Antitrust
Briefings of the day: U.S.A. vs. Apple Inc.
May 15, 2013: 3:51 PM ETIn the DOJ's great e-book conspiracy, Apple is the sole defendant still standing.
FORTUNE -- The conspiracy case that the U.S. Department of Justice filed against Apple and five book publishers in April 2011 is finally coming to a head.
In the year that has passed, all five publishers have settled. Only Apple had the stomach -- or the wherewithal -- to take the case to trial.
It's scheduled to begin in a Manhattan courthouse on June 3. We plan to be there.
Links to the two sides' final briefings are attached below. A few excerpts:
From the DOJ:
"A preponderance of the evidence shows that Apple, Inc. conspired and agreed with [five publishers listed] for the purpose and with the effect of raising consumer e-book prices and restraining retail price competition... The conspiracy took root in publishers' disdain for $9.99 e-book prices and Apple's fear of having to compete with Amazon and other e-book retailers on price, and accomplished Defendants' goals of raising prices and limiting price competition'.. Because of its place 'in the center as the ringmaster' of a horizontal agreement among Publisher Defendants to fix the retail prices of e-books, Apple is liable per se under Section 1 of the Sherman Act."
From Apple:
"Apple did not conspire to fix e-book prices. The evidence proves that Apple acted independently, to further its own legitimate business goals, in negotiating agency agreements with the publishers to enter the e-book market. Plaintiffs can no longer rely on mere allegations, faulty assumptions, and unfounded conclusions. That time has passed. Plaintiffs must produce evidence at trial that Apple consciously conspired with the publishers. But plaintiffs fall well short of their burden; indeed, the evidence contradicts their key allegations against Apple."
Those PDFs
See also:
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What Apple did to trigger a European antitrust inquiry
The focus is on the commitments carriers must make if they want to carry the iPhone.
FORTUNE -- In an SEC report filed last month, Leap Wireless (LEAP) disclosed that it had signed a contract with Apple (AAPL) in May 2012 in which the carrier, in exchange for the right to sell the iPhone, agreed to buy $800 million worth of the devices over the next three years.
As it turned out, it MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Mar 22, 2013 7:57 AM ET -
Apple: Amazon played DOJ's antitrust division like a violin
Points to meetings between government lawyers and at least 14 Amazon employees
FORTUNE -- Apple (AAPL) opened a new front in its attack on the Justice Department's e-book antitrust suit, which accuses the company of conspiring with five publishers to raise the price of electronic books.
The DOJ, Apple charges, colluded with Amazon (AMZN) to bring the suit in the first place.
"Amazon was the driving force behind the Government's investigation," Apple claimed MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Aug 16, 2012 8:52 AM ET -
DOJ to Apple: You're wrong, wrong, wrong on e-books
With public comments running 10 to 1 against it, the antitrust division refuses to budge
FORTUNE -- My bias may be showing, but when I read the document filed Monday by the Justice Department in response to sharp criticism from Apple (AAPL) and others of its e-book antitrust suit (see Apple to DOJ: Bite me), I found the rhetoric surprisingly overheated and, for the government agency charged with enforcing the nation's MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Jul 23, 2012 4:52 PM ET -
Apple to DOJ: Bite me
The Justice Department may regret trying to make its e-book antitrust suit stick to Apple
FORTUNE -- I haven't had so much fun reading legal documents since the Watergate trials.
I loved U.S. v. Apple et al. for the juicy details: the 56 phone calls, the clandestine meetings in swank Manhattan eateries, the secret e-mails "double erased" to ensure they couldn't be traced.
But what makes Apple's (AAPL) response, filed Tuesday, such a MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - May 26, 2012 7:57 AM ET -
Steve Jobs on camera: 'The publishers are actually going to withhold their books from Amazon'
Telegraphing an alleged price-fixing conspiracy 2 years before the DOJ caught up to it
FORTUNE -- Paid Content's Laura Hazard Owen, combing through documents newly unredacted in the states' (as opposed to the U.S. Department of Justice's) antitrust complaint against Apple (AAPL) and five book publishers, uncovered a gem: a blunt Steve Jobs e-mail that basically hands the attorneys general their price-fixing case.
In a note to a publishing executive nervous about MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - May 15, 2012 7:18 AM ETPosted in: Amazon, Antitrust, Apple, Brad Stone, e-books, iBookstore, Price fixing, Publishing, Steve Jobs, Walt Mossberg -
Amazon throws its e-book weight around. Again.
More heavy-handed behavior from the book world's 500-pound gorilla
FORTUNE -- Publishers who have had to deal with Amazon's (AMZN) arrogant reps know first hand the contempt with which they hold folks in the business of printing books on paper.
Now that the company is in the media's spotlight following the Justice Department's ass-backwards antitrust suit, the rest of us are getting a taste for how the book world's 500-pound gorilla operates.
The MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 30, 2012 12:44 PM ETPosted in: Amazon, Antitrust, Apple, Boobie Miles, Books, Buzz Bissinger, David Carr, DOJ, e-books, Friday Night Lights, Hunger Games, Justice Department, New York Times, Publishing -
Who dropped the dime on the Apple e-book five?
Decoding the Department of Justice's antitrust whodunnit
FORTUNE -- At a hearing in a Manhattan federal court Wednesday, attorneys for Apple (AAPL) and two major book publishers said that rather than settling -- as three of their co-defendants had -- they wanted to go to trial to defend themselves against U.S. government charges that they had colluded illegally to raise e-book prices. (See The Apple e-book conspiracy: Three days in January.)
Which means MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 19, 2012 3:16 PM ETPosted in: Amazon, Antitrust, Apple, Barnes & Noble, e-books, Eddy Cue, Hachette, Justice Department, Markus Dohle, Publishing, Random House, Steve Jobs -
Cocking the Apple slingshot
Why would a stock like Apple fall 10% just before quarterly earnings are due?
MONDAY 4:00 p.m. UPDATE: Throw another -4.15% on the barbie. One analyst called today's selloff "panic profit taking."
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I think it may be time once again to dust off Jason Schwarz' classic blog post: Apple: Seven Reasons Shorts Love It.
Apple's (AAPL) shares, in case you missed it, took a drubbing last week, falling $38.77 (6%) in MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 16, 2012 7:40 AM ETPosted in: Antitrust, Apple, DOJ, e-books, Hedge fund, iTunes, Jason Schwarz, Quarterly earnings, Steve Jobs -
Apple keeps it simple: The DOJ's case is 'simply not true'
Cupertino breaks its silence, laying out its legal defense in four sentences
The company's response to US v. Apple Inc. et al., when it came Thursday evening, was as succinct and carefully crafted as any Apple (AAPL) marketing slogan.
What the Department of Justice characterized as a "per se violation" of the Sherman Antitrust Act, Apple is going to paint as an act of liberation.
We got our copy the company's four-sentence response to MORE
Philip Elmer-DeWitt - Apr 13, 2012 6:13 AM ETPosted in: Amazon, Antitrust, App Store, Apple, Department of Justice, DOJ, E-book, iBookstore, Publishing, Sherman Antitrust Act
