Penguin has agreed to pay $75 million to settle the ebook
pricing lawsuit with consumers and states. Meanwhile, Apple and the Department
of Justice are set to go to trial on June 3. Book publisher Penguin has agreed
to a $75 million settlement with consumers and states in the ebook pricing
lawsuit, several months after it settled with the Department of Justice. The
other publishers in the case — HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, Hachette
and Macmillan — had already settled with both the states and the DOJ. Penguin’s
settlement is by far the largest that any of the publishers have reached. The
settlement also clears the way for the Penguin-Random House merger to move
forward in the second half of this year. Penguin’s parent company Pearson said
in a statement, “In anticipation of reaching this agreement, Pearson had made a
$40m provision for settlement in its 2012 accounts. An incremental charge will
be expensed in Pearson’s 2013 statutory accounts as part of the accounting for
the Penguin Random House joint-venture.
