Garmin Friday claimed “total victory” in Philips' lawsuit. An International Trade Commission administrative law judge's initial determination Thursday found Philips’ asserted patents were invalid and didn't cover Garmin’s popular wearable devices, Garmin said. “Garmin has repeatedly taken a stand against meritless patent lawsuits, and it is our consistent policy to fight baseless patent claims,” said Andrew Etkind, general counsel. The initial determination is subject to ITC review. Philips emailed Friday to say it's aware of ITC's initial determination. "We are studying this decision, as we determine our next steps," said a spokesperson. "Moreover, as separate to the ITC investigation, litigations related to other patents are still pending between Philips and Fitbit and Garmin," he said, saying the company will "refrain from providing further comments."
Epson America went to court for at least the second time to block an Amazon third-party seller from allegedly masquerading as an authorized retailer by accepting orders for Epson home theater projectors it can’t fulfill. Consumers expect the Epson products they order from the third-party seller, Edge AV Store, “will be fulfilled with the specific products they ordered,” said Epson’s complaint (in Pacer) Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Fort Lauderdale. Most consumers receive no products or are shipped goods other than what they ordered “in a classic bait-and-switch scheme,” it said. Shoppers who are scammed are forced to seek refunds or credits through Amazon, which isn't named as a defendant. Edge AV Store “does not actually have in its inventory, and cannot actually obtain,” the Epson products it merchandises because the goods are “restricted SKUs” available only through authorized Epson resellers, “which Edge AV Store is not,” said the complaint. The merchant also “engages in the practice of falsely inflating its positive reviews in order to increase the legitimacy of its online storefront,” said Epson. The vendor took nearly identical legal action just before Christmas against another Amazon third-party seller, Stratton AV (see 2012230025). Both complaints allege the Amazon merchants are costing Epson legitimate sales because their online activities are giving the brand a bad name. The suits seek injunctive relief, plus punitive and compensatory damages. Attempts to reach Edge AV Store and Stratton AV for comment Thursday were unsuccessful. Amazon didn’t respond to questions.
DOJ asked a federal court to sign off on the proposed final judgment to fix anti-competitive issues with Liberty Latin America's $1.95 billion acquisition of AT&T’s wireless and wireline telecommunications businesses in Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands (see 2010230053). In a motion for entry of final judgment (docket 20-cv-03064, in Pacer) Wednesday in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Justice said Liberty would have 30 days after the court's asset preservation order to sell the fiber network in the San Juan area that it picked up as part of its 2016 acquisition of Cable & Wireless Communications. The buyer has to be given an indefeasible right of use to provide fiber connectivity over specific fiber strands in Liberty's network dedicated to the buyer's use, it said.
A bipartisan group of attorneys general from more than half the states urged the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse a lower court ruling dismissing a robocalling case on the grounds that the Telephone Consumer Protection Act was unconstitutional from 2015 to 2019. In Lindenbaum v. Realgy, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio reasoned TCPA couldn’t be enforced during that period because the Supreme Court said in 2020 that it was unconstitutional for Congress to amend the law in 2015 with a government debt exception. Indiana, North Carolina, 32 other states and Washington, D.C., disagreed, in an amicus brief at the 6th Circuit in case 20-4252. “People who engaged in illegal robocalling between 2015 and 2020 should be brought to justice,” said California AG Xavier Becerra (D) Tuesday: “Granting a five-year hall pass to these harassers would permit illegal activity and open the door for more.” Indiana AG Todd Rokita (R) pledged to “stay on the offense” against illegal robocallers.
The 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals' rejection of a Massachusetts Department of Telecommunications and Cable (MDTC) appeal of an FCC decision (see 2012180023) distorted both court precedent and the congressional balance between consumer protection and using the LEC test to promote competition. That's according to MDTC Monday in a petition for rehearing en banc (in Pacer, docket 19-2282) of the decision upholding the agency's finding that vMVPD service AT&T TV Now is effective competition to cable TV, ending basic rate regulation in parts of the state. The FCC didn't comment.
Google’s alleged actions detailed in DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit were “lawful, justified, procompetitive” and carried out with legitimate business interests, the company argued (in Pacer) Friday at U.S. District Court in Washington (see 2101080055). It responded to an amended complaint (in Pacer) from DOJ and various states, which claimed the platform signed exclusionary agreements, “including tying arrangements, and engaged in anticompetitive conduct to lock up distribution channels and block rivals.” The complaint cites agreements with distributors like Apple, LG, Motorola, Samsung, AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Mozilla, Opera and UCWeb. Google requested the complaint be dismissed. The company argued it shares revenue through such agreements in order to be the default search service, and it denied it blocks “counterparties from dealing with Google’s competitors.”
