Apple could be going the wireless way for its earphones as the company has applied for a new trademark under the name "AirPods" in several countries.
Interestingly, the application for the AirPods in the U.S. was not made by Apple under its own name but under the name Entertainment in Flight, LLC. In the past, Apple has deployed this strategy to camouflage its trademark work.
The company was created in September and some sleuthing from MacRumors revealed that Entertainment in Flight, LLC did not seem to have any other noticeable operations apart from the filing of the trademark on Sept. 22, 2015.
"We have been unable to find a concrete link between Apple and the AirPods trademark, but the evidence we've gathered is highly suggestive that Apple is indeed behind the filing," notes the publication.
The pattern of the trademark filing for AirPods is similar to the one used by Apple. What further confirms the publications' assertions that Entertainment in Flight, LLC is an alias for Apple is the fact that the contact information lists a Gmail account. Usually, Apple's "shell companies" deploy the Gmail address (which are based on the name of the company) for a trademark filing.
The U.S. filing is not the only one made by Entertainment in Flight and trademark filings have also been made in Australia, Canada, Turkey, Norway and the EU.
Moreover, the filing of the trademark is in International Class 9 which mentions the categories as earphones, microphones, audio accessories and products of a similar nature. What's interesting is that Apple's existing line of earphones are dubbed EarPods and the AirPods naming convention seems to hint that the latter could be a wireless variant of Apple's earphones.
In 2014, Apple acquired Beats for $3 billion and offers several types of wireless headphones and earphones through the brand. However, the Beats hardware has so far been segregated from its line-up and the company is yet to create and wireless headphone or EarPods that are Apple-branded.
A refresh for Apple's earphones have been long awaited and if the company releases wireless earphones that are keeping with the times, then iDevice fans will have something to cheer about.
