Ultrahuman sues Oura for patent infringement in smart ring battle

After being sued by Oura, smart ring maker Ultrahuman is suing right back, alleging a similar violation.

Ultrahuman, which has similar health and fitness tracking capabilities as its competitor, filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Finland-based Oura in India’s Delhi High Court on Thursday.

“Oura has blatantly copied Ultrahuman’s advanced intellectual property including women’s health features, circadian health tools, and glucose monitoring platform thereby benefiting from Ultrahuman’s investment in public health without a license to do so,” Ultrahuman alleged in a press release announcing the lawsuit.

It’s the latest salvo in the legal battle of the smart rings.

Oura sued Ultrahuman and RingConn for patent infringement in the U.S., saying the rivals copied key features such as its curved battery to fit the ring shape and advanced sensors. Oura claims its competitors purchased Oura rings to reverse engineer them and study their inner workings. The U.S. International Trade Commission (ITC) initially ruled in favor of Oura’s infringement claims, but a final decision is still to come.

Earlier this year, Ultrahuman said certain components of the smart ring have actually been around for years, and Oura only recently secured the patent to take on competitors. “This isn’t a dispute over years of secret R&D,” Ultrahuman said in a blog post about the lawsuit. “It’s about a very recent patent purchase now being wielded to limit the choices ring-wearers like you have…”

Ultrahuman’s lawsuit against Oura centers around a patent granted by the India Patent Office that the company says protects the unique smart ring architecture of its Ring AIR smart ring. It alleges that Oura’s Ring 4 infringes on this patent by copying these protected elements and further profiting from this with a subscription-based service.

“Companies that replicate Ultrahuman’s breakthroughs only to lock them behind mandatory subscriptions are anti-innovation and anti-consumer,” the press release continued.

Oura did not respond to Mashable by the time of publication.