OAKLAND — Ten years of antitrust litigation against Apple Inc. ended in a complete bust for plaintiffs lawyers at Robbins Geller Rudman & Geller on Tuesday, when jurors returned a verdict siding with the company after just three hours of deliberation.
A jury in Oakland federal court unanimously determined a 2006 iTunes update was a product improvement, not just a way for Apple to maintain control over the MP3 music player market. The update blocked iPods from playing music bought from music stores that competed with iTunes, but it also added features Apple argued were obvious improvements—including a higher resolution screen, the ability to watch movies, and an auto-syncing feature. Apple’s lawyers, led by William Isaacson and Karen Dunn of Boies, Schiller & Flexner, also argued the update fixed security holes.
