A U.S. federal judge ordered Taiwan-based optical storage products maker Quanta Storage Inc. and its U.S. unit to pay $439 million in damages to HP Inc. for selling optical disk drives at inflated prices, Bloomberg News reported.
U.S. District Judge David Hittner increased the amount from a $176 million award announced by a Houston jury in October 2019. Hittner tripled the award to $528 million, in line with antitrust laws, for ignoring the jury's findings without a reason, but deducted $89 million HP received in settlements from other companies that had allegedly engaged in price-fixing.
Over the last decade, Sony Corp., Panasonic Corp. and Hitachi-LG, among others, have settled with HP, while Quanta opted for a court trial, Bloomberg News reported.
Quanta attorney Andrew Lusby reportedly refused to comment.