The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office officially published a series of 55 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. today. In this particular report we briefly cover five patents of interest. As an example, one granted patent covers the technology behind the HomePod's spatial awareness; another covers Apple's Home App while yet another covers the channel bar UI found in Apple TV. As always, we close out this week's granted patent report with our traditional listing of the remaining granted patents that were issued to Apple today.
Speaker System
We begin with a patent for a speaker system titled "Room and Program responsive loudspeaker system that uses the principles found in Apple's HomePod. Other HomePod related patents could be found in our Audio archives.
Apple notes on their HomePod page that "Equipped with spatial awareness, HomePod automatically tunes itself to give you optimal sound — wherever it's placed. Pair it with a second HomePod to create an unmatched stereo experience."
Apple's patent states that "The audio receiver measures the acoustic properties of the room in which the loudspeaker arrays reside and the audio characteristics of the sound program content to be played through the loudspeaker arrays. Based on these measurements, the audio receiver assigns a directivity ratio and potentially various beam patterns to one or more segments of the sound program content."
Apple TV Channel Bar Patent UI
Apple has been granted an Apple TV patent relating to its channel bar UI. Apple's patent FIG. 5 below depicts one embodiment of Apple TV with secondary sources.
Apple notes that invention covers a channel bar that is "dynamically scoped responsive to interactions of a viewer with the system. Selectable elements within the channel bar provide direct access to related content regarding video content, such as television series information and cast information. In addition, the channel bar is operable in multiple modes. An EPG [Electronic Program Guide] mode displays live video for multiple channels simultaneously. Themed modes permit channel bars that display content according to various themes which may be defined by a viewer, the provider, or both."
Home App, Hearing Aid & Flexible Displays
Other granted patents worth pointing out today: One covers Apple's Home App; another relates to hearing aid detection that we originally covered back in 2013; and finally, one for electronic devices with flexible displays that we originally covered as a patent application back in 2012.
The Remaining Patents granted to Apple Today
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.
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