MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
I. INTRODUCTION
Plaintiff CCBN.com Inc. (“CCBN”) alleges that defendant Thomson Financial, Inc. breached its fiduciary duty to plaintiff, violated the antitrust laws, and engaged in a host of other statutory and common law transgressions. 1 The defendant has moved, on numerous grounds, to dismiss all claims. After hearing and briefing, the motion to dismiss is ALLOWED in part and DENIED in part.
II. ALLEGED FACTS
The complaint alleges the following facts.
In October 1997, CCBN’s founders invited Thomson Financial to become an investor in CCBN. This would not be the first business deal between the parties. Jeffrey Parker, one of the founders of CCBN, had started two information services companies in the early 1980s and sold both to Thomson in 1986. Those companies became the foundation of Thomson Financial. CCBN envisioned that the synergies between CCBN and Thomson Financial, as well as the past relationship between the parties, would make for a successful partnership in CCBN’s IR venture.
A deal between the two companies was consummated in October 1997. Thomson Financial invested $1.5 million in CCBN, acquiring a 13 percent equity interest in the company. As a condition of that investment, Thomson Financial obtained the right to designate two of the five members of CCBN’s Board of Directors. CCBN and Thomson Financial also agreed that CCBN would have the exclusive right to publish Thomson Financial’s First Call consensus estimates on its customers’ IR web pages, and that Thomson Financial would be entitled to receive information periodically from CCBN, through Thomson Financial’s Board representatives and informally through CCBN management, regarding the development of CCBN’s business.
After Thomson Financial’s investment, CCBN viewed Thomson Financial as a strategic business partner. Believing that the two companies had an agreement that Thomson Financial would not compete with CCBN in the provision of IR communication services, CCBN openly shared with Thomson Financial extensive proprietary information, including the organization and structure of its content, customer data, and analyses of customer strengths and weaknesses.
In 2000, Thomson Financial began to use confidential CCBN information, obtained by Thomson Financial representatives on CCBN’s board, to openly compete with CCBN in various ways. First, Thomson Financial board members employed numerous delaying tactics to stall CCBN’s planned expansion into the European market. Second, various Thomson Financial officials encouraged plaintiff to delay the introduction of new investment products, such as an “intelligence dashboard” tab on its popular “StreetEvents” service, in order to give Thomson Financial time to develop products to compete directly with CCBN. The intelligence dashboard tab would have provided CCBN clients with detailed and easily accessible information concerning shareholder targeting data, trading volume, and analyst estimates. Third, Thomson Financial misappropriated CCBN corporate opportunities, and interfered with prospective business arrangements of CCBN, using information obtained from Thomson Financial board members. Fourth, Thomson Financial used confidential information obtained in its role as a CCBN fiduciary to launch “First Call Events,” an IR product that provides services that are virtually identical to CCBN’s StreetEvents calendar. To advance its efforts to compete with CCBN,
III. MOTION TO DISMISS STANDARD
For purposes of this motion, the Court takes as true “the well-pleaded facts as they appear in the complaint, extending [the] plaintiff every reasonable inference in [her] favor.”
Coyne v. City of Somerville,
IV. LEGAL ANALYSIS
A. Breach of Fiduciary Duty — Board Representation (Count 1)
Defendant claims that CCBN has failed to allege facts sufficient to support its breach of fiduciary duty claims. Under the law of Delaware
2
, the state of incorporation, a minority shareholder is not a fiduciary of a corporation unless it exercises actual control over the corporation. “[A] shareholder holding less than a 50% interest is not a controlling shareholder, with the fiduciary obligations accompanying that status, unless the shareholder exercises actual control over the conduct of the corporation.”
In re Healthco Int’l Inc.,
Nonetheless, CCBN argues that Thomson Financial is liable under the doctrine of respondeat superior for the breach of fiduciary duty by its own employees and former executives who sat on CCBN’s board.
See generally
Restatement (Seo-ond) Of AgenCY §§ 140, 212 (1958). While this is an interesting theory, courts applying Delaware law have rejected it.
See U.S. Airways Group, Inc. v. British Airways PLC,
Plaintiff also relies on
Blau v. Lehman,
CCBN has a comeback argument that Thomson is liable for joining with a fiduciary in a breach of her fiduciary duties. Under Delaware law, “one who knowingly joins with a fiduciary, including corporate officials, in a breach of a fiduciary obligation is liable to the beneficiaries of the trust relationship.”
Ivanhoe Partners v. Newmont Mining Corp.,
As directors on CCBN’s board, Thomson Financial’s designees owed a fiduciary duty to CCBN.
See Skeen v. Jo-Ann Stores, Inc.,
B. Breach of Fiduciary Duty — Joint Venture Relationship (Count 2)
CCBN next contends that Thomson Financial owes a fiduciary obligation to CCBN through the existence of a relationship of trust and confidence between the parties. Defendant contends that plaintiff fails to plead facts demonstrating that the parties’ relationship was anything other than an ordinary, arms length business relationship.
Under Delaware law, “the existence of a fiduciary relationship requires one party reposing, to a second party’s knowledge, trust and confidence in the sec
Numerous allegations suggest a relationship of “trust and confidence” between CCBN and Thomson Financial that goes well beyond a conventional business relationship. Among other things, Thomson Financial had a long standing close business relationship with CCBN, made various representations to encourage a relationship of confidence, had designees on the Board of Directors, shared confidential information, and was negotiating a joint venture.
