The Supreme Court has ruled in favor of the world’s largest watch maker, Omega, which claimed recently that the warehouse club Costco was reselling Swatch watches, a division of Omega, at reduced prices without the consent of the Swiss watchