Knobbe Martens Olson & Bear LLP

Masimo Corporation

For nearly ten years, Masimo Corporation has manufactured and sold patient monitoring devices that combine proprietary signal processing algorithms with innovative sensor technologies to accurately report human physiology. Specifically, Masimo systems are designed to substantially eliminate the problems of motion artifact, low peripheral perfusion and most weak signal-to-noise situations, extending pulse oximetry into high motion, low signal and noise intensive environments. Over 100 clinical studies conclude that Masimo's technologies represent the standard of care for pulse oximeters. Masimo has recently added the non-invasive detection of carbon monoxide to its long list of innovations.

During the same time frame, the firm has helped Masimo acquire, manage, license, and enforce a large and valuable patent and trademark portfolio including over 100 U.S. patents, many of which have foreign counterpart patents and applications, and dozens of registered U.S and foreign trademarks. The firm also works closely with management to provide a wide variety of agreements buttressed by the foregoing patent and trademark portfolios, including OEM licenses, joint-development agreements and partnering agreements.

The firm has also guided and continues to guide Masimo through a number of enforcement proceedings, including patent litigation with Nellcor Puritan Bennett Inc., a division of Tyco Healthcare. In the spring of 2004, the firm's litigation team brought Masimo through a jury trial resulting in a finding that Nellcor infringes certain Masimo patents on read-through-motion pulse oximetry technology. The same jury rejected Nellcor's claim that Masimo's pulse oximetry sensor infringes a Nellcor patent.

In addition, the firm assisted Masimo's CEO, Joe Kiani, during his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy, and Consumer Rights, as the subcommittee held hearings regarding the practices of Group Purchasing Organizations (GPOs) and Dominant Medical suppliers, hopefully paving the way for hospitals to more easily provide patients with the best technologies innovation can provide, regardless of the particular provider of those technologies.

Knobbe Martens is proud to represent this innovative industry leader.