French Regulator Fines Sony €13.5M for PS4 Controller Practices - News

Tweet

France's antitrust regulator, the Autorité de la Concurrence, last month announced it has fined Sony €13.5 million as it abused its market dominance for the supply of PlayStation 4 controllers.

CPI reported the regulator revealed Sony committed two primary infractions. The first is Sony implementing  technical measures in November 2015 that was designed to combat counterfeiting, which inadvertently affected the use of third-party controller that did not have an official Sony license. This caused the controller to disconnect during system updates.

The second infraction was that Sony stopped rival companies from Joining PlayStation's licensing program as access was only granted through Sony's partnership program. Sony refused to communicate the program access criteria to manufacturers when requested. 

"Sony applied the criteria in a discretionary manner, even though access to the program was the only way to avoid disconnections," said Autorité de la Concurrence in a statement.

The regulator says these practices damaged the brand image of third-party manufacturers and impeded their market expansion. 

A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012 and taking over the hardware estimates in 2017. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel. You can contact the author on Twitter @TrunksWD.

More Articles

10 Comments

Sort by Highest Rated

• Newest
• Oldest
• Highest Rated
• Lowest Rated

tslog (on 02 January 2024)

Agree with this….now fine Xbox for forcing a monopoly on having exclusive wireless Xbox controllers. It’s such a scam.

• +7

Hiku tslog (on 02 January 2024)

Third party Xbox controllers have to be wired?

• 0

DonFerrari (on 03 January 2024)

A small amount that won't change much, but odd that they consider monopolistic practice to avoid third party sales of parts and counterfeit prevention.
With such a broad understanding they could very well sue almost all companies that have accessories.

• +2

Dante9 (on 03 January 2024)

Who buys those shady ass outside controllers anyways?

• +2

Drakrami Dante9 (on 03 January 2024)

Well just to be fair.. ps4 controllers stick drift like hell.. I burn through a controller like every 6-9 months lol.

• 0

Dante9 Drakrami (on 04 January 2024)

That's weird. I don't recall having to replace a single controller for the PS4. And I game a lot. There might have been one that I don't recall, but not enough to remember specifically.

• 0

Giggity_goo (on 03 January 2024)

should be going after the drifters

• +1

haxxiy (on 02 January 2024)

The proverbial slap in the corporate wrist.

• 0

LivncA_Dis3 (on 02 January 2024)

Ain't that a bitch or Sony is being a bitch? Haha

• 0

Qwark (on 02 January 2024)

Good, more countries should follow France's example

• -1