Some good news
Get Ready for E-Book Price Cuts in Near Future
Cheaper e-books from three leading publishers could return within one to three months, industry executives said Friday, in the wake of a federal judge's approval this week of the antitrust settlement between the publishers and the Justice Department.
"It could be pretty fast," said one executive, who asked not to be identified.
Under terms of the final judgment entered Friday, the three publishers that settled—Lagardère MMB.FR +0.82% SCA's Hachette Book Group, CBS Corp.'s CBS +0.84% Simon & Schuster Inc., and News Corp.'s NWSA -0.10% HarperCollins Publishers LLC—have to take steps within 10 days to let most e-book retailers, including Amazon.com Inc., AMZN +3.09% out of agreements that now prevent discounting. The retailers will be able to terminate the agreements within 30 days.
The exception to the time frame is Apple Inc. AAPL +0.62% Publishers have just seven days to exit contracts with the tech giant, which sells e-books through its iBookstore. Apple declined to comment.
The Justice Department in April filed a civil antitrust suit alleging collusion among Apple and five publishers to raise e-book prices and prevent the type of steep discounting championed by Amazon. Three of the publishers settled, while the other two—Pearson PSON.LN -0.08% PLC's Penguin Group (USA) and Macmillan, a unit of Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH, are continuing to fight the action, as is Apple.
Amazon is expected to move aggressively to reduce prices. It had sold best-sellers in e-book version at $9.99 before 2010, when the five major publishers forced it to stop discounting their titles. E-book best-seller prices rose to between $12.99 and $14.99 or higher.
"We look forward to lowering book prices," said Russ Grandinetti, Amazon's vice president of Kindle content, in an interview. "This is good news for customers and we are excited to be able to do it."
How Apple will deal with the new pricing landscape isn't clear. Apple's contracts could be terminated by next Friday—unless, that is, someone appealing the judge's decision successfully wins a stay.
Apple has said in earlier court filings that it would seek an appeal if the court approved the settlement. And on Friday, Bob Kohn, an antitrust lawyer and opponent of the settlement, filed papers with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York seeking to have the case appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Mr. Kohn also asked for the settlement to be stayed pending appeal.
"I am hopeful that Judge Denise Cote will grant my motion to stay the settlement," said Mr. Kohn. "If a district court denies a motion for a stay, the court of appeals can be asked to stay the settlement."
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