The production company behind 2010's I Spit on Your Grave remake is suing a variety of John Doe users of alleged piracy website 1137x for direct and contributory copyright infringement for sharing the film via BitTorrent. In the suit filed this week in U.S. District Court in Denver (docket 21-cv-00239, in Pacer), Family of the Year Productions said it plans to subpoena Google and unnamed ISPs to learn the John Doe subscriber identities and IP address log information.
Apple “hosts and facilitates” at least 50 “social casinos” on the App Store that prey on addicted gamblers in an orchestrated “conspiracy” to reap profits at twice the rate of traditional Las Vegas casinos, alleged two self-described gaming addicts in a complaint (in Pacer) Friday in U.S. District Court in San Jose. Apple’s practices violate protections against illegal gambling in the 1970 Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (Rico) Act, said the complaint, seeking class-action status on behalf of other recovering compulsive gamblers. Social casinos sell gamblers monetary credits they redeem for spins on virtual slot machines but don’t let them cash out as they can in a Las Vegas house, said the suit. Credits they win can be used only for additional spins on the slots, it said. Apple and the social casinos collaborate in a “mutually beneficial business partnership,” it said. In exchange for distributing the social casinos, feeding them “valuable data” about their players and collecting their money, Apple earns a 30% commission on every wager, it said. The traditional casino takes in 15% at most on every bet, it said. Apple is using its developer tools to “take advantage of users with severe gambling problems,” said the complaint. “Apple has unlawfully made billions of dollars on the backs of consumers.” It breached the Rico Act by engaging in a “pattern of racketeering activity,” including by marketing and selling “rigged and manipulated” slot games that are illegal in many states and “disguising them as innocuous video game entertainment,” it said. Apple also is injuring consumers by continuously “soliciting” the public “to play illegal slot machines,” it said. The suit seeks restitution of all gambling losses for the proposed class of consumers, plus punitive and statutory damages. Apple didn’t comment Monday.
Nothing is pending at the Supreme Court this term that will likely lead to dramatic changes in the Chevron doctrine, but some narrowing could be inevitable, experts told a Free State Foundation webinar Friday. Courts “regard telecom as something that’s highly technocratic and that generalist judges aren’t in a very good position to answer,” said Christopher Yoo, University of Pennsylvania Law School professor. The most likely next step for SCOTUS is a reinterpretation of when Chevron should apply, he said. Any new look at the doctrine reflects growing skepticism of expert agencies, Yoo said. “We’ve seen a discrediting of expertise,” he said: “We’ve started to see agencies as captured.” The trend is for justices to be “ideologically sorted and polarized,” which is clear in appointments to the court under then-President Donald Trump, said Cato Institute's Ilya Shapiro. Since becoming a justice in 2017, Neil Gorsuch “has continued his campaign against the awesome power of the administrative state, both regarding judicial over-deference to agencies and congressional over-delegation of legislative power to the agencies,” Shapiro said. “Where Gorsuch wants to pare back the scope of judicial deference, [Justice Brett] Kavanaugh has focused on the occasions where deference is applied in the first place.” Justice Amy Coney Barrett is likely to support narrowing deference, he said. Shapiro said the court could parse the difference between deference to administration agencies and independent agencies like the FCC. As the newest justice, Barrett is "a bit of a wild card,” said TechFreedom Internet Policy Counsel Corbin Barthold. Kavanaugh might want to narrow Chevron, not overturn it, Barthold said. There aren’t the votes to overturn Chevron, “but it’s still open that it might get narrowed,” he said. The court doesn’t have any cases on its current docket “that squarely raise the Chevron doctrine, but of course any case involving a government agency statutory interpretation could raise it,” said Jeffrey Lubbers, American University professor of practice in administrative law. The court heard the FCC's appeal of Prometheus IV Tuesday involving media ownership rules (see 2101190070).
Judge Amit Mehta of the U.S. District Court for D.C. on Thursday set status hearings for Feb. 25, March 30 and April 30 in DOJ’s antitrust case (in Pacer) against Google (see 2101080055).