These don't appear to be patents which Apple bought. Apple is the applicant as well as the original assignee on all of them. So these are almost certainly inventions by people working for Apple.They have done several things. They bought patents and were assigned all US rights to those patents, and they have developed the patents and these developments have been included in their patents.
People should just a look at the patent law suit. I’ve linked it again below.
People should really read the document before making blanket statements.
- Patent 257. “Seamlessly Embedded Heart Rate Monitor”. A system to identify an EKG in an external enclosed system different to the previous method. They outline it very clearly in the document. Page 8.
- Patent 619 "Electronic Device Having Sealed Button Biometric Sensing System" is a method of waterproofing such device. Page 16.
- Patent 898 "Wellness Aggregator" has to do with the way in which the data is stored. Page 24. It goes in to great detail about this citing very many examples.
- Patent 533 "User Interfaces For Health Monitoring" is the way in which hardware and software resolve difficult or problematic measurements. Page 41
I have never even indicated that I am a patent lawyer, yet I will say that I believe it is the responsibility to search patents to ensure you are not infringing. AliveCor may very well have "invented" the same technology that Apple has bought, improved or invented, and it’s not unusual to have 2 different parties inventing the same product. However my understanding is that the Party who has patented the technology first has the rights to that patent. They may have brought these to market prior as well, but that makes no difference. AliveCor should have done it’s due diligence.
They made the Apple Watch, so I don’t believe it’s patent trolling, or anything like it. They bought the initial patent to have an external device unlike what has been done before. AliveCor has used that technology to bring it product. Apple has no interest in making medical devices where you put your thumb on each pad to get a reading. It’s not a wearable.
As Apple have said before, sometimes they have to wait decades to bring products to life. Now that 3nm chips are being developed, they may have a whole string of products they have had on the shelves. Who knows?
I'd also note that the oldest among them (i.e. the '257 patent) features embodiments related to iPhones. The included drawings are of iPhones with leads placed around the bezels or under the display. And some of the example embodiments describe the same (though I don't think, and wouldn't expect, that the term iPhone was used).