Context: In late January, Apple started shipping the Apple Vision Pro mixed-reality device (YouTube video).
What’s new: On Monday (March 18, 2024), a small company founded in 2001 named Proxense filed a multi-patent infringement complaint against Apple over optical authentication technologies, targeting multiple Apple products, among them the Apple Vision Pro. The lawsuit was brought in the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas and assigned to Judge Alan D. Albright of the court’s Waco division.
Direct impact: Proxense is seeking damages (for which that district is famous) and an injunction. It will take a while for the case to unfold, but Judge Albright aims to take cases to trial relatively quickly.
Wider ramifications: This is probably the first-ever patent infringement complaint naming the Apple Vision Pro among the accused devices, with many more to come. Compared to Apple, almost any other defendant to patent infringement cases in the world is a soft target.
Here’s the Proxense v. Apple complaint:
At the end of the case number, the letters ADA stand for Judge Alan D. Albright, a judge and former patent litigator who temporarily managed to make the Waco division of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas the world’s number one patent litigation venue: his court temporarily attracted about a quarter of all U.S. patent infringement filings, as plaintiffs expected swift decisions, a generally (though it still depends on a given case) plaintiff-friendly judicial style, and can sue many technology companies there because of the presence they have in the Austin area, while lawsuits in districts with which a defendant has only a tenuous connection are easily transferred out.
For many years, Apple’s least favorite U.S. patent litigation venue was the Eastern District of Texas. They even relocated some Apple Stores to avoid a strong presence there. But then came the period during which Judge Albright attracted an unprecendeted number of patent infringement filings. Apple and others lobbied against the setup there that enabled “judge-shopping”: anyone who filed a case with the Waco division of the Western District of Texas was sure to have the case assigned tp Judge Albright. Under pressure from the Chief Justice of the United States himself, the district court changed the assignment rules, which is why there’s now only a limited chance of having a case assigned to Judge Albright. Proxense was lucky, though again, Judge Albright does strive to make correct decisions and it’s not like a weak case would become strong only because he’s presiding over the proceedings.
David Hecht, the lawyer who filed this complaint, has sued Apple on many occasions for more than a decade: first at Quinn Emanuel, and in recent years through his own New York firm, Hecht Partners. Many (but by far not all) of his Apple cases involved patents.
Four of the patents-in-suit have the same title (“Biometric personal data key (PDK) authentication”) as they are from the same patent family:
- U.S. Patent No. 9,298,905
- U.S. Patent No. 8,352,730
- U.S. Patent No. 8,886,954
- U.S. Patent No. 10,698,989
The other two patents also share a title (“Hybrid Device Having a Personal Digital Key and Receiver-Decoder circuit and Methods of Use”) as they are from one patent family:
Here are the references to the Apple Vision Pro that are found in the complaint:
- In 2024, Apple introduced Retina ID with the Apple Vision Pro. Apple describes that: “In the same way that Touch ID revolutionized authentication using a fingerprint and Face ID revolutionized authentication using facial recognition, Optic ID revolutionizes authentication using iris recognition.” [] “With a look, Optic ID securely unlocks your Apple Vision Pro. You can use it to authorize purchases from the App Store and Book Store, payments using Apple Pay, and more.” [] “Developers can also allow you to use Optic ID to sign into their apps.” [] “Apps that support Touch ID or Face ID automatically support Optic ID.” []
- Apple uses Apple ID (in conjunction with biometrics sensors available on various devices) across its devices, including iPhone, iPad, and Apple Vision Pro. Apple instructs its users to (1) Open the Settings app; (2) Tap Sign in to your [device]; and (3) Choose a way to sign in […]
The complaint says the company “holds 80 patents on related technology, including digital content distribution, digital rights management, personal authentication, biometric data management and mobile payments.” Of those patents, they picked six to sue Apple.
In a different patent dispute involving Apple as the defendant, a patent holder is asserting pulse oximetry patents and has won a U.S. import ban, but Apple keeps selling certain Apple Watch models with the feature temporarily disabled. Should Apple prevail on Apple, it will almost certainly reactivate that functionality by means of a software update (March 12, 2024 ip fray article).