Apple's HealthKit fitness tracking platform for iOS 8 has plenty of people excited, but it has Alison Hardacre angry and disappointed. That's because Ms. Hardacre is the co-founder of HealthKit, an Australia-based company that lets users track their health and fitness online, and then share that information with their doctors.
Apple announced HealthKit on Monday, but it's been an Australian business for two years
Apple's own HealthKit lets users track their health and fitness on their iPhone via third-party tracking devices, and they can share that data with their doctors. Ms. Hardacre said her company had no idea Apple was planning on using the HealthKit name until she started getting emails asking if she had struck a deal with the Cupertino-based company.
"We won't let them trample over our product. Someone needs to be fired for this," Ms. Hardacre told Mail Online. "We have a business with the same name and a similar product, if they had done a quick Google search they would have seen that. It's not fair."
Assuming Apple never bothered to check and see if anyone else was using the HealthKit name is a bit presumptuous considering the legal team at its disposal. What's more likely is that Apple knew about the Australian HealthKit and decided that dealing with any fallout from using the name was the better course of action -- news that won't come as any consolation to Ms. Hardacre.
Apple's first mention of HealthKit came on Monday during the company's Worldwide Developer Conference keynote presentation. At the time, Apple said it already had the Mayo Clinic and tracker makers like Nike on board, and that more companies would offer HealthKit support, too.
Ms. Hardacre said her company is considering legal action and commented in a blog post, "They didn't feel that they had to do a quick domain search - it would have taken 5 seconds to type www.healthkit.com into their browser and discover us. Would it have made any difference to them?"
The Australian HealthKit hasn't said if it has been in contact with Apple since iOS 8 and its HealthKit feature were introduced earlier this week. Apple hasn't offered up any comment, either.