There has been a lot of chatter in recent days on the Fitness Strava application and the Finnish company SmartWatch SUUNTO depositing separate proceedings against Garmin – and what it means for millions of people who have one or more of the best Garmin watches.
We have broken down the whole situation below, as well as the probable results of this legal quarry still evolving.
Strava’s trial and what it means for you
The Strava / Garmin costume dates back to 2011, when Strava filed the patent for what was going to become its segment technology. The segments allow users to determine how well they have done between two points on a course, using GPS technology to provide data on the user traveling between these points.
The patent was finally granted in 2015, but Garmin piqued Strava to the post, publishing his own segments functionality in 2014 on the cyclist EDGE 1000. Garmin and Strava collaborated in a master cooperation agreement to put in the live segments of Strava on his aircraft, and the two worked closely for a decade.
Now Strava has filed three charges of patent infringement against Garmin and one for a breach of contract, as disclosed by Garminrumors – apparently for having violated this agreement.
Article 55 of the trial stipulates: “Garmin spread far beyond the scope of this agreement. Garmin has built, marked and widely deployed Garmin segments outside the Strava built experience and not of the Strava; activated segment competitors and segment services independent of Garmin.
Strava has now decided to take action on a long -term simulation problem between the pair, despite the way Strava and Garmin worked together on functionality.
The two other patent counterfeit counts refer to thermal cards and how other users’ routes are recommended and shown in the Garmin and Strava applications. This patent, filed in 2016 under the title “Generation of activity cards preferably users” and granted in 2017, would have (according to the trial) which would have been flouted by Garmin “on July 25, 2025”.
Strava asked for the Tribunal’s award and orders Garmin to permanently stop the sale of watches with counterfeit technology.
This is the main concern for users: that Garmin looks is not sold as long as the legal situation is not resolved, or that Garmin will be forced to remove the features of his watches, via a software update like Apple was with its blood oxygen sensor. We will surely know about it in the coming days.
A revealing reddit article
Adjust the recordings on Garmin from R / Strava
All of this seems relatively simple, but another problem has surface that could explain why Strava has chosen to arm this longtime problem now.
Strava’s product manager Matt Salazar went to the Strava Soust on Friday October 3 to solve a problem with the Garmin API, or application programming interface. Garmin wants to display his logo when his data is shared with third -party services, including Strava, and has threatened to withdraw from these services if he is unable to do so.
Salazar wrote: “We already provide an allocation to each data partner, but Garmin wants to use Strava and all the other partners as an advertising platform – they told us that they cared more about their marketing than your user experience. We consider that it is your data.”
It seems that the moment is not a coincidence. Garmin presented an ultimatum to Strava, so Strava withdrew, trying to stimulate support in the Strava community and presents an apparently indisputable patent dispute.
Unfortunately for Strava, the Reddit Post turned against him. Reddit users quickly underlined hypocrisy, because Strava displays its own logo when sharing data with other applications, and has already adopted reference approaches with third -party applications.
“I do not believe a second, you do this to defend us and our data and our user experience, and no one else buys it,” said a poster.
“As a member of Strava Premium (paid), I want to be clear that Strava is only used for me if you work with Garmin. Says another.
At the time of writing the writing moment, the message has 0 votes up and more than 1,300 comments. OOF.
And SUUNTO?
It seems that Suunto felt blood in the water and wants to join the food frenzy, hitting Garmin with a trial of his own in which he claims that Garmin has violated at least five patents of Suunto mouse.
These include patents on golf watches, such as a wrist computer which can detect a typing event and determine the position of a bullet using GPS; an energy efficient method of using heart rate sensor data to determine the respiratory frequency of a carrier; and an antenna assembly technology which also allows the incorporation of additional metallic components without interfering with the signal or reception.
Suunto names many watches, including Fenix, Precursor, Venu, Instinct and Epix ranges. He even goes after the ranges of Marq Ultra-Premium, like the Garmin Marq Golfer Gen 2, which we recently attributed five stars in our review.
SUUNTO requests Garmin’s damages due to the potential loss of income, but does not ask that this does not stop for the sale of these watches – relief to those looking for discounts on Amazon Big Days on the Garmin Fenix 8. Even if the case of Suunto is confirmed, you can always get a garmin.
