Truck manufacturing industry expert witnesses may opine on commercial motor vehicles, trucking regulatory matters and related issues. In Class Action Lawsuit Alleges Eaton-Truck Maker Conspiracy, TruckstopUSA writes:
A class action lawsuit accuses truck makers of conspiring with Eaton Corporation to help Eaton maintain a monopoly in the Class 8 truck transmission market, forcing up the price of trucks containing Eaton transmissions.
On Oct. 4, the New York-based plaintiff’s law firm Murray, Frank & Sailer LLP filed a class action complaint in the U.S. Court for the District of Kansas on behalf of a nationwide class of Class 8 truck purchasers who indirectly bought Eaton transmissions by purchasing Class 8 trucks from October 2002 to the present.
The suit alleges that Eaton cut deals with truck makers to cut other transmission makers out of the market, especially ZF Meritor, which was forced out of the market. ZF Meritor is a joint venture of ArvinMeritor and ZF Friedrichshafen AG formed in 1999. Although ZF Meritor still exists as a legal entity, ArvinMeritor said it was forced to stop selling transmissions because of Eaton’s actions.
Because of this, the suit claims, truck buyers paid more than they would have if there had been serious competition.