American Airlines Wins Just $1 From Sabre in 11-Year-Old Antitrust Case
Photo Credit: A US Airways plane on the tarmac. Flickr / Colin Brown
Skift Take
The long-running case revolved around practices that the leading U.S. provider of airline fare data to travel agents imposes on nearly all airlines. If the verdict stands, it doesn't make Sabre change, well, anything. Except maybe a smaller tip for a barista.
Airlines huffed at global distribution services companies like Sabre Corp. for decades. They puffed about how excessive fees and anti-competitive terms imposed by businesses that provide flight schedules, fare discount information, and booking services to travel agents were costing them hundreds of millions of dollars in profits.
And on Thursday, a federal court jury in Manhattan blew their house down, awarding American Airlines $1 after an 11-year lawsuit against Sabre, whose dominance of the U.S. market for flight data used by travel agents has been one of the industry's longest-running melodramas. A nominal victory for American, the result finds that Sabre's practices didn't cause American any financial harm.
The dispute was over practices Sabre used to force airlines to use its services, and prevent carriers from reaching out to travel agents and business travelers more directly. Bolstered by a 5-4 2018 Supreme Court decision that made it harder for antitrus
