United States of America v. Microsoft Corporation, 253 F.3d 34, was a landmark American antitrust law case at the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. The U.S. government accused Microsoft of illegally monopolizing the web browser market for Windows, primarily through the legal and technical restrictions it put on the abilities of PC manufacturers (OEMs) and users to uninstall Internet Explorer and use other programs such as Netscape and Java.
In the United States, antitrust law is a collection of mostly federal laws that regulate the conduct and organization of businesses to promote competition and prevent unjustified monopolies. The three main U.S. antitrust statutes are the Sherman Act of 1890, the Clayton Act of 1914, and the Federal Trade Commission Act of 1914. These acts serve three major functions. First, Section 1 of the Sherman Act prohibits price fixing and the operation of cartels, and prohibits other collusive practices that unreasonably restrain trade. Second, Section 7 of the Clayton Act restricts the mergers and acquisitions of organizations that may substantially lessen competition or tend to create a monopoly. Third, Section 2 of the Sherman Act prohibits monopolization.
Tying is the practice of selling one product or service as a mandatory addition to the purchase of a different product or service. In legal terms, a tying sale makes the sale of one good to the de facto customer conditional on the purchase of a second distinctive good. Tying is often illegal when the products are not naturally related. It is related to but distinct from freebie marketing, a common method of giving away one item to ensure a continual flow of sales of another related item.
The multinational technology corporation Apple Inc. has been a participant in various legal proceedings and claims since it began operation and, like its competitors and peers, engages in litigation in its normal course of business for a variety of reasons. In particular, Apple is known for and promotes itself as actively and aggressively enforcing its intellectual property interests. From the 1980s to the present, Apple has been plaintiff or defendant in civil actions in the United States and other countries. Some of these actions have determined significant case law for the information technology industry and many have captured the attention of the public and media. Apple's litigation generally involves intellectual property disputes, but the company has also been a party in lawsuits that include antitrust claims, consumer actions, commercial unfair trade practice suits, defamation claims, and corporate espionage, among other matters.
Milan Dale Smith, Jr. is an American attorney and jurist serving as a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Smith's brother, Gordon H. Smith, was a Republican U.S. Senator from 1997 to 2009. Milan Smith is neither a Republican nor a Democrat, and he considers himself to be a political independent.
Leegin Creative Leather Products, Inc. v. PSKS, Inc., 551 U.S. 877 (2007), is a US antitrust case in which the United States Supreme Court overruled Dr. Miles Medical Co. v. John D. Park & Sons Co.Dr Miles had ruled that vertical price restraints were illegal per se under Section 1 of the Sherman Antitrust Act. Leegin established that the legality of such restraints are to be judged based on the rule of reason.
Microsoft has been involved in numerous high-profile legal matters that involved litigation over the history of the company, including cases against the United States, the European Union, and competitors.
United States v. Glaxo Group Ltd., 410 U.S. 52 (1973), is a 1973 decision of the United States Supreme Court in which the Court held that (1) when a patent is directly involved in an antitrust violation, the Government may challenge the validity of the patent; and (2) ordinarily, in patent-antitrust cases, "[m]andatory selling on specified terms and compulsory patent licensing at reasonable charges are recognized antitrust remedies."
Illinois Brick Co. v. Illinois, 431 U.S. 720 (1977), is a United States Supreme Court case that involved issues concerning statutory standing in antitrust law.
Maria Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers is an American lawyer serving as a United States district judge of the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. She was previously a California state court judge on the Alameda County Superior Court from 2008 to 2011.
United States v. Apple Inc., 952 F. Supp. 2d 638, was a US antitrust case in which the Court held that Apple Inc. conspired to raise the price of e-books in violation of the Sherman Act.
High-Tech Employee Antitrust Litigation is a 2010 United States Department of Justice (DOJ) antitrust action and a 2013 civil class action against several Silicon Valley companies for alleged "no cold call" agreements which restrained the recruitment of high-tech employees.
