Antitrust Standing after Apple v. Pepper: Application to the Sports Betting Data Market

• Author: Ryan M. Rodenberg
• DOI: 10.1177/0003603X19875045
• Published date: 01 December 2019
• Date: 01 December 2019

Article

Antitrust Standing after Apple

v. Pepper: Application

to the Sports Betting

Data Market

Ryan M. Rodenberg*

Abstract

In Apple v. Pepper, the U.S. Supreme Court expressed a largely permissive view about whether certain

potential plaintiffs have legal standing to pursue antitrust lawsuits in federal court. The Apple v. Pepper

ruling provided important clarity about the scope of the so-called indirect purchaser rule set forth

forty-plus years earlier in Illinois Brick. This paper first summarizes the key takeaways from the Apple v.

Pepper decision released on May 13, 2019, positioning the ruling vis-`

a-vis other standing-related cases

that have sometimes closed the courtroom doors to plaintiffs alleging anticompetitive conduct under

the Sherman Act and Clayton Act. This paper then applies the lessons from Apple v. Pepper to sports

betting data, an emerging tech-focused market. This paper concludes by outlining how—and why—this

market will likely be subject to antitrust scrutiny soon.

Keywords

antitrust standing, Illinois Brick, data market

I. Introduction

On May 13, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court—by a 5-4 vote in the long-running Apple v. Pepper

litigation

1

—provided future antitrust plaintiffs a boost when faced with a motion to dismiss premised

on a lack of standing. In Apple v. Pepper, a group of iPhone app purchasers alleged that Apple charged

too much for apps and monopolized the app market.

2

Apple claimed that the plaintiffs did not have

*JD/PhD, Associate Professor, Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida,USA

Corresponding Author:

Ryan M. Rodenberg, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL 32306, USA.

Email: rrodenberg@fsu.edu

1. 587 U.S. ___, 139 S. Ct. 1514 (2019). Justice Kavanaugh wrote the Court’s majority opinion and was joined by Justice

Ginsburg, Justice Breyer, Justice Sotomayor, and Justice Kagan. Justice Gorsuch penned a dissent and was joined by Chief

Justice Roberts, Justice Thomas, and Justice Alito. See id. at 1525–31.

2. Id. at 1518–19.

The Antitrust Bulletin

2019, Vol. 64(4) 584-593

ªThe Author(s) 2019

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DOI: 10.1177/0003603X19875045

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