Sportswear giant Nike (NKE) is suing Vancouver-based Lululemon Athletica (LULU) over its Mirror Home Gym.
Specifically, Nike claims that Lululemon’s Mirror Home Gym and mobile app infringes on its patents for digital home exercise equipment.
The Nike suit is the latest in the thriving home fitness industry, where companies are turning to the courts to protect their products from competition while expanding into new lines of business.
Lululemon acquired start-up Mirror for $500 million U.S. in 2020.
Nike lawsuit’s paints the Mirror as a novice in the market while “Nike has spent decades creating game-changing digital sport technologies.”
To prove its expertise, Nike pointed to several products it’s developed in the field, including the Nike+ iPod system introduced in 2006, and Nike+ ESP basketball and training products, which went on sale in 2012.
The patents at issue in the lawsuit cover a memory system used to determine how many repetitions a user should exercise based on their fitness level, ways to set up competitions between users, and ways to receive and record athletic activity data.
Nike is seeking unspecified financial compensation for what it claims is intentional unauthorized use of the inventions, plus an order that would prevent Lululemon from using the patented features.
Nike said it sent a letter on November 3 notifying Lululemon that it was infringing on the patents. Lululemon responded last month, writing “Lululemon does not believe that Nike’s patents are relevant to the Mirror and Mirror app,” according to documents filed in court.
