NEW YORK, June 21: Apple Inc, on trial for allegedly colluding to raise the price of e-books, said an adverse ruling would have a “chilling effect” on how businesses investigate new markets.
If Apple was found guilty, it would “send shudders through the business community” by condemning the ordinary negotiations that companies undertake to enter new markets, the company’s lawyer, Orin Snyder, said on the last day of the trial.
“We submit a ruling against Apple on this record sets a dangerous precedent,” Snyder said.
The US Justice Department accuses Apple of conspiring with US publishers beginning in late 2009 to increase the price of e-books in an effort to undercut the pricing established by then-dominant Amazon.Com Inc. The publishers have settled with the government.
Throughout closing arguments Thursday, Apple found itself fighting back against tough questioning by US District Judge Denise Cote.
At one point on Thursday, Cote asked if it was correct that Apple “understood publishers were willing to work together to put pressure on Amazon.”
Snyder responded there was no evidence Apple understood the publishers were allegedly conspiring together before it proposed creating an online bookstore for its coming iPad. Apple had no idea the publishing executives were calling each other and having dinners together.
“There is no such thing as a conspiracy by telepathy,” Snyder said.
For three weeks, the government has sought to show the popular iPad maker conspired with five of the biggest publishers to raise prices for new and bestselling books from the $9.99 set by Amazon.Com.
Amazon.Com, which at the time controlled up to 90 per cent of the e-book market, had been buying books at wholesale and then selling them at times below its costs as it promoted its Kindle reading device.
Apple, by contrast, entered into so-called agency agreements in which publishers rather than Apple set book prices of up to 12.99 dollar and 14.99 dollar, in a move the government contends enabled publishers to push back against Amazon.Com’s pricing.
(AGENCIES)
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