The ban on Apple selling the Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 in the United States began on December 26, because of a dispute with Masimo Inc. about patents relating to the blood oxygen sensing in the Watches. Now, they could be back on sale at a moment’s notice, thanks to a successful appeal by Apple.
In the latest twist in the saga, an emergency motion for an appeal by Apple has led to the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit today accepting an interim stay for the sales ban between January 5 to January 10, 2024 while the court considers Apple’s request to stay the ban until its appeal has taken place.
Apple has not yet said whether it will restart sales of the Watches, and both say “Currently unavailable” on the company’s website.
This latest development comes at is revealed that the company has a product redesign in place which it hopes will see the Watches on sale again fast.
The appeal filing that has led to the interim stay was published, though with significant redactions. One of these replaces text with the description “redesign details”. It reads, “The Exclusion Order Enforcement Branch of U.S. Customs and Border Protection is scheduled to decide on January 12, 2024 whether a redesigned version of the Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2—which…” before the blacked-out redaction begins. The sentence concludes “falls outside the scope of the Commission’s remedial orders.”
Why this is interesting is it looks like it confirms, for the first time, that Apple has indeed been working on a solution to the patent dispute. And indeed it looks like that solution is far enough advanced to be described as a redesign. It seems overwhelmingly likely that this means a software redesign rather than hardware, something that Masimo says will not be enough and commented that the “hardware needs to change.”
No details are given, but the idea that Apple has come up with a suitable redesign is remarkable, given the time frame.
Right now, the only Apple Watch on sale from the company in the U.S. is the Apple Watch SE, as this doesn’t contain the blood oxygen sensing feature, though this could change quickly.
This is a fast-moving situation, so please check back for more details as they emerge.
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