Farmers file Right-to-Repair Class Action against John Deere (Forest River Farms v. Deere)

Farmers have filed a Right-to-Repair Class Action Lawsuit alleging Antitrust/Monopoly violation against John Deere in the tractor services market. The lawsuit claims that Deere blocks farmers and independent shoops from servicing their tractors and combines.

#RightToRepair #JohnDeere #Lawsuit

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John Deere Class Action
00:00 - Introduction
01:19 - Case Intro
03:11 - The Claims
04:15 - The Relevant Market
04:33 - Detailed Facts - Required Service Technicians
11:14 - Deere's Failure to Provide Promised Tools
16:32 - Inadequate Software
17:37 - The FTC Report
18:54 - Antitrust Allegations & Claims for Relief
20:40 - Leonard Thoughts
27:14 - Credits & Thanks!

[Relkond]

the “buy our thing at/below cost, then pay $$$ in perpetuity to use it” business model needs to be ended.

[PSSPWRD]

This is part of the reason why the market for old tractors is still so high. Even tractors from the 1940s with no power-take-off will sell for thousands so long as the engine works - because they can be fixed without having to go through all this rigamarole

[Akira_]

The “buy a different brand” argument is just as bad as the “just move to a different town” or “just get a different job” or “just use a different ISP” arguments. Some people don’t know how the real world works

[duaneb]

Another huge factor in this is the attachments for said tractors - many farmers have multiple attachments they use on their farms, and those can run in the thousands if not hundreds of thousands as well, and changing their equipment would increase massively because of this. Farmers need to be able to repair their tractors!

[beckettevans]

I hope this sets a precedent for r2r for all products, I only wish that we could also abolish the ever pervasive planned obsolescence.

[skeilercadena]

I’m a field service technician for a John Deere dealership in Wyoming. Even though we’re a construction and forestry dealer we’re not even allowed to work on Ag equipment. We can hook up to ECU’s to pull codes but that’s about it. A lot of the newer machines give the trouble codes or DTC’s in their displays which is, to an extent, more access then even we’re allowed to look at. I always kind of found that strange. Anyways, I’ve found this topic interesting and enjoy your videos! Thanks for what you do!

[AlanTuringWannabe]

This could potentially help us all. This could potentially lower food costs since farmers don't have to pay outrageous prices for their repairs.

[dyadica]

The other really key issue for farmers is their work is often very time sensitive, and even if the repairs were free, they'd take too long and tie up labor hours in transporting the equipment. When it's time to plant, you have to plant now and as fast as possible. Similarly for harvest and even some mid-season activities. When equipment was simpler, they could do it themselves, often on the spot and immediately.

[eingames]

I live in Iowa and I see less Deere green in the fields. And more of the old tractors are starting to come out of mothballs to be put in service.

[mrfoameruk]

All I'm gonna say is Louis Rossmann

[mattg]

This has a lot of similarity to the McDonalds ice cream machine repair situation. I hope they are forced to disgorge undue profits and have to pay punitive damages for uncompetitive behavior - assuming the allegations reviewed are in fact true as always.

[Marco_Onyxheart]

As an embedded engineer and open source enthousiast who actually has to use CAN bus, I hate this.

They have a system they could have opened up easily, but they just don't. Screw the end user.

[arzonmagnus]

SO basically, John Deere is "holding hostage" the farming industry by locking down service to ONE chain of repairs.

[redisk]

We need so much work on right to repair

[HughMungoose]

The only problem is that they'll just go to a ridiculously priced subscription model if they are forced to make the software available. Legislation needs to account for this to stop them doing it.

[StewPedassle]

20:55 I think it's a lot more than just a "cost of switching ecosystems" issue. Back when I was farming, large areas would be heavily tied to a certain brand simply because of proximity to that dealership. In my grandfather's day, you had one or two dealerships in each town with more than a few hundred people, so you actually had some competition and options. Nowadays, it seems that you have one type of dealership within 30 minutes of you (if you're lucky) and about twice as far if you want a different brand.

So, in my experience, the more expensive and time-critical components (harvesters, planters, and a majority of your tractors) seem to be heavily dependent on the nearest dealership, while certain application-specific standouts (e.g., one or two of your highest HP tractors or something that performs much better on your specific farming practices) and lower-cost implements (like tillage and spraying) or add-ons seem to have more variety.

Though, even things like planter changes that work in conjunction with Deere components will face the wrath of Deere if they become too popular. For an example of that, you can look up John Deere v. Kinze Manufacturing around 1980, where they lost miserably in court on the patent portion and settled the anti-trust portion before it could be heard. Similar cases w.r.t. planters are happening to this day.

[TehNoobSchool]

I used to work in IT for a local college and I often had to deal with the software for our John Deere program. This software is one of the most dysfunctional I had the displeasure of using. They required constant attention and would just stop working randomly.

[Bacteriophagebs]

The broken promise to make the software available might be the most damning part of this. Anyone who purchased a Deere product after that statement was made has a pretty good case for detrimental reliance, as they can easily claim that they would not have made the purchase if not for the promise, thus negating the "walled garden" market argument that is pretty much Deere's only defense.

[jamescanjuggle]

to an argument saying "If you dont like us dont buy us"

lets say someone in my area of rural ireland wants a new tractor, and has a set budget, often enough the only supplier near you will be a john deer.

so its not like they can just go and buy somewhere else, when theres literally no other options due to the geography of the situation

[vgamesx]

Well as Louis Rossmann will often point out, this isn't a problem with X company, just don't buy from them and the problem goes away, this is a problem with near every company now and also a lack of modern day repair culture, if you boycott Apple plenty of people will continue to buy from them and Samsung or whoever will also make it difficult to repair your device, maybe not to the same degree but still be unhelpful regardless and thus nothing will ever change, well that is with the one exception that if the very few repair friendly companies like framework absolutely explode in popularity then maybe something will change, but that's fairly large if.