A federal judge on Tuesday set a trial for next May to determine the damages against Apple -- which could be in the hundreds of millions -- in an e-book price-fixing case.
The Cupertino company was widely expected to appeal the ruling from U.S. District Judge Denise Cote when she ruled last month it was guilty of illegal e-book price fixing. It is unclear if that happened.
"The plaintiffs have shown that Apple conspired to raise the retail price of e-books and that they are entitled to injunctive relief," Judge Cote wrote in her opinion.
Federal prosecutors argued Apple used the launch of the forthcoming iPad to break up Amazon’s grip on the e-book market. Up until that point, Amazon sold e-books through a traditional retail model, buying copies of the e-book from publishers at wholesale prices, and then choosing their own prices at the retail level—just like a traditional bookstore. Amazon would often sell new releases at a loss, to promote the Kindle.
Apple proposed the so-called “agency model,” where book publishers would be able to set retail prices on their own. Prosecutors claimed that switch cost consumers hundreds of millions of dollars in unfairly high prices for e-books.
The five publishers originally implicated in the case settled out of court.
Apple argued that it’s negotiations were completely legal, and followed industry standards.
The judge is also considering injunctive relief to prevent Apple from engaging in another price-fixing conspiracy, Reuters reported.
COMPANY AAPL
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