When Mum & Dad Fight: What Strava v. Garmin Teaches Us About IP

Overview

Update: on 21 October 2025, Strava filed a notice voluntarily dismissing the action without prejudice, and the case subsequently closed. The discussion below reflects the position before that dismissal and should be read as contemporaneous commentary rather than a description of current proceedings.

For many athletes, Garmin captures the activity while Strava connects it to a wider community. The dispute therefore offered a useful case study in how patents, contracts, and product roadmaps can collide—and what founders should consider long before a disagreement becomes litigation.

On 30 September 2025, Strava sued Garmin in the District of Colorado, alleging patent infringement and breach of a 2015 Master Cooperation Agreement (MCA). The asserted patents fell into two categories: the “Segments” machinery (US 9,116,922) and the “user-preference activity maps” family associated with heatmaps and popularity-based routing (US 9,297,651 and 9,778,053). Strava also requested injunctive relief. The filed complaint set out those allegations; the dismissal meant the court did not decide them.

Partnerships such as Strava–Garmin can be governed by coexistence agreements—here, the 2015 MCA under which Strava Live Segments appeared on Garmin devices within defined limits. Strava’s pleaded theory concerned both patent infringement and conduct allegedly outside the agreement. Even a successful non-infringement defence would not necessarily have resolved a separate contract issue. The complaint therefore presented two potential paths before it was dismissed.

The thorny part, namely the substantive issues in the dispute: prior art, prior use, and how “we did it first” actually works.

Screenshots and release notes can help establish a timeline, but legal analysis depends on evidence and the wording of the claims. Strava’s Segments patent family traces back to 2011, while the heatmap and popularity-routing family claims December 2013 priority. Garmin material from 2013 might have been relevant to validity or prior-use arguments if it met the applicable legal and evidential tests. None of that would have been automatic: patent claims are specific, and any prior-user-rights defence under 35 U.S.C. § 273 would have required a fact-intensive showing. The dismissal meant those issues were not determined in this action.

The request for an injunction also required a practical reality check. Even if infringement were proven, a permanent injunction would not follow automatically: U.S. courts apply an equitable test, and preliminary relief has its own requirements. In consumer technology, possible outcomes can include damages, settlement, or a design-around rather than the immediate removal of a core feature.

Before the dismissal, one plausible path appeared to be revised coexistence terms: clearer guardrails around “Garmin segments” and “Strava Segments,” workable attribution, and potentially a settlement or design-around focused on the asserted claim steps. A PTAB challenge to the heatmap claims would have indicated confidence in the earlier-use material.

Lessons for founders and product teams—learn the significance of intellectual property rights (IPRs) and related legal constructs before you need them. IP may not be susceptible to being established retrospectively if a dispute arises.

Firstly, it is advisable to secure one or more priority dates early. If your differentiation depends on data aggregation, matching logic, or ranking heuristics, file documentation such as patent applications early and keep the family alive with continuations as your product evolves. Strava’s position on segments is strongest where its patent claims capture specific matching mechanics, not just a general concept and the vibe of a leaderboard. The difference between “we invented the idea” and “we own these claim elements” is everything.

Secondly, it is advisable to control your disclosures. Public demonstrations, documents, and blog posts may become relevant prior art under 35 U.S.C. § 102. If you are planning to disclose an invention, consider filing strategy before the disclosure. If you rely on secrecy, maintain clear records of reasonable confidentiality measures, access controls, and versioned documentation so that the history can be evidenced later.

Thirdly, treat collaboration contracts carefully. When a feature is embedded in a partner’s hardware or application, the agreement should address licence scope, implementation boundaries, branding or attribution, confidential information, and remedies. The Strava–Garmin dispute is a useful reminder that patent and contract questions can arise together.

Finally, assume injunctions are hard and plan potential design-arounds. If you assert, you may still end up negotiating economics around a defendant’s alternative feature that side-steps one or two claim elements. If you’re the defendant, invest early in a Plan B architecture so you’re not refactoring under a TRO. The availability of relief depends on the evidence and the applicable legal test.

At the time, a cross-licence, sharper attribution rules, or clearer boundaries around the experience on each device screen were all plausible outcomes. The longer-term question remains whether popularity-routing features become common across the category while protection concentrates on more specific data-pipeline implementations. In that situation, distribution, network effects, contracts, and carefully drafted claims can each contribute to defensibility.

Your turn: if you were counselling either side, would you double down on the patent case, push for PTAB first, or pursue a negotiated line around segments and routing? And as a founder, what would you file—or keep secret—today so you are not learning these lessons the hard way later? V24 can help teams consider the IP and commercial questions raised by similar disputes.