Audio Video News

The antitrust battle being waged by EchoStar Communications Corporation has escalated. The operator of direct satellite broadcast service Dish Network announced September 6 that it has hired attorney David Boies to lead the litigation against its bigger rival DirecTV. Boies successfully prosecuted the US government's antitrust suit against software giant Microsoft.

Ever since the conclusion of the Microsoft case, Boies has been inundated with offers of big-league work. He has taken on the cause of Napster, Inc., the Silicon Valley startup under attack by the music recording industry for alleged widescale copyright infringements. Boies is a partner in the Armonk, New York–based law firm of Boies, Schiller & Flexner. He will join T. Wade Welch, a partner in T. Wade Welch & Associates of Houston, in pursuing the suit, which is being heard in a federal court in Denver.

The suit accuses DirecTV, a unit of General Motors Corp.'s Hughes Electronics Corp., of illegally keeping EchoStar products out of electronics stores. No trial date has been set, according to statements made by a company spokeswoman.

In an unrelated development, EchoStar announced that, effective September 5, it has entered a long-term agreement with Crown Media Holdings Inc. to carry the Odyssey Network, a 24-hour family-entertainment television channel, as part of Dish Network's "America's Top 150" programming package.