Apple responds in its March 3 filing that “a supposed belief that a market must be entered for competitive reasons hardly shows a ‘conscious commitment’ to ‘achieve an unlawful objective’ of raising prices to uncompetitive levels by conspiracy or otherwise.”
The Apple filing continues …
“Nor does this ‘Kindle theory’ make sense on its own terms. For example, if Amazon was a ‘threat’ that needed to be squelched by means of an illegal conspiracy, why would Apple offer Amazon’s Kindle app on the iPad? Why would Apple conclude that conspiring to force Amazon to no longer lose money on eBooks would cripple Amazon’s competitive fortunes? And why would Apple perceive the need for an illegal solution to the “Kindle threat” when it had an obvious and lawful one which it implemented – namely, introducing a multipurpose device (the iPad) whose marketing and sales success was not centered on eBook sales?