The U.S Supreme Court rejected Apple's appeal and settled on paying a fine of $450 million to consumers, states and legal fee.
Apple has been fined $450 million to withdraw from an antitrust suit as the U.S Supreme Court has completely retracted from Federal Court’s verdict. The Supreme Court has denied listening to any argument against the fact Apple’s involvement in the manipulation of prices of electronic books.
Apple Inc. had filed an appeal with the Supreme Court against the verdict that stated that the technology company was involved in over-charging its customers for eBooks. This appeal by the iPhone maker was reject by the Court. As per a court filing in 2014, the iPhone maker had agreed to pay the above-mentioned amount to settle the allegations that were made by U.S Justice Department and a number of other consumers.
As per the settlement, the Cupertino, California based organization has to pay $400 million to the customers that it was over-charging for e-books, over $30 million as legal fees while $20 million to the states. The U.S Justice Department said in a statement that consumers of e-books will also get credits for future eBook purchases.
Bill Baer, the assistant attorney general, said in a statement that the tech giant was ‘knowingly’ involved in overcharging the eBook customers with the help of book publishers but this issue is settled once and for all.
The technology company launched the iBook store back in 2010 in an effort to capture Amazon’s bookstore market. In the eBook world, Apple made this entry in an attempt to dethrone the retail giant however it is quite evident that it didn’t manage to live up to its endeavors as now the company is being forced to pay a handsome amount of money as fine for conspiring with book publishers.
At the time when Apple wanted to dominate the e-book market, Amazon Inc. was known as the loss leader in selling books as it was selling them for a price of $9.99 but nonetheless, it dominated the market.
According to this case, the federal judge found out that Apple was conspiring with five of the best publishers in Manhattan; they were shifting to a system according to which the publishers would set the prices instead of the retailers. Denise Cote, the U.S. District Judge stated that due to this strategy, there was a 40% increase in the eBooks best sellers.
Furthermore, the District Judge also mentioned how the late founder and CEO of Apple Inc., Steve Jobs was questioned at an event while introducing the iPad regarding the high prices of eBooks on the iBookstore. He was asked why someone would pay $14.99 when they can buy the same eBook at a price of $9.99 from Amazon. To this, Jobs replied that the prices would be the same and that the publishers were not happy with selling the books at a rate that Amazon was selling the books.
In its defense, the tech company stated that ever since they have entered the market the competition has enhanced and the prices of these eBooks has fallen.
No comments:
Post a Comment