3 TEAM REPRESENTATIVES Trial Case Study #4 US Airways, Inc., for American Airlines, Inc. v. Sabre Holdings Corporation, et al., Case No. 1:11-cv-02725 (S.D.N.Y.) We demonstrated how Sabre preserved its gatekeeper power and blocked new entrants by imposing contractual conditions on airlines, preventing them from encouraging travel agencies to use alternative distribution channels, penalizing airlines that tried to create competitive alternatives to Sabre, and locking in travel agents to the Sabre system through a variety of restraints and incentivized booking payments. No precedent existed for presenting a two-sided market claim to a jury. To achieve this victory, O’Melveny navigated several challenges: • We overcame US Airways’ prior agreements to the contractual restraints that it now was claiming to be anticompetitive; • We dealt with US Airways’ absorption into American Airlines and the many years that had elapsed since the events in dispute as a result of the Second Circuit’s reversal of our 2016 jury trial victory; and • We educated the jury on the economics and operation of two-sided platforms and explained how Sabre could exercise monopoly power, despite having less than the typical market share to support a Section 2 claim. We focused the jury’s attention on Sabre’s broader, market-wide misconduct toward multiple airlines and potential The Winning Strategy In the first ever two-sided market jury trial, through a combination of fact and expert economist evidence, O’Melveny successfully explained to the jury how a two-sided platform could possess anticompetitive, gatekeeper power. Andrew Frackman NEW YORK Partner +1 212 326 2017 afrackman@omm.com Ian Simmons WASHINGTON, DC Co-Chair, Antitrust +1 202 383 5106 isimmons@omm.com Madhu Pocha CENTURY CITY Partner +1 310 246 8588 mpocha@omm.com
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