UD vs. Konami Lawsuit

Quote from the Post.... Calls to Upper Deck and its law firm, Rutan & Tucker, were not returned.

Legal sources suggested the execs took the Fifth to avoid exposing themselves to potential criminal charges, like mail fraud or wire fraud, stemming from testimony uncovered in the civil case.

Upper Deck, which has expanded its business into memorabilia like autographs, still generates the bulk of its revenue through trading cards.

It had a distribution deal with Konami going back to 2002, but allegedly began making and selling fake cards outside of the deal.

Ben Fox, Konami's lawyer at Morrison & Foerster, said his client was looking for "hundreds of millions of dollars" in damages.

"This could be the end of Upper Deck," said Joshua Leland Evans, chairman of memorabilia shop Leland's Auction House in Bohemia, NY. "I'm not sure they can survive this. We are hearing big rumors of financial trouble at Upper Deck. It could only be a matter of time before they go out of business."


WOW!!!!!!!
 
89chinook said:
Quote from the Post.... Calls to Upper Deck and its law firm, Rutan & Tucker, were not returned.

Legal sources suggested the execs took the Fifth to avoid exposing themselves to potential criminal charges, like mail fraud or wire fraud, stemming from testimony uncovered in the civil case.

Upper Deck, which has expanded its business into memorabilia like autographs, still generates the bulk of its revenue through trading cards.

It had a distribution deal with Konami going back to 2002, but allegedly began making and selling fake cards outside of the deal.

Ben Fox, Konami's lawyer at Morrison & Foerster, said his client was looking for "hundreds of millions of dollars" in damages.

"This could be the end of Upper Deck," said Joshua Leland Evans, chairman of memorabilia shop Leland's Auction House in Bohemia, NY. "I'm not sure they can survive this. We are hearing big rumors of financial trouble at Upper Deck. It could only be a matter of time before they go out of business."


WOW!!!!!!!
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I seriously doubt it.
 
Rather than put UD out of business Konami will probably take an interest... say 35% of UD... and get paid for years to come rather than getting pennies on the dollar thru the bankrupcy court.
 
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Any credibility that upper deck had, has now disappeared.
I am now seriously doubting that any/all memorabilia cards I have from UD are real.

I can say that if they do go under, I wont miss them.
 
I think that we are finally hearing the death rattle of UD. I'm pretty sure that they will simply close the doors as UD and reopen under a new banner.
 
Is anyone really and truly surprised by any of this? A lot of the things they have done over the years are pure criminal. I hope they can't buy their way out of this one and they finally suffer what has been coming for a long time. You might get away with lies, cheating, and stealing for awhile, but eventually you get caught in something that you can't get out of. NHLPA, are you listening? Who knows what UD is doing behind your back with that license. Do you really want to have the NHL name associated with a company who conducts themselves in this manner? Get out while you can......
 
I said this was the beginning of the end a year ago i think it is getting near at hand especially with the 100 million plus they already owe the government
 
Millions?

The math was provided to us earlier. Statutory damages - just what's on the books as required damages to be paid when this kind of thing occurs - was reportedly $15,000 - $150,000 PER INFRACTION. And there are 600,000 alleged cases of infraction.

$9-90 BILLION in statutory damages possible with those figures, never mind punitive damages.

"Mr. McWilliam, meet your new majority shareholder."
 
quincy said:
Millions?

The math was provided to us earlier. Statutory damages - just what's on the books as required damages to be paid when this kind of thing occurs - was reportedly $15,000 - $150,000 PER INFRACTION. And there are 600,000 alleged cases of infraction.

$9-90 BILLION in statutory damages possible with those figures, never mind punitive damages.

"Mr. McWilliam, meet your new majority shareholder."
Click to expand...

Sorry, but the court system will never award Billions - not to mention this will be dealt out before it's all over.....
 
Stadium Sports said:
Sorry, but the court system will never award Billions - not to mention this will be dealt out before it's all over.....
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If the court will award multimillions against college students for downloading music from napster (another form of willful copyright infringement, same thing we are dealing with here) there is no reason to think that they will not go into the billions for this.

I think this is a case to make an example of. Its one thing to infringe, and a completely different thing to have an agreement with a company and produce things outside the agreement to make more money.

Someone brought up bankruptcy before. If Upper Deck goes into bankruptcy Konami has no say in the matter, and they will have to live with whatever priority (order of repayment upon liquidation) that the court assigns them. They should be somewhere behind perfected secured creditors, meaning those with recorded interests on identifiable tangible assets. I doubt that they will be able to get out from under the judgment if they file for reorganization, so this would be the end of Upper Deck.
 
If Upper Deck goes into bankruptcy...LOL...you all thought redemptions and replacements were a gong show before...? Someone else said it, if you have anything outstanding, I would suggest that now would be a good time to cash those chips in.
 
Triple B said:
If Upper Deck goes into bankruptcy...LOL...you all thought redemptions and replacements were a gong show before...? Someone else said it, if you have anything outstanding, I would suggest that now would be a good time to cash those chips in.
Click to expand...

Case in point - Fleer a few years ago...
 
Art - I've been saying for the last couple of years that UD was reminding me more and more of Pinnacle in their final days...
 
I think the worst part about a potential Upper Deck bankruptcy is the loss of all the game used memorabilia from the hobby. I don't think any reputable company can honestly take on that mess. If Upper Deck has no idea what piece came from where, how can another company ever figure it out?
 
I've kept up with this on a couple of other boards and in-the-know blogs. Apparently the cards were the "rare" foils and were printed up and distributed in retail packs where they sell a foil and some "regular cards". Presumably this was done to get rid of the common stock lying around.
 
The good old Konami code... and it looks like UD no longer has an infinite life code...

The GU could take a hit, but could this mean the resurrection of a couple other companies in the sportcards industry for hockey? I wonder how the NHLPA will handle a possible new partner for sportcards??

Big Tall said:
In order to win this lawsuit, please press up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A
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