Heartflow sues AI rival Elucid over alleged IP violations
Heartflow, the California-based medtech company known for its artificial intelligence (AI)-powered imaging software, has filed a lawsuit accusing Elucid of patent infringement and trade secret misappropriation.
Boston-based Elucid is one of Heartflow’s primary competitors in the AI imaging space. Heartflow filed this lawsuit after Elucid announced it had received U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval for FFR-IQ, the company’s new AI software for the noninvasive analysis of fractional flow reserve derived from CT (FFR-CT).
According to Heartflow, Elucid built FFR-IQ by hiring away multiple Heartflow employees and gaining access to highly confidential trade secrets. In the lawsuit, Heartflow pointed to images of FFR-IQ and its own FFR-CT software, FFRCT Analysis, and highlighted the similarities in appearance.
“This is an action arising out of egregious violations of Heartflow’s intellectual property rights by Elucid,” according to the lawsuit. “In particular, Elucid’s recent commercialization efforts of its FFR-CT product demonstrate that Elucid built its product based on Heartflow’s award-winning FFRCT Analysis product and innovations that required thousands of hours of painstaking research and development including millions of dollars of investment and de novo regulatory approval. Instead of leveraging its own technology and know-how, and respecting Heartflow’s intellectual property rights, Elucid took shortcuts.”
Heartflow is demanding a jury trial and seeking damages.
“Elucid’s misappropriation has caused and will continue to cause Heartflow irreparable harm and damages,” according to the lawsuit. “These include loss of profits, loss of goodwill, loss of competitive advantage, and Elucid’s unjust enrichment through avoided development, regulatory, and market-development costs, and an unearned head start.”
Elucid, meanwhile, is standing behind its technology in the face of these allegations. The company plans on responding to the lawsuit through the appropriate legal channels.
“Elucid was founded to help physicians predict cardiovascular risk and personalize prevention for each patient, so that more heart attacks and strokes can be avoided,” Kelly Huang, PhD, CEO of Elucid, said in a statement. “We fully believe in the uniqueness of our products and technology, we are confident in their independent development, and we have invested substantially for over a decade in building a robust intellectual property portfolio. Our commitment to patients and physicians is unchanged, and we remain focused on supporting the clinicians and care teams who seek better solutions for patient care.”
Heartflow told Cardiovascular Business it is not commenting on this lawsuit other than what was already said in the complaint.
Heartflow previously sued Cleerly over similar allegations
Back in April, Heartflow sued Denver-based Cleerly for allegedly infringing on six different patents when developing its own AI-powered coronary CT angiography (CCTA) evaluation technologies. Cleerly issued a statement at the time highlighting its continued confidence in its intellectual property.
One of modern medicine’s biggest trends
The rise of these AI-enabled CCTA software offerings has been one of the biggest ongoing trends in both cardiology and radiology. These automated tests are noninvasive and help cardiologists provide preventive care and develop personalized treatment strategies for their patients.
The FDA has now signed off on several AI-powered CCTA analysis tools. These technologies have also received improved Medicare coverage and new Category 1 CPT codes, and a payment policy first announced in 2024 more than doubled the reimbursements hospitals receive for performing CCTA.
Michael has more than 19 years of experience as a professional writer and editor. He has written at length about cardiology, radiology, artificial intelligence and other key healthcare topics.