M-Edge Sues Amazon for Unfair Competition
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The business of making cases and accessories for devices such as Amazon Kindle can be quite lucrative. It is no secret that Amazon sells a ton of Kindle units each and every year. M-Edge Accessories is behind some of the most popular add-ons available for Amazon Kindles. M-Edge is now complaining that Amazon is using its power to bully the company and even hijack its products.
M-Edge developed a very successful product line: personal electronic device jackets with multiple features for the Kindle and other e-readers. Amazon thereafter repeatedly sought to hijack the product through threats, deceit, interference with M-Edge’s customer relationships, and patent infringement.
Amazon is seemingly demanding an increased commission rate on M-Edge Kindle cases. The folks at M-Edge claim that Amazon executive Jay Marine threatened to de-list M-Edge from Amazon.com if the company did not pay up.
M-Edge had to retroactively pay the difference between the 8% fee and the 25% fee for all of January, 2010. That amount was approximately $600,000; a sizable sum to M-Edge. M-Edge refused, pointing to its existing, three-year contract which it had just signed in November of 2009.
Amazon is one of the most innovative companies around. But it has acted like a bully in the past. In fact, most large companies do that once in a while. It will be interesting to see how successful this lawsuit will be. M-Edge products continue to be listed on Amazon.com at this point.
