Tech distributor Avnet to hunt $274 mln in antitrust damages at trial

(Reuters) – Avnet Inc mentioned on Thursday it can search greater than $274 million in damages at trial subsequent month in a U.S. federal courtroom over the electronics distributor’s claims that it overpaid for sure key parts in a world price-fixing conspiracy led by a gaggle of Japanese producers.

Plaintiffs’ legal professionals for Avnet in new pre-trial filings in San Francisco federal courtroom outlined the contours of their allegations in opposition to Nippon Chemi-Con Corp, Hitachi Chemical Co Ltd and a number of other different firms that make “capacitor” parts broadly present in cell phones and private computer systems.

Publicly traded Avnet, based mostly in Phoenix and using greater than 15,000 staff, is among the many nation’s largest distributors of connectors and semiconductors. Avnet opted out of sophistication motion settlements involving different so-called “direct purchasers” of capacitors.

Amongst these offers, Nippon agreed to pay $160 million, and Hitachi paid $63 million.

“The capacitors price-fixing conspiracy is among the most coordinated, effectively documented, and long-running conspiracies in latest historical past,” a lawyer for Avnet, Scott Wagner of Bilzin Sumberg Baena Value & Axelrod, mentioned in Thursday’s submitting. The corporate alleges the price-fixing occurred from 2001 to 2014.

Attorneys for Avnet and a consultant from the corporate didn’t instantly reply on Friday to messages in search of remark.

Protection attorneys for Nippon Chemi-Con and Hitachi Chemical didn’t instantly reply on Friday to comparable messages.

Hitachi, Nippon and different defendants denied legal responsibility as a part of their settlement agreements, and the businesses on Thursday in a court filing disputed Avnet’s claims that it had been harmed.

Attorneys for defendants additionally mentioned that out of the $91 million in Avnet’s claimed damages, “solely $1.5 million” was tied to capacitor purchases from the defendants. Events in antitrust circumstances can get better thrice the quantity of precise damages.

“The conspiracy Avnet alleges — each in membership and scope — merely didn’t exist,” the protection legal professionals mentioned of their joint submitting.

Avnet’s legal professionals mentioned “conspirators took meticulous notes of their conferences with opponents,” used code names and urged “others to destroy their notes after studying to make sure that the conspiracy remained hid.” They additional alleged that capacitor producers exchanged confidential details about manufacturing and costs at group conferences “and mentioned when and find out how to sluggish manufacturing to be able to increase costs.”

The jury trial, set to start on Nov. 10, is anticipated to final three to 4 weeks earlier than U.S. District Choose James Donato.

The case is Avnet Inc v Hitachi Chemical Co Ltd et al, U.S. District Courtroom, Northern District of California, No. 3:17-cv-07046-JD.

For Avnet: Robert Turken and Scott Wagner of Bilzin Sumberg Baena Value & Axelrod

For Hitachi Chemical Co Ltd: Chul Pak of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati

For Nippon Chemi-Con: Joseph Bial of Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison

Learn extra:

U.S court asked to approve $165 mln capacitor antitrust settlement

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