If you’re someone who runs for exercise, then chances are you’re more than familiar with Strava. For those unfamiliar, Strava is a fitness-tracking platform for athletes. It allows users to record their exercise GPS, which they can then share with friends or on social media. Now, it looks like Strava and Garmin are having a bit of a dispute, resulting in a lawsuit where Strava sues Garmin over alleged patent infringements.
Strava sues Garmin over patents
The lawsuit was filed on September 30 in the US District Court for the District of Colorado. It targets two key features: Segments and heatmaps, which are admittedly features one might commonly associate with Strava. The company claims these features, which have existed on Garmin devices for over a decade, violate its patents. The fitness platform is demanding that Garmin stop selling watches like the Fenix 8, Forerunner, and Venu series, as well as Edge cycling computers.
Strava filed the patents for Segments in 2011 and heatmaps in 2013. However, Garmin introduced its own heatmaps in early 2013 and Segments in 2014. Despite being similar in concept, both companies decided to work together. Strava and Garmin eventually signed a Master Cooperation Agreement in 2015 to implement Strava Live Segments on Garmin devices.
According to Strava’s complaint, “On information and belief, Garmin has long sought to leverage its hardware footprint to build its own social and competitive fitness experiences, but those efforts have failed to match Strava’s adoption, engagement, or network effects. Given the low popularity of Garmin’s internally-built features, Garmin sought to collaborate with Strava to directly integrate Strava’s segments into Garmin’s devices.”
So, what’s next?
If you use any of Garmin’s fitness/smartwatches, you might be worried that this lawsuit could have a negative impact on your overall experience. However, that’s something Strava is hoping to avoid. According to a Strava spokesperson, “Our lawsuit is between two companies; we do not intend to take any actions that would disrupt the ability of Garmin users to sync their data with Strava and hope Garmin values our shared users in the same way.”
However, Garmin did not really say much about it. The company did make a statement, which was to say it does not comment on pending litigation.
Strava vs Garmin Lawsuit Could Shake Up Your Workout Tech
