John Deere will pay $99 million in right-to-repair lawsuit, but admits nothing

[midian182]

Winners & losers: John Deere, the largest agriculture machinery company in the world, has long been a source of anger for right-to-repair advocates. Now, it may have to pay out $99 million to settle a class-action lawsuit accusing it of monopolizing repairs for its agricultural equipment.

The proposed settlement still needs court approval, and Deere says the agreement includes no admission of wrongdoing – despite it paying almost $100 million.

The payout would cover farmers, ranchers, and other buyers who paid Deere-authorized dealers for certain repairs on large agricultural equipment from January 10, 2018, through the date of preliminary approval.

Deere has also agreed to provide access to the digital tools needed to maintain, diagnose, and repair tractors, combines, and other large machines for 10 years. According to court filings, that recovery could equal roughly 26% to 53% of estimated overcharge damages, which is far above the usual range for antitrust settlements.

Deere has spent years as one of the clearest examples of how modern hardware can be controlled long after it is sold. In 2023, the company signed a memorandum of understanding with the American Farm Bureau Federation, which was pitched as a concession to the right-to-repair movement.

But by 2024, Deere was still being accused of failing to live up to the spirit of that agreement. Colorado lawmakers clearly felt the same way when they passed the first state right-to-repair law for farmers, arguing that voluntary promises were vague, incomplete, and unenforceable.

Deere's reputation in this fight was not helped by the other controversies. The company was scolded over GPL compliance and on the now-infamous jailbreak that got Doom running on Deere machinery, both of which reinforced the impression of a company more interested in locking down its ecosystem than letting owners to fix what they bought.

Deere still faces a separate FTC antitrust lawsuit, and at least one independent repair technician told KCRG that, settlement or not, "nothing's changed" for people in the field trying to fix software-tied equipment without dealer intervention.

In other right-to-repair news, it was reported last week that major tech companies are backing a Colorado bill that critics say could seriously weaken protections for consumers and independent repair shops.

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John Deere will pay $99 million in right-to-repair lawsuit, but admits nothing

 

[yRaz]

If I buy something, it is mine. I'll smash it with a hammer in a parking lot if I want. But specifically designing your products so that sections of the DMCA can have people throwing in jail for repairing things they bought us beyond

 

[Endymio]

If I buy something, it is mine. I'll smash it with a hammer in a parking lot if I want. But specifically designing your products so that sections of the DMCA can have people throwing in jail for repairing things they bought us beyond [sic]

Yeah, lucky that never happened here, eh? John Deere merely refused to provide free access to its diagnostic tools. If you could figure out yourself what needed to be done, no one was stopping you.

 

[Hecate91]

Except those with John Deere equipment couldn't figure out what went wrong. It's very much like trying to diagnose a modern car without an OBDII scanner. Tractors and vehicles are being purposely designed so the average owner can't fix it themselves, so companies can profit even more from after sales support and service. Unsurprisingly those opposing right to repair are the wealthy ones who never had to repair anything themselves and wouldn't know the difference between a wrench and a screwdriver.

 

[Endymio]

Except those with John Deere equipment couldn't figure out what went wrong. It's very much like trying to diagnose a modern car without an OBDII scanner

I use a third-party made OBDII scanner to read my Mercedes codes; nothing was stopping a third party from doing the same for Deere.

Tractors and vehicles are being purposely designed so the average owner can't fix it themselves, so companies can profit even more from after sales support and service.

Learn economics. Like many other firms, Deere prices the value of after-market support into the product itself. They currently average a 10% margin, and just a few years ago were running under 5% -- hardly outrageous, and long-term this ruling simply means Deere will raise the initial price to compensate.

There are plenty of competitors to Deere who have more open repair policies ... Farmers continue to purchase Deere because the slightly higher overall TCO is more than compensated by other factors. That's how the free market works.

those opposing right to repair are the wealthy ones who never had to repair anything themselves and wouldn't know the difference between a wrench and a screwdriver.

The last major piece of equipment I repaired, decades ago, was the control board for a 50KW Class IV research laser. I didn't use either a wrench nor a screwdriver, though.

 

[toooooot]

That thing in the main image is gorgeous, though.

 

[Hecate91]

nothing was stopping a third party from doing the same for Deere.

Nothing but the software being proprietary and not available outside John Deere service centers, please read the article.

Learn economics.

It isn't about economics, when the equipment fails in the middle of a field, it isn't cost efficient for a farmer to have their tractor towed out to a dealer because it won't start, but a company like John Deere would've happily kept that software away from the hands of owners had they won the lawsuit.
Their refusal to admit they screwed up with anti-consumer nonsense says everything.
Also John Deere tractors usually start at a quarter of a million dollars, if they're having issues with profit margins,John Deere needs to work on internal company spending, it doesn't mean they need to be even more greedy.

 

[brunocasarini]

Either I buy something and it's mine, and I can do whatever the F I want with it, including repairing it, or it should not be sold, only rent. That goes for everything - from farming machinery to cars, electronics etc..

 

[The Talking Tech]

Sue those bastards again and again.