I need to check how the lawsuits by farmers against $DE are going in their right to repair fight:
March 15 (Reuters) - Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) has been sued in a pair of proposed antitrust class actions accusing the company of unlawfully curbing competition for maintenance and replacement parts for its electric vehicles, forcing owners to pay more and wait longer for repair services.
The lawsuits, filed on Tuesday and Wednesday in federal court in San Francisco, allege that Tesla designed its electric vehicles, warranties and repair policies to discourage owners and lessees from using independent shops outside of Tesla’s control.
The growing “right-to-repair” legislative movement seeks to make it easier and cheaper for consumers to fix their products by requiring manufacturers to share repair information, provide diagnostic tools, and supply service parts. Various right-to-repair laws have been considered and passed around the world. In Europe, manufacturers are legally required to supply spare parts for up to 10 years. In the U.S., President Biden signed a sweeping executive order in July 2021 directing the FTC to draft new right-to-repair regulations, and various U.S. states have passed some version of right-to-repair legislation.
Repair advocates argue that such legislation will break manufacturers’ monopoly on the repair market and benefit consumers. They further contend that easier repair allows consumers to hold on to their old products longer, so they do not throw away used products and buy new ones as quickly. This would reduce the environmental impact by reducing e-waste and new production. Our research, forthcoming in the journal Management Science, challenges this conventional wisdom and finds that the right-to-repair legislation may not benefit either consumers or the environment.
The key is that manufacturers might strategically adjust new product prices to mitigate their foreseeable profit loss from the right-to-repair legislation. Will manufacturers follow a margin strategy and raise new product prices to capitalize on easier repair? Will manufacturers follow a volume strategy and cut new product prices to lure consumers into replacing instead of repairing a glitchy product? Such price responses can have nuanced implications for both consumers and the environment.