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Nintendo appeal against price-fixing fine

by Steven Williamson on 20 May 2008, 10:06

Tags: Nintendo (TYO:7974)

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It's all fine and dandy to look at Nintendo's career through rose-tinted specatacles, but it hasn't always played the game by the rules and put consumers best interests at heart.

In October 2002 the company and seven of its distributors were fined a record 149m euros (£92.1m) by the European Commission after it was discovered that they'd artificially inflated prices of video games between 1991 and 1998.

During that period, prices of Nintendo products were up to 65% higher in Germany or the Netherlands than in Britain.

Six years on and Nintendo still haven't coughed up, but has instead appealed once again at the European Court in Luxembourg yesterday where a lawyer for the company said, "The penalty was unfair, illegal, even shocking."

EU lawyer, Xavier Lewis, told the court: "The fine was not of a capricious nature, or based on wild estimates. This fine was for an infringement that was considered very serious."

How come these big companies get to contest their fines? We get fined in a court of law and we have no choice but to pay up. The European Commission ought to take inflation into account over the last six years and wack some extra on top.


HEXUS Forums :: 6 Comments

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Posted by Hicks12 - Tue 20 May 2008 10:55
how come nintendo always get fined and not the likes of microsoft and sony? pretty much every company has pathetic pricing in the eu when compared to the US, its better for me to buy call of duty 4 from america(amazon.com) for pc @ $30 than it is here from amazon at £30, thats a joke as even import tax cant cost that much.
**** happens and its up to the people to justify the cost, not like you need games to live and will the people get there money back? hell no, so whats the point.
Posted by beanbandit - Tue 20 May 2008 13:28
Hicks12
how come nintendo always get fined and not the likes of microsoft and sony? pretty much every company has pathetic pricing in the eu when compared to the US, its better for me to buy call of duty 4 from america(amazon.com) for pc @ $30 than it is here from amazon at £30, thats a joke as even import tax cant cost that much.
**** happens and its up to the people to justify the cost, not like you need games to live and will the people get there money back? hell no, so whats the point.

This has nothing to do with the difference in price between the US & Euroland. The EU don't set the prices, what they do is make sure that prices across its member states are not harshly inflated, 65% increase is a bit of a joke tbh, so Nintendo got what they deserved. What amazes me is how long its taken the big N to appeal against this fine, 6 years, what a joke.
Posted by s_kinton - Tue 20 May 2008 14:11
Six years and they still haven't paid up…what a joke. Either fine someone and make them pay or dont bother, six years far too long. Litle things like these just consolidate peoples views that the judicial systems in use in the UK and EU are poor.
Posted by Lanky123 - Tue 20 May 2008 16:42
From the company that openly boasted that they made a profit on every Wii sold from launch, and that has licences to print money such as pokemon and mario, that's not too impressive. Doesn't the EU have something it can actually do to make Nintendo pay up? :rolleyes:
Posted by Spud1 - Wed 21 May 2008 13:30
I imagine there is going to be interest on that fine - so, the longer they wait the more money the EU will get out of them =)

Plus from Nintendos POV if they think they have a case (which from a business point of view they do..imo you should be able to charge whatever you like for your products, and vary that accross the world) then it makes sense to try and fight it. If they win they won't have to pay a penny and will likely have their legal bills paid for. £92.1m is a heck of a lot of money, regardless of the size of your business, and well worth fighting over.

From a consumer POV I don't like this whole price inflating business at all - but thats because I live in the UK where our prices are higher than say the USA..As above though just because I don't particularly like it doesn't mean its wrong. It's almost as bad as the EU's anti competition business with Microsoft..that ruling is just so incredibly wrong for lots of reasons, but I won't get into that here :)

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