Apple races to change blood oxygen algorithms as U.S. Apple Watch ban looms

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It’s a high-stakes engineering effort unlike any Apple has undertaken before. Though the iPhone maker’s products have previously been barred in certain countries over legal disputes, this restriction would hit one of Apple’s biggest moneymakers in its home country — on Christmas no less. Without a last-minute veto by the White House, a ban imposed by the International Trade Commission will take effect on Dec. 25.

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Apple could settle with Masimo, though that’s a route it typically prefers not to take. And the two companies don’t appear to have engaged on that front. For now, Apple is focused on modifying its technology and trying to win favor with regulators.

If the ban holds, Apple is working on a range of legal and technical options. Already, it’s begun preparing stores for the change. It sent new signs to its retail outlets that promote the Apple Watch without showing photos of the Series 9 and Ultra 2 — two models targeted by the ban. The company’s lower-end SE watch will still be available.

Apple plans to stop selling the prohibited watches on its website on Thursday and then pull them from its roughly 270 brick-and-mortar outlets by Dec. 24.

Work within Apple suggests that the company believes software changes — rather than a more complicated hardware overhaul — will be enough to bring the device back to store shelves. But the patents at the heart of the dispute are mostly related to hardware, including how light is emitted into the skin to measure the amount of oxygen in a person’s blood…

Masimo has said that a software fix will be an insufficient remedy. “The hardware needs to change,” the maker of medical devices said… In a scenario where Apple needs to remove hardware from its device, getting new models produced and shipped could take at least three months, according to one person familiar with the company’s operations. And that doesn’t account for how long it will take the customs agency to approve the move.

‎Via: Bloomberg