Worry not; Nintendo isn’t the bad guy here. But you should know that your precious Nintendo DS is somehow involved in a price fixing scandal between two LCD makers in Japan.
Sharp and Hitachi, two of Japan’s largest electronics companies, were raided by investigators from the Japan Fair Trade Commission yesterday. It seems that something has been funky about the pricing of the two liquid crystal screens on the Nintendo DS.
Originally, Sharp made all of the DS LCD screens, but when things blew up for Nintendo, Hitachi hopped on board to contribute, and this is when the alleged price fixing began. The two companies are said to have made a deal where the price of these screens would stay fixed, despite falling prices and competition. What sucks is that these two have been investigated for price fixing in the past, last time over television screens.
According to TimesOnline, both companies have confirmed that they were visited by the JFTC, but neither cared to comment.
Poor Nintendo. They get screwed by something that probably originates at a drunken pact at some izakaya after work one night. I can’t wait to hear what Nintendo has to say about this.
[Thanks, JR]
