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Finally some good news for content streaming and DVD rental company Netflix, as a lawsuit alleging price fixing has been tossed by a US District Court Judge.
US District Judge Phyllis Hamilton ruled in the case that began in 2004 amid allegations Walmart and Netflix agreed that the former would not rent DVDs to consumers as long as the latter continued to not sell the discs to customers. The case soon reached class action status, but Hamilton wrote in a ruling that even the existence of a ruling would not be much of a boon to Netflix in building its then-still-catching-on business. The Register obtained Hamilton’s decision, in which she writes:
“The court concludes that no reasonable juror could believe that Netflix would have lowered its [rental plan] to $15.99 in response to continued competition from Walmart, whose [comparable plan] was set at $17.49 – particularly when those facts demonstrate that Netflix chose not to lower its price in the face of Blockbuster’s $14.99 price cut, despite the fact that Blockbuster had a higher market share than Walmart.”
At the time of the contested action, Blockbuster controlled 17% of the DVD rental by mail market.
