What might have been a big partnership opportunity for AliveCor in the years following the release of the Apple Watch in 2015, to offer watch bands that monitor heart health, has turned into a messy court fight.
Now, instead of riding Apple’s coattails as a prominent player in the wearable medical device market, forecast to grow to $132.5 billion by 2031, AliveCor’s Food and Drug Administration-approved technology is inaccessible to the tens of millions of people who buy Apple Watches every year.
The startup is in its third year of trying to prove to judges that the iPhone maker brazenly copied its heart-monitoring technology and sabotaged AliveCor’s ability to offer its own product on the Apple Watch. Apple has parried with claims that its smaller rival’s patent-infringement and antitrust claims are meritless — and with counterattacks alleging that AliveCor is the imitator…
[L]egal experts are skeptical that AliveCor can win its crusade to prove Apple illegally blocked its technology from the Apple Watch, or even collect royalty payments from its adversary.
