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Comment by gonehome | Hacker News Reader

Unfortunately it's not that simple.

I talked to someone building related tech in the industry and E-Ink the company has a stranglehold on suppliers and leverages that to force compliance despite the patent nearing expiration (blocking anyone else from getting access to those suppliers).

The patent has allowed them to become entrenched and all current suppliers to depend on them. This will be hard to correct even with patent expiration.

I don't remember the specific details (unfortunately) and it's second hand info, but I was disappointed to hear it from someone more involved than I.

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I wish the FTC would crack down harder on exclusivity deals like this.

Why? E-Ink is a tiny niche in the display sector. Now, if, say, only Apple had E-Ink phones, it would be a monopoly issue.

E-Ink is apparently engaged in anti-competitive practices. Why should it matter that the market in question is small?

Lots of companies do this. Amazon demands exclusivity for certain book sales, and they have contracts with sellers that make it hard for other marketplaces to undercut them. Qualcomm is famous for abusive practices. The list goes on.

In general, IMO companies should be able to compete by offering a superior product and/or a superior price point and/or a superior experience. They should not be able to compete by getting in each others’ way.

You are of course correct. The far bigger core problem is that our government is generally captured and does not serve one of its core purposes, enforcing competition, i.e. preventing manipulation of markets. A way that a legitimate and constitutional government would do such a thing, would be, e.g., require competitive practices, e.g., e-ink screens must be sold to anyone so wants to buy them at fair price, to put in end products … if the company e-ink wishes to engage in interstate commerce, which is supposed to be regulated by Congress.

However, because Congress and the whole government is inherently illegitimate as is easily objectively measured by its constant, frequent, and persistent failure to abide by the constitution; things like industry capture of government and fraudulent regulatory bodies, is now the norm.

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