Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
63,290
30,373



The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office has denied Apple's trademark application for the "Touch ID" name used for its fingerprint recognition technology, citing a similar trademark owned by Kronos Technology. The USPTO rejection letter was sent to Apple in May 2014, according to Patently Apple, which recently uncovered the communication.

touchid.jpg
In its letter to Apple, the USPTO said Apple's trademark for Touch ID was too similar to U.S. Registration number 2735480, which was issued to Kronos in 2003 and protects the term "Kronos Touch ID." Apple has until November 2014 to change the nomenclature of its trademark application, which would require the company to rename its fingerprint scanning technology. Alternatively, Apple can seek to acquire or license the trademark from Kronos.

Apple faced a similar situation with its iPhone name, which was trademarked by Cisco. Apple and Cisco negotiated a deal that allowed Apple to license the trademark following an infringement lawsuit filed by Cisco shortly after the iPhone debuted. In recent years, Apple also settled an iPhone trademark infringement case with Brazilian company IGB and an iPad name dispute Chinese company Proview Technology.

Article Link: USPTO Preliminarily Denies Apple's 'Touch ID' Trademark Application
 

Richardgm

macrumors 6502a
Aug 1, 2008
968
719
Apple probably can solve their trademark issues (iPad, App Store, MultiTouch, and now Touch ID) by doing a little research first.
 

macduke

macrumors G5
Jun 27, 2007
13,106
19,603
TouchID is a good name, and likely an important part of their upcoming payments platform. Just pay Kronos and call it a day.
 

outphase

macrumors 65816
Jun 13, 2009
1,291
32
Parts Unknown
Reports on Office Actions from the USPTO always come off as huge things on tech sites. It's not that the USPTO is declaring it dead. For example, a trademark office action has a 6 month due date for a response. Apple has many courses of action to take because the trademark registration application isn't abandoned yet.
 

madsci954

macrumors 68030
Oct 14, 2011
2,725
658
Ohio
Or buy them... :)

Kronos is a global company that deals with workforce software for other companies. I would imagine the price tag would make the Beats acquisition look like chump change in comparison.

Apple will probably offer to buy the name only or buy a license to use.
 

juanrp

macrumors 6502a
Jun 14, 2014
591
40
Florida
Knowing apple they will either:

1. Acquire the license like they have in the past

2. Rename it something like 'Finger ID' and overdramatize it.

Ex: Finger ID is beautifully, unapologetically renamed for a better user experience. With Finger ID, we had to work with usability, then work backwards to design. Which let us to create the beautiful iPhone 6 to go with it.
 

Attachments

  • image.jpg
    image.jpg
    38.6 KB · Views: 161

QuarterSwede

macrumors G3
Oct 1, 2005
9,778
2,026
Colorado Springs, CO
TouchID is a good name, and likely an important part of their upcoming payments platform. Just pay Kronos and call it a day.
Oh how I would love for Apple to buy Kronos. I have to use and edit time entries every day and that software is HORRIBLE (although the time clock works but the UX sucks). You're lucky if it even gets through loading.

Too bad it would make little sense for them to buy them. Licensing is the way to go.
 
Last edited:

TheRealTVGuy

macrumors 6502a
Jul 21, 2010
704
1,156
Orlando, FL
Oh how I would love for Apple to buy Kronos. I have to use and edit time entries every day and that software is HORRIBLE (although the time clock works but the UX sucks). You're lucky if it even gets through loading.

Too bad it would make little sense for them to buy them. Licensing is the way to go.



THANK YOU!
I work for a large media and entertainment company and we're switching from Kronos to Workday. The fact that we had an older computer trying to VPN onto the company network and that the Kronos Application utilized an older version of Java meant that it would freeze up most of the time.

Nasty software.
/rant
 

Iconoclysm

macrumors 68040
May 13, 2010
3,090
2,458
Washington, DC
Kronos is a global company that deals with workforce software for other companies. I would imagine the price tag would make the Beats acquisition look like chump change in comparison.

Apple will probably offer to buy the name only or buy a license to use.

Well, the price tag for that company in 2007 was $1.77 billion, and it's probably far less now...so no, Beats acquisition would make this look like chump change.
 

Kabeyun

macrumors 68040
Mar 27, 2004
3,410
6,347
Eastern USA
Kronos is a global company that deals with workforce software for other companies. I would imagine the price tag would make the Beats acquisition look like chump change in comparison.

Apple will probably offer to buy the name only or buy a license to use.
...aaaand to use "Touch ID," what other answer did you have in mind?
 

3282868

macrumors 603
Jan 8, 2009
5,281
0
Random thought, I never liked iPad. I remember many threads around early 2010 hinting to iSlate as Apple bought up domains with that name. Would have saved them the headache.

As for this, seems frivolous. It's not "Kronos Touch ID", it's "Touch ID", a pretty simple monicker. Either Apple pays off the patent/settles or changes it to "Apple Touch ID"?
 

BrentD

macrumors 6502
Jun 25, 2010
305
221
Well, the price tag for that company in 2007 was $1.77 billion, and it's probably far less now...so no, Beats acquisition would make this look like chump change.
Their current valuation is actually at 1.78B according to the NYSE. Doesn't change your overall point, but it hasn't decreased.
 

rorschach

macrumors 68020
Jul 27, 2003
2,269
1,841
Kronos is a global company that deals with workforce software for other companies. I would imagine the price tag would make the Beats acquisition look like chump change in comparison.

Apple will probably offer to buy the name only or buy a license to use.

Funny enough, Apple has used Kronos for its own workforce management for years.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.