Más sobre Leegin

La decisión de la Corte Suprema de Justicia de EEUU en el caso Leegin Creative Leather Products, Inc v. PSKS, Inc., que cambió el precedente sobre el análisis de la fijación de precios verticales (retail price maintenance), sigue produciendo polémica en la academia. En esta ocasión ASHLEY DOTY (University of California, Berkeley - School of Law) publica en el Berkley Technology Law Journal, Vol. 23, No. 1, 2008 un documento titulado "Leegin v. PSKS: New Standard, New Challenges" en el que argumenta que el nuevo precedente de la Corte, a pesar de ser "correcto", crea nuevos problemas tanto para los agentes económicos y posibles incongruencias con otras normas.

A continuación trascribo el resumen y palabras claves del documento:

Abstract: In Leegin Creative Leather Products, Inc v. PSKS, Inc., the Supreme Court, taking heed of years of economic research identifying procompetitive benefits of vertical resale price maintenance (RPM), declared that the practice shall be evaluated under the rule of reason analysis. In a 5-4 split, the Court explicitly overruled Dr. Miles Medical Co. v. John D. Park & Sons Co., in which ninety-six years ago, the Court pronounced RPM to be per se illegal. This paper argues that the Court's decision was correct, but notes that the new standard creates a whole host of new problems, from uncertainty for market players, to a potential adverse interaction with the First Sale Doctrine in patent law.

Keywords: Leegin, Antitrust, First Sale Doctrine, Exhaustion, Quanta v. LG