“Five publishers agreed to pay a total of $166 million to settle their roles in a high-profile ebook price-fixing scheme,” Jeff John Roberts writes for paidContent. “For Apple, however, the price tag could be much higher in light of a damning court decision that fingered it as the conspiracy’s ringleader.”
“The publishing and tech sector is still digesting the implications of Wednesday’s 160-page decision but, according to antitrust lawyers, Apple is in a tight legal spot,” Roberts writes. “It vehemently denies wrongdoing and has fought the price-fixing accusations at all turns, in court and in the press. Now, if a verdict is entered after the damages phase of the trial, Apple is on the hook to pay special damages under a section of the Clayton Act that automatically triples antitrust awards.”
Roberts writes, “Apple’s liability, according to lawyer Jeff Friedman, will be determined by this formula: harm to consumers x 3, minus the $166 million paid by the publishers.”
Read more in the full article here.
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