Google has been involved in multiple lawsuits over issues such as privacy, advertising, intellectual property and various Google services such as Google Books and YouTube. The company's legal department expanded from one to nearly 100 lawyers in the first five years of business, and by 2014 had grown to around 400 lawyers. Google's Chief Legal Officer is Senior Vice President of Corporate Development David Drummond.
Big Tech, also known as the Tech Giants, are the largest information technology companies. The term most often refers to the Big Five tech companies in the United States: Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Apple, Meta, and Microsoft. The term can also include major Chinese technology companies, including the grouping of Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, and Xiaomi (BATX). Big Tech can also include smaller tech companies with high valuations, such as Netflix and Nvidia, or non-tech companies with high-tech practices, such as the automaker Tesla. The concept of Big Tech is analogous to the consolidation of market dominance by a few companies in other market sectors, such as Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, and J.P. Morgan in investment banking, the Big Three consulting firms, Big Oil, and Big Media.
Apple Inc. v. Pepper, 587 U.S. ___ (2019), was a United States Supreme Court case related to antitrust laws related to third-party resellers. The case centers on Apple Inc.'s App Store, and whether consumers of apps offered through the store have Article III standing under federal antitrust laws to bring a class-action antitrust lawsuit against Apple for practices it uses to regulate the App Store. The case centers on the applicability of the "Illinois Brick doctrine" established by the Supreme Court in 1977 via Illinois Brick Co. v. Illinois, which determined that indirect consumers of products lack Article III standing to bring antitrust charges against producers of those products. In its 5–4 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that since consumers purchased apps directly through Apple, that they have standing under Illinois Brick to seek antitrust charges against Apple.
Epic Games, Inc. v. Apple Inc. was a lawsuit brought by Epic Games against Apple in August 2020 in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California, related to Apple's practices in the iOS App Store. Epic Games specifically had challenged Apple's restrictions on apps from having other in-app purchasing methods outside of the one offered by the App Store. Epic Games' founder Tim Sweeney had previously challenged the 30% revenue cut that Apple takes on each purchase made in the App Store, and with their game Fortnite, wanted to either bypass Apple or have Apple take less of a cut. Epic implemented changes in Fortnite intentionally on August 13, 2020, to bypass the App Store payment system, prompting Apple to block the game from the App Store and leading to Epic filing its lawsuit. Apple filed a countersuit, asserting Epic purposely breached its terms of contract with Apple to goad it into action, and defended itself from Epic's suit.
Federal Tr' was a noted American antitrust case, in which the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) accused Qualcomm's licensing agreements as anticompetitive, mainly because their practices excluded competition and harmed competitors in the modern chip market, which according to the FTC, violated both Section 1 and Section 2 of the Sherman Act. On May 21, 2019, the United States District Court for the Northern District of California ruled in favor of the plaintiff, the FTC, by alleging that Qualcomm had indeed violated the federal antitrust laws by (1) refusing to license its patents to direct competitors, in its relevant product market (2) by placing an extra fee on rival chip sales through its licensing of its patent, and (3) by entering in an exclusive business deal with Apple from 2011 to 2013. The case was seen as controversial when the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit decided to unanimously reverse the decision of the district court by arguing that the FTC failed to prove through its rule of reason analysis that Qualcomm's policies have a considerable negative effect towards the consumer in the CDMA and cellular chips market.
The Open App Markets Act (OAMA) is a proposed antitrust bill in the United States Congress. The Senate version of the legislation, S.2710, was introduced on August 11, 2021, by Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN). On August 13, 2021, a companion bill in the House of Representatives was introduced by Hank Johnson (D-GA) and Ken Buck (R-CO).
United States v. Google LLC is an ongoing federal antitrust case brought by the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) against Google LLC on October 20, 2020. The suit alleges that Google has violated the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 by illegally monopolizing the search engine and search advertising markets, most notably on Android devices.
