Sony fined €13.5m by French antitrust regulator

4 months ago

Sony has been fined €13.5 million by French antitrust regulator Autorité de la Concurrence, which has accused the company of "abusing its dominant position in the market" by restricting third-party PlayStation 4 controllers.

Filed by the regulator last month following a referral from French controller manufacturer Subsonic, its investigation found that Sony put counterfeiting measures in place in November 2015 that caused third-party controllers to regularly disconnect from the console during system updates.

The competition regulator also found that third-party manufacturers faced difficulty in joining its licensing program, which it alleged that Sony "refused to communicate" terms and criteria to manufacturers who'd requested it.

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Author
Sophie McEvoy