Startup Risks Clash With Apple, Google Over Virus-App Royalties

A Utah-based startup says it has exclusive business rights to the use of smartphones and other electronic devices for tracing people who have come into contact with a person with Covid-19, setting up a potential patent-infringement battle with some of the biggest technology companies.

Blyncsy, Inc., which describes itself as a “movement and data intelligence” company headquartered in Salt Lake City, holds the business method patent for “tracking proximity relationships and uses thereof” by identifying the movements of people with a contagious disease, Chief Executive Officer Mark Pittman said.

Blyncsy (pronounced BLINK-see) won the patent from the U.S. Patent ...