See Industrial General Corp. v. Sequoia Pacific Systems Corp.,
C. Sherman Act Claims (Counts 7-10)
The First Amended Complaint alleges four separate antitrust counts under the Sherman Act, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1-2 (2000). Plaintiff argues: (1) that Thomson Financial required customers who wanted to purchase Thomson Financial’s “Aggregated Research” product to also purchase its “Aggregated Calendar” product, in violation of § 1 of the Sherman Act; (2) that Thomson Financial required purchasers of Thomson Financial’s “First Call Consensus Estimate” to also purchase its “Aggregated Calendar” product, also in violation of § 1 of the Sherman Act; (3) that Thomson Financial engaged in a pattern of illegal conduct in an effort to drive CCBN from the market for IR calendaring services, resulting in a dangerous probability of Thomson Financial obtaining a monopoly position in that market, in violation of § 2 of the Sherman Act; and (4) that Thomson Financial engaged in a pattern of misconduct that has resulted in Thomson Financial’s monopolization of the IR calendaring market, also in violation of § 2 of the Sherman Act.
1. The Section 1 Claims
Section 1 of the Sherman Act makes illegal “[e]very contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy, in restraint of trade or commerce among the several States .... ” 15 U.S.C. § 1. Courts have analyzed some kinds of § 1 illegal restraint claims under a “rule of reason” inquiry, and others under
“per se
” rules. “As its name suggests, the rule of reason requires the factfinder to decide whether under all the circumstances of the case the restrictive practice imposes an unreasonable restraint on competition.”
Arizona v. Maricopa County Med. Soc’y,
Courts have identified some tying arrangements as
per se
violations of the Sherman Act.
See Maricopa County Med. Soc’y,
(1) the tying and the tied products are actually two distinct products; (2) there is an agreement or condition, express or implied, that establishes a tie; (3) the entity accused of tying has sufficient economic power in the market for the tying product to distort consumers’ choices with respect to the tied product; and (4) the tie forecloses a substantial amount of commerce in the market for the tied product.
Borschow Hospital and Medical Supplies, Inc. v. Cesar Castillo Inc.,
The complaint makes adequate allegations that the two products at issue are distinct products. The Aggregated Calendar product (the tied product) provides information from individual companies about their own events and schedules. As described, such a service is not interchangeable with Aggregated Research or Consensus Estimate products (the tying products), which are independent analyses of the financial strength of publicly traded companies. Defendant disputes the contention that these are distinct products. Nonetheless, at this stage of the litigation, sufficient allegations concerning the first element of the tying claim have been made.
With respect to the second element, defendant argues that plaintiff has not set forth adequate factual allegations concerning the existence of “an agreement or condition, express or implied, that establishes a tie.”
Borschow Hospital,
Even under notice pleading standards, as framed, the complaint does nothing more than parrot the second element of the tying claim and assert that “on information and belief’ it is implicated here. While no special pleading standards attach to antitrust claims, plaintiffs must do more than assert conclusory allegations.
See DM Research, Inc. v. College of Amer
Even if this “information and belief’ allegation were sufficient, defendant also emphasizes plaintiffs failure to adequately allege the third element of the claim, that defendant Thomson Financial “has sufficient economic power in the market for the tying product to distort consumers’ choices with respect to the tied product.”
Borschow Hospital,
The Amended Complaint makes no estimates of Thomson Financial’s share of the aggregate research market. To be sure, there is an allegation that Thomson Financial charges supracompetitive prices, and that brokers, institutional investors and publicly traded companies all require current access to First Call’s earnings estimated products. Nonetheless, the Amended Complaint does not allege that it can “profitably raise prices substantially above the competitive level.”
United States v. Microsoft Corporation,
More must be alleged to satisfy the market power element of a § 1 claim than the mere assertion that such power exists.
See Town of Norwood v. New England Power Company,
The failure to adequately plead the third element of the § 1 claims relates to CCBN’s failure to satisfy the fourth element of the claim, that “the tie forecloses a substantial amount of commerce in the market for the tied product.”
Borschow Hospital,
The inadequacies plaguing plaintiffs
per se
theory undermine its rule of reason argument as well. In the absence of
per se
liability, an antitrust plaintiff must show under the rule of reason that defendant’s conduct had an “actual adverse effect on competition.”
Jefferson Parish Hosp. Dist. No. 2 v. Hyde,
The motion to dismiss the § 1 antitrust claims is ALLOWED.
2. The Section 2 Claims
Section 2 of the Sherman Act makes it illegal to “monopolize, or attempt to monopolize, or combine or conspire with any other person or persons, to monopolize any part of the trade or commerce among the several States ....” 15 U.S.C. § 2. To state a claim for monopolization under § 2 of the Sherman Act, a plaintiff must adequately allege that: “(1) the defendant has monopoly power and (2) the defendant ‘has engaged in impermissible “exclusionary practices” with the design or effect of protecting or enhancing its monopoly position.’ ”
Coastal Fuels of Puerto Rico, Inc. v. Caribbean Petroleum Corp.,
Again, plaintiffs § 2 claims fail because of deficient allegations of Thomson Financial’s market in the aggregated calendar market which it was allegedly attempting to monopolize.
See Spectrum Sports, Inc. v. McQuillan,
ORDER
For the reasons stated, the Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss (Docket #38) is ALLOWED as to counts 1, 7, 8, 9 and 10 and is otherwise DENIED.
Notes
. After wading through the 19 separate counts of the original everything-but-the-kitchen-sink complaint, and while finalizing the opinion, I received the First Amended Complaint. Courtesy suggests that counsel should have informed the Court that an amended complaint was on the way.
. “It is well settled that internal corporate affairs are governed by the law of the state of incorporation (Delaware).”
Micro Networks Corp. v. HIG Hightec, Inc.,
