John Deere Repair Software Opened by FTC: Antitrust Template for Cars and Phones

The FTC secured a court order requiring John Deere to provide farmers and independent repair shops with diagnostic software, repair manuals, and electronic reprogramming tools previously locked to authorized dealers. This marks the first federal antitrust precedent that withholding repair software to control who can service a physical product constitutes illegal monopolization—a legal theory now directly applicable to automotive, medical device, and smartphone manufacturers.

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