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Abstract

Many companies that sell long-lasting products also sell related “aftermarket” products, such as repair services and replacement parts. In Eastman Kodak Co. v. Image Technical Services, 504 U.S. 451 (1992), the Supreme Court held that a company may face antitrust liability for exploiting its monopoly power in these aftermarkets even if it lacks market power in the original product market. This paper reconsiders that decision along two dimensions. First, despite both praise and criticism of the decision, there has been no historical investigation into the actual motivations underlying Kodak’s conduct in the copier and micrographics equipment aftermarkets. By drawing on original research and interviews with former Kodak employees and executives, this paper casts doubt on explanations for Kodak’s behavior offered by the Court and scholars and provides a new account of Kodak’s practices in those markets. Second, this paper takes a fresh look at the Kodak doctrine’s development in the years since the Supreme Court’s decision. What emerges from this analysis is a picture of an antirust doctrine ill-adapted to the world of software-based equipment and, worse still, an antitrust doctrine that raised the cost of aftermarket segmentation, likely promoting the very sort of aftermarket monopoly it sought to prevent.

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