By Mike Scarcella
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear CoStar Group’s bid to dismiss antitrust claims brought by real estate data provider Commercial Real Estate Exchange in the long-running feud between the two rival companies.
Here are some details:
* The justices made no comment, upholding a lower appeals court decision that allowed CREXi to proceed with its lawsuit.
* CREXi is seeking unspecified damages for loss of revenue and profits. It alleges that CoStar violated antitrust law by coercing real estate brokers to use its data platforms and by hindering its rivals’ access to essential web tools.
* CoStar denied any wrongdoing, arguing that it was not obligated to provide its competitors with access to its websites and databases.
* California-based CREXi filed its antitrust allegations as counterclaims against CoStar in a copyright lawsuit that CoStar filed against CREXi in 2020.
* CoStar’s ongoing lawsuit accuses CREXi of willfully copying tens of thousands of photos of real properties from CoStar as part of an extensive copyright infringement scheme.
* CoStar stated in a release that CREXi’s antitrust counterclaims are just a sideshow compared to CoStar’s underlying complaints against CREXi for massive copyright infringement, and that these allegations will not delay the copyright infringement trial.
