Biden won’t save the Apple Watch from potential ban
Enlarge / AliveCor and Apple's battle started with the Apple Watch Series 4. (credit: Valentina Palladino)
Apple will continue fighting California-based AliveCor over the startup's electrocardiogram (ECG) technology. On Tuesday, AliveCor announced that US President Joe Biden had decided not to veto the US International Trade Commission's (ITC) December ruling that could lead to an import ban on the Apple Watch Series 4 and later.
It's unlikely that Apple's watch will be totally banned. But as The Verge pointed out, AliveCor could walk away with a licensing agreement from Apple to use its patents in the Apple Watch.
According to AliveCor, which has around 150 workers to Apple's 80,000, it shared its ECG sensor technology with Apple in 2015 while building a business relationship, The Hill reported earlier this month. In 2018, Apple released the Apple Watch Series 4, which not only introduced an ECG sensor to the smartwatch but also blocked outside heart monitoring apps. AliveCor said this forced it in 2019 to stop selling KardiaBand, an ECG band that the company announced for Apple Watches in 2016.