The Patent Office today published 15 newly granted patents for Apple Inc. The patents covered a variety of technologies and applications, but one of the most interesting included a latch with a camera for a MacBook lid that pivots.
PatentlyApple highlighted the camera latch patent not so much for its idea of a swivel latch that includes a light (a feature that could come in handy with increased used of FaceTime and similar apps), but for the fact that it was designed for a lid that was meant to pivot. A pivoting lid harkens back to Windows-based tablet PCs that have so far proven marginally interesting in the market.
Apple Patent Figure
Source: PatentlyApple
However, having secured this patent Apple could be positioned to be a player in 2013 when Intel’s 3rd generation Ultrabooks are expected on the market. These are said to include a pivoting notebook lid that would form a tablet computer. Potentially this patent could interfere with those plans.
Other patents published today dealt with multi-touch, media syncing, calendaring, text-to-speech, authentication, video encoders, and other technologies.