$6M Optical Disk Drive Class Action Settlement Gets Tentative OK

A federal judge on Thursday preliminarily approved a $6 million class action settlement between NEC Corp. and direct buyers of the company’s optical disk drives. The class action settlement marks the latest to be reached in a disk drive price-fixing MDL, leaving plaintiffs about halfway through the process of resolving a number of class action lawsuits alleging that the companies colluded to artificially inflate prices of CD, DVD, and Blu-Ray computer disk drives.

The NEC disk drive settlement covers all consumers who directly purchased NEC optical disk drives between Jan. 1, 2004 and Jan. 1, 2010. Up to $750,000 of the $6 million class action settlement amount may be used in helping plaintiffs in the other optical drive price fixing class action lawsuits work to achieve a legal resolution with the remaining companies.

Class action settlements in the disk drive price-fixing MDL have already been reached with Hitachi-LG Data Storage Inc. and Panasonic Corp for $26 million and $5.75 million, respectively. Remaining defendants in the consolidated disk drive class action include Sony, Toshiba, and Samsung among others. Plaintiffs in those cases allege that the companies engaged in collusion through anti-competitive business practices for at least six years.

The direct purchasers are represented by class action lawyers from Saveri & Saveri Inc., Alioto Law Firm, Derman DeValerio, Cotchett Pitre & McCarthy LLP, and Hausfeld LLP among others.

The Optical Drive Price-Fixing Class Action Lawsuits are consolidated as In re: Optical Disk Drive Products Antitrust Litigation, MDL No. 2143, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

UPDATE July 25, 2016: A judge approved a $124.5 million settlement for indirect purchasers in 23 states and the District of Columbia. To file a claim, visit www.DollarsForDiskDrives.com/TCA.