Tech companies Apple and Amazon have been sued in the United States. The companies are accused of having agreed on prices for iPads and iPhones.
The companies would do this by excluding other sellers of the latest Apple products from Amazon’s website, according to reports from the Reuters news agency.
An agreement that passed on into effect in January 2019 specified that Apple would give Amazon discounts of up to 10 percent on its products. In return, Amazon only allowed seven of its 600 resellers to continue using its platform.
According to the complainants, building barriers to keep competitors out and thus raise prices is precisely the kind of behaviour the US Congress wants to prevent through antitrust laws.
In the third quarter of this year, Apple and Amazon combined product revenues exceeded $125 billion. An Italian judge recently cancelled a €173 million fine imposed on Apple and Amazon by Italy’s Antitrust Commission for alleged price fixing.
