Antitrust Fights Loom as Companies Seek to Protect Platforms

Antitrust litigation frequently made headlines in 2025, led by a number of high-profile cases from the government’s monopolization suits against Google LLC and Meta Platforms Inc. to the controversial approval of the merger between Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Juniper Networks Inc. and the litigation about payments for coaches and athletes in college sports.

The antitrust landscape was also affected by new leadership at the Department of Justice and Federal Trade Commission, where commissioners fired by President Donald Trump are challenging their removal.

Antitrust activity will continue in 2026 as new laws and leadership begin to take shape. Expect litigation to continue and enforcement to potentially increase.

Control Over Platforms

Technology companies’ control over their platforms—and the restriction of potential rivals trying to use those platforms—has spawned considerable litigation in recent years, such as the lawsuits brought by Epic Games challenging the terms imposed on developers distributing their apps on Apple Inc.'s and Google’s mobile platforms.

The platform owners have sought to beat back monopolization allegations by invoking the refusal-to-deal doctrine, derived from the principle that the antitrust laws shouldn’t force a company to deal with its rivals, except in extremely limited situations. The refusal-to-deal test is difficult to satisfy, so if a company can convince a court that a case is based on solid refusal-to-deal grounds, it usually means an early victory for the defendant.

Several 2025 decisions suggest that courts will be more willing to diverge from the restrictive refusal-to-deal framework where the alleged exclusion involves contractual restraints that prevent customers or other third parties from working with competitors.

Last year, for example, the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit’s CoStar Grp., Inc. v. Com. Real Est. Exch., Inc. decision overturned a district court’s application of the “refusal-to-deal” framework. In that case, CREXi, an online platform providing commercial real estate listing for brokers, entered into contracts with brokers (its customers) that allegedly constrained those customers from using a competitor, CoStar.

The contracts at issue prohibited brokers from using any data provided to CREXi for listings on competitive listing platforms like CoStar. The Ninth Circuit held these exclusionary clauses were “[a]monopolist’s efforts ‘to limit the abilities of third parties to deal with rivals’ is...not a refusal to deal with the monopolist’s competitors.”

Algorithmic Pricing

There were continued developments in litigation in 2025 overcompetitors’ use of tools that employ algorithms to help set pricing, particularly in the real estate sector. While the DOJ brought its first algorithmic pricing case more than 10 years ago (concerning the online pricing of wall décor), litigation picked up in the last year.

Such litigation—which may be brought by federal or state enforcers or private plaintiffs—will likely continue to feature prominently in the 2026 antitrust landscape. Notable developments include Gibson v. Cendyn Group, the first decision from a court of appeals addressing algorithmic pricing.

In Gibson, plaintiffs alleged hotels on the Las Vegas Strip restrained trade by using a common software service to price hotel-room rentals. The Ninth Circuit held, however, that the agreements between individual hotels and the software didn’t restrict hotels from pricing rooms “in accordance with their own judgment,” rejecting plaintiffs’ antitrust claim. The US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit is currently considering a similar case in Cornish-Adebyi v. Caesars Ent., Inc.

These decisions reflect the emergence of a fact-specific approach. Courts look to factors such as the existence of an agreement to provide data or to follow the software’s recommendations, whether data is anonymized, and whether the data exchanged is nonpublic or competitively sensitive (with historical pricing data being less so).

The health care sector may also see continued algorithmic pricing litigation, as evidenced by the numerous class action lawsuits filed in several different federal courts against GoodRx and pharmacy benefit managers for allegedly using algorithmic pricing tools to suppress reimbursement rates and increase fees for independent pharmacies.

California and New York have become the first states to amend their antitrust laws to prohibit the use of algorithmic pricing. California’s new law relaxes the standard to bring algorithmic-pricing cases, and New York’s law prohibits companies from using algorithms to set rental rates on residential units. The effects of these laws will begin to be felt in 2026.

Labor Market Enforcement

Labor market enforcement likely will continue to be high profile.In February, the FTC created the Joint Labor Task Force to prioritize the investigation and prosecution of no-poach, solicitation, no-hire, wage-fixing, and noncompete agreements, in addition to exploring ways to strengthen antitrust enforcement in labor markets.

In April, the DOJ obtained its first ever jury conviction for wage-fixing charges after a jury found that a former home health-care executive conspired to artificially limit nurses’ wages.

The impact of college sports antitrust litigation also will continue to reverberate. In November, a judge approved a $303 million settlement between the NCAA and a class of more than 7,000 assistant volunteer coaches who alleged the NCAA violated antitrust noncompete laws by requiring every member school to cap the total compensation for volunteer assistant coaches to $16,000. And payments to student-athletes will be under increasing scrutiny following the settlement in House v. NCAA that permitted schools to pay athletes.

Year Ahead

Look for a number of high profile antitrust litigation-related developments in the year ahead, including the DOJ’s litigation against data analytics firm Agri Stats for facilitating wage-setting and price-fixing, continued litigation regarding algorithmic pricing and procurement fraud, the US Supreme Court’s decision regarding the president’s ability to fire FTC commissioners, and potential early results from DOJ’s new whistleblower rewards program.

Also, expect to see expanded enforcement in several states, based on developments such as new state laws, expanded criminal enforcement authority, and certain states’ decision to challenge the Hewlett-Packard Enterprises-Juniper merger. Sports, content moderation, and environmental, social, and governance alliances may all continue to be under the antitrust microscope.

This article does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Bloomberg Industry Group, Inc., the publisher of Bloomberg Law, Bloomberg Tax, and Bloomberg Government, or its owners.

Author Information

Alexis Loebis a partner at Farella Braun + Martel who focuses on white-collar defense and government and internal investigations, antitrust matters, and complex civil litigation.

Christopher C. Wheeler is a partner at Farella Braun + Martel who litigates high-stakes, complex civil cases in California courts.

Douglas A. Lewis is an associate at Farella Braun + Martel who is in the firm’s business litigation practice.

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