A lawyer from Texas has found a way of taking a big chunk from the finances of the laptop computer industry. All you need to do is file a lawsuit against a corporation for a problem that doesn't exist. If you are one of those working in the market for laptop computers, this is not something to laugh about. Five other companies have also received lawsuits filed against them, which will most likely lead to an increase in prices.
A $9 billion lawsuit was filed by a lawyer against a Japanese appliance maker, and the entire escapade ended with the lawyer getting a $2 billion settlement from the company. It was decided by the company that to settle the suit early on was better than taking it to court where it risks losing more.
It was through this settlement that a group of lawyers managed to earn around $147 million in contingency fees. The computer manufacturer also gave to its millions of buyers cash rebates worth hundreds of dollars, as well as discount coupons. Laptop owners became the plaintiffs of this lawsuit filed last March.
These men argued that the design flaw in the laptop computers could cause corruption or loss of data. This flaw did not affect these men in any way, however.
The Japanese company pointed out that no one had ever complained before about this defect which had been pointed out. The Japanese company stated that until the lawyers filed the lawsuit last March, no customers made any complaints at all about the technology. Nothing in the company's extensive tests revealed a loss of data due to this flaw.
The cost of losing the jury trial would have been more than $9 billion, jeopardizing the future of this Japanese company. This move by the company to surrender in an easily defensible case was like throwing bloody meat into the Gulf of Mexico. Even before the splash sounds faded, sharks were already there. In effect, more lawsuits began to emerge, this time directed against five laptop manufacturers believed to have used the NEC floppy control chip.
Lawsuits are making businesses consider layoffs. More problems would arise from this. Specializing in the computer industry, a financial analyst from New York says that prices of personal computers could go up because of these settlements. That would be doubly ironic because economists credit falling computer prices over the last two decades as one of the main factors in keeping inflation exceptionally low in the United States, a key ingredient in the nation's nearly two decades of uninterrupted prosperity.
If you spare just a few hundred dollars, you can purchase low priced computers that work better than those that existed twenty years ago that cost thousands of dollars. Computer prices are sure to soar if laptop manufacturers are bullied just like the Japanese company. This is not regarded as good news for those who cannot afford it.
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