Epic Games, Inc. v. Apple Inc.

Background

The court addressed administrative motions to seal filed by NVIDIA Corporation, Google LLC, App Annie, Inc., Sony Interactive Entertainment LLC, Yoga Buddhi Co., Roblox Inc., Valve Corporation, Match Group Inc., and Apple Inc. concerning agreements or other documents involving PayPal, Inc. and AMZN Mobile LLC. The court explained that court records are generally subject to a strong presumption of public access. Under the applicable local rule, sealing may be allowed for privileged material, trade secrets, or other information protected by law. The court also stressed that the case concerns business competition and that the information’s relevance to the court’s analysis had to be balanced against third parties’ confidentiality interests.

Rulings on the motions

- NVIDIA Corporation: The motion was granted as to all documents except specified portions of PX-2480/DX-3554 and PX-0729. The titles of certain slides or pages had to be disclosed, while the remainder could remain sealed. The court found compelling reasons to protect NVIDIA’s highly confidential pricing strategy, business decision-making, and financial records. NVIDIA was ordered to provide revised redacted versions for any public portion of the trial, if the documents were admitted.

- Google LLC: The motion was granted as to all documents except specified portions of several exhibits. The court ordered certain text or entire documents unredacted, while permitting other portions to remain sealed. The court deferred consideration of six documents containing general consumer survey data until their use at trial and warned that some pages might later be unsealed. The court also denied Google’s request to prevent public display of redacted documents during trial; admitted documents would be available to the public at the end of each trial day.

- App Annie, Inc.: The motion was provisionally granted. The request concerned estimated app-usage data that App Annie sells as part of its analytics business. The court found that disclosure could harm App Annie and that the public interest in the specific exhibits was reduced because Apple said it would use the data only in summary exhibits. The ruling was contingent on the court’s later review of the exhibits, which had not yet been provided.

- Sony Interactive Entertainment LLC: The motion was denied. Sony sought to seal exhibits concerning policies developers must follow regarding pricing information, virtual currency, and wholesale pricing. The court found that Sony had not shown public-disclosure harm because the policies were disclosed to developers using Sony’s digital marketplace. The court also found a significant public interest in documents concerning alternative digital distribution platforms and competition.

- Yoga Buddhi Co.: The motion was granted. The court allowed redaction of personal identifying information, including names, phone numbers, and email addresses, but stated that the substance and majority of the customer communications should otherwise be unsealed and unredacted.

- Roblox, Inc.: The motion was granted. The court allowed one document, DX-3879, to remain sealed because it contained sensitive pricing, revenue, and user data.

- Valve Corporation: The motion was granted as to all documents except specified portions. The court ordered two template agreements to be entirely unredacted because they were widely available to developers on Valve’s Steam platform. It deferred consideration of two agreements involving Epic Games until trial because their use and context were not yet known. The court also ordered specified policy slides and certain partner-and-title information unredacted, subject to limited protection for games or cross-play features that had not been publicly released. It deferred consideration of another document concerning the Epic Games Store until trial. Valve had to provide revised redacted versions for any public portion of the trial, if the documents were admitted.

- Match Group Inc.: The opinion states that the motion was granted as to all documents except for documents that were to remain sealed. Because the provided text does not identify the documents covered by that exception, the precise scope of this ruling is unclear. The court stated that general references summarizing the information without specific numbers would not require sealing the courtroom, while the requests otherwise sought to protect highly confidential non-public financial information.

- PayPal, Inc. and AMZN Mobile LLC: The court deferred consideration of Apple’s requests to seal two specific agreements until the agreements were used at trial. The court stated that it could not rule without knowing more about the context in which the agreements would be used.

Disposition and significance

The order addressed access to court documents rather than the merits of Epic Games’ competition dispute with Apple. It granted, provisionally granted, denied, or deferred the various sealing requests as described above and terminated Docket Nos. 486, 504, 506, 507, 513, 514, 516, 522, 525, 526, 528, and 543. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers signed the order.