other side of the coin for Apple is the arrival of “patent trolls”. Four years after the announcement of this technology, a company spotted by Patently Apple announced that it wanted to take legal action against the Cupertino company.
The patent was published after Apple's demonstration
Indeed, the SmartWatch company MobileConcepts filed a patent shortly after WWDC precisely describing the technology presented by Apple weeks earlier. This patent being the only proof of invention that exists for such a system, Apple will have to argue to prove that it has not committed any theft of intellectual property.
However, this case should be quite simple for Apple's lawyers. Indeed, there is a public demonstration (WWDC 2016) of the technology which predates the establishment of the patent. Which clearly shows that the patent should never have been issued at the time, and that SmartWatch MobileConcepts was content to transcribe Apple's presentations to produce a patent and hope that the Cupertino company will pay the requests for damages.
Patent trolls are the cancer of Silicon Valley
Companies like SmartWatch MobileConcepts are numerous in the world of new technologies. They file patents, without ever developing the corresponding technology and they only wait for a large company in Silicon Valley to use this system to claim paternity and go to trial.
Unfortunately for them, American justice is starting to put the kibosh on this system, and an in-depth reform of patents for inventions as well as their distribution could well see the light of day in the coming years, thus cutting the problem at the root.
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By : Keleops AG
