A federal judge in the United States ruled that IBM must pay 1.6 billion US dollars (about 10.7 billion yuan) to BMC software company because IBM made customers use its software when providing services to their common customers. IBM and BMC have been operating under a carefully negotiated agreement for a long time. The agreement prohibits IBM from encouraging their common customers to switch to their own software product line.
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In 2017, BMC sued IBM, saying that its competitors planned to violate the agreement and poached at& when the two companies renewed the power sharing agreement in 2015; T's software business. IBM countered that at& T gave up BMC products and switched to IBM for its own reasons. IBM claims that this is fair competition under the agreement with BMC.
Houston district judge gray Miller dismissed IBM's allegations on Monday. IBM said it got at&, one of BMC's core customers, fairly; T's host software account. Miller awarded BMC this compensation according to his previous judgment, and considered that IBM was at& T's role in the decision to abandon BMC is somewhat like "intentional misconduct".
IBM said in a statement: "this judgment has no factual and legal basis at all, and IBM intends to seek a complete reversal of this judgment in the appeal. The decision to remove BMC software technology from its host was entirely made by at&t, which was recognized by the court and confirmed in the testimony of at&t representatives."
