How a 2018 continuation led to Masimo’s $634M verdict against Apple

What did the court decide, and where does the case stand?

The case is Masimo Corp. v. Apple Inc., No. 8:20-cv-00048-JVS (C.D. Cal.). On Nov 14, 2025 the jury found for Masimo on claims 11–14 of the ’776 patent and awarded $634,313,913. Press reports describe the features at issue as Apple Watch’s workout mode and heart-rate notifications (AppleInsider).

Claim 11 recites a patient monitor whose processors calculate pulse rate while switching, on a trigger signal, between two light-source control protocols with different duty cycles and power consumption. Claims 12–14 depend from it.

On July 20, 2026, Judge Selna entered final judgment. Per Bloomberg Law and Strata-gee, he kept the verdict, found claims 11–14 not invalid, and found no willfulness. Masimo filed a notice of appeal the same day. On Oct 5, 2026 the court awarded prejudgment interest. Press reports put it at about $184M, for a total of about $818M (iPhone in Canada). Apple has said it will appeal. We could not confirm a Federal Circuit docket number.

What can practitioners learn from the ’776 family?

Keeping a family pending kept options open

By 2018 the earliest application was more than 16 years old. Because a continuation was always on file, new claims could still be presented on the 2002 disclosure. Once the last pending member issues or is abandoned, that door closes for good.

Claims aimed at a known product are proper

The sources we checked do not say what products Masimo’s counsel had in mind when the 2018 claims were drafted, and we draw no conclusion about it. The law on the point is settled. Kingsdown (Fed. Cir. 1988) says:

“[N]or is it in any manner improper to amend or insert claims intended to cover a competitor’s product the applicant’s attorney has learned about during the prosecution of a patent application.”

The limit is support. It is not improper to broaden claims to encompass a competitor’s products “as long as the disclosure supports the broadened claims” (Liebel-Flarsheim, 2004, quoted in Google v. Sonos, 2025).

Support had to come from the 2002 disclosure

A continuation gets the earlier filing date only for claims the earlier disclosure supports (35 U.S.C. 120). New claims in 2018 had to find written-description support in a specification carried forward from 2002. The courts watch this closely: the requirement is “particularly important” when claims are added later in response to others’ developments (Quake v. Lo, 2019).

On the record we checked, the claims held up. The PTAB found claims 1–16 patentable in IPR2020-01524 (certificate issued May 9, 2024). An IPR can only raise novelty and obviousness over patents and printed publications (35 U.S.C. 311(b)), so it did not test written description. The district court found claims 11–14 not invalid, per press reports.

From filing to grant in 344 days

The application was filed on Oct 29, 2018, published on Mar 7, 2019, and issued on Oct 8, 2019. The face of the patent does not say how examination was expedited, if at all, and we did not review the file history. The general point stands: a pending application has no enforceable claims, so time to grant matters. For a fast route, see Track One for continuations.

What would the same filing owe today?

The continuing application fee took effect on Jan 19, 2025 (89 FR 91898). Benefit claims presented before then never owe it (CAF Guide Q6), so the real 2018 filing paid nothing. Here is what an identical continuation would owe if filed now.

The fee runs from the earliest benefit date, not the priority date. A provisional does not count (CAF Guide Q4). For this family the earliest benefit date is June 26, 2002, the filing date of 10/184,028, not July 2, 2001.

• The 9-year anniversary, June 26, 2011, was a Sunday. Filing on the next business day, June 27, still owed only the 6-year amount (CAF Guide Q14–15).
• The patent does not state Masimo’s entity size, so all three rates are shown. The fee is on top of the basic filing, search and examination fees.
• If the fee is not paid, the benefit claim is not entered and the application loses the earlier date.