Suit alleging Apple monopoly on iPhone apps is dismissed

Apple won dismissal on procedural grounds of a suit claiming the company maintains a monopoly over iPhone applications

U.S. District Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Oakland, California, ruled today that the plaintiffs weren’t in a legal position to bring the suit as they hadn’t bought the applications at issue in the case.

The complaint can still be amended and refiled, Gonzalez said.

The plaintiffs failed to prove “collective allegations that they have been deprived of lower cost alternatives, paid higher prices for Apple-approved applications, or had their iPhones disabled or destroyed,” Gonzalez wrote. “At a minimum, plaintiffs must allege facts showing that each named plaintiff has personally suffered an injury-in-fact based on Apple’s alleged conduct.”

In a suit originally filed in 2011, the same consumers argued that Cupertino, California-based Apple has built a monopoly for iPhone applications because they’re only for sale at Apple’s App Store.

Bloomberg