Valve ordered to give information to Apple on 436 Steam games in Epic Games legal case

Valve, the creator of the popular game distribution platform Steam, will be required to turn over historical overall sales, pricing and other information on 436 games hosted on the store to Apple as part of the antitrust case Apple vs. Epic Games.

As noted in a report from paywalled by Law360, in a virtual discovery hearing on Wednesday, U.S. magistrate judge Thomas S. Hixson ruled that Apple’s data subpoena to Valve was valid, however, noted that Apple had “salted the earth with subpoenas, “telling Valve ‘don’t worry, it’s not just you.” Apple’s initial subpoena requested data from Valve on Steam dating back to 2015, the judge’s ruling will however require Valve to produce data limited to 2017.

‌Epic Games‌ is in a heated legal battle with Apple over the App Store and claims the Cupertino tech giant is locking developers into its ecosystem and forcing them to pay a “30% tax” for in-app purchases. Apple’s subpoena for Valve’s data is one of many that Apple has offered as it tries to prove its point that the “App Store” as a distribution platform for software is no different from others.

Gavin W. Stok, an attorney representing Valve at the discovery hearing, urged Judge Hixson to dismiss the subpoena and not force his company to produce the data. Stok says Valve is run by a small team and that collecting all of the data Apple requests would require it to “dedicate multiple full-time employees,” and that it would not be able to guarantee that the request will be able to do so. be satisfied on time.

Apple attorney Jay P. Srinivasan says the request is feasible and points out that Apple could have requested data on the 30,000 games from the Steam store, but instead is only asking for data on 436 games. Apple continued to defend its subpoena, calling Valve a “top player” in the full picture of relevant markets like the “App Store”.

Ahead of what is set to be a stormy hearing scheduled for July 2021 between Apple and Epic Games, Valve has until mid-March to produce the data. We’ve reached out to Valve for comment on the judge’s ruling and will update the page once we respond.