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San Francisco, CA - Samsung has yet to announce a release date for its new Galaxy Ring brand of wearable, health-tracking devices, but it has filed an intellectual property suit in California federal court Thursday targeting a Finnish startup that makes its own line of smart rings.

Samsung Electronics Corp. Ltd. on Thursday lodged a declaratory judgment action saying there's "an actual, imminent risk" that Oura Health OY will bring a patent infringement case against the South Korean electronics giant.

In January, Samsung teased the launch of the Galaxy Ring at an event in San Jose, California, called Galaxy Unpacked, the company's major sales show, where it was described by Samsung as "a powerful and accessible health and wellness device" and "a brand-new form factor." A prototype would not be displayed until the Mobile World Congress, a different sales show, that took place the next month in Barcelona, Spain. A release date or price point for these devices has yet to be announced.

Nevertheless, according to Samsung's lawsuit, Oura CEO Tom Hale has been going around and threatening litigation in comments to blogs and news outlets. His company, which has been around since 2013, sells its own electronic wearable device called the Oura Ring. Oura started selling the rings, which track various measurements of physical activity, in 2017, and that were once endorsed by Kim Kardashian. In 2022, the company announced that it has sold over a million so far.

According to Samsung's suit, Oura's CEO sent the blog TechCrunch a statement on the day of Samsung's first Galaxy Ring announcement that read: "Oura has the strongest [intellectual property] portfolio — in both hardware and software — for the smart ring form factor, with 100 granted patents, 270 pending patent applications and 130+ registered trademarks." The suit said that a week later Hale appeared on CNBC's "Squawk Box" and told host Andrew Ross Sorkin that, "We'll see whether or not [the Galaxy Ring] infringes on [Oura's technology]. And frankly, we'll take the action that's appropriate."

Samsung, however, is saying that its ring does not infringe a handful of Oura patents, which Oura has already leveled in cases against other companies. The one that has moved furthest along is a dispute at the U.S. International Trade Commission that targeted a number of companies that are not Samsung, like Circular, a French maker of electronic rings, and RingConn, a Chinese company that also makes rings.

A hearing in front of an administrative judge at the ITC is not scheduled to take place until this December.

Representatives for the companies did not return a request for comment.

The patents-at-issue are U.S. Patent Nos. 10,842,429; 11,868,178; 11,868,179; 10,893,833; and 11,599,147.

Samsung is represented by Bill Trac, Cason Cole, Marc J. Pensabene, Mark Liang, Sorin Gabriel Zaharia, and Ryan Ken Yagura of O'Melveny & Myers LLP.

Counsel information for Oura was not available Friday.

The case is Samsung Electronics Corp. Ltd. et al. v. Oura Health OY et al., case number 3:24-cv-03245, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.