The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 45 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today. In this particular report we cover Apple's granted patents for their Lightning connector and one relating to Touch ID biometrics. We wrap up this week's granted patent report with our traditional listing of the remaining granted patents that were issued to Apple today.

Granted Patent: Lightning Connector

Apple's newly granted patent covers their invention relating to their lightning connector describes as a "Dual orientation electronic connector." Apple's patent FIG. 13A illustrated below is a simplified perspective view of a plug connector having eight contacts formed on each opposing surface of tab #44 according to one embodiment of the present invention; FIGS. 13B and 13C are simplified top and bottom views of plug connector 100 shown in FIG. 13A.

Apple's granted patent 9,437,984 was filed in Q3 2015 and published today by the US Patent and Trademark Office. Origins of the invention are noted as dating back to 2011.

Granted Patent: Touch ID, Finger Biometric Pre-Matching

Apple's newly granted patent titled "Electronic device performing finger biometric pre-matching and related methods" covers their invention relating to the field of electronics, and, more particularly, to the field of finger sensors. More specifically, Apple's Touch ID related patent relates to providing an authentication device that more quickly performs a finger matching operation.

Apple's granted patent 9,436,864 was originally filed in Q3 2012 and published today by the US Patent and Trademark Office. Apple's Senior Engineering Manager Giovanni Gozzini is noted as the inventor. Gozzini came to Apple via their acquisition of Authentec. Earlier in his career Giovanni Gozzini was vice president of development at UPEK. Giovanni has over 18 years of engineering expertise with focuses on low-power silicon sensors, analog computing devices and high speed designs for telecommunication. He alsoi has deep technical experience in system level design and integration of semiconductors, hardware and software for biometric applications.

The Remaining Patents granted to Apple Today

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Patently Apple presents only a brief summary of granted patents with associated graphics for journalistic news purposes as each Granted Patent is revealed by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office. Readers are cautioned that the full text of any Granted Patent should be read in its entirety for full details. About Making Comments on our Site: Patently Apple reserves the right to post, dismiss or edit any comments. Those using abusive language or behavior will result in being blacklisted on Disqus.