Amazon is facing a new lawsuit alleging that a deal between the company and five book publishers has created higher prices on ebooks, The Wall Street Journal reported
The lawsuit filed by law firm Hagens Berman in a federal district court in New York, alleges that the publishers pay high commissions and other costs to Amazon, which in turn increases the retail price of ebooks sold on the platform
The lawsuit claims the five publishers account for 80 percent of books sold in the US, and calls the arrangement a “conspiracy to fix the retail price of ebooks,” which it argues is a violation of antitrust law
In another ebook lawsuit back in 2012, the Justice Department accused Apple of conspiring with major book publishers in an attempt to compete with Amazon, by inflating ebook prices above the $9.99 price that Amazon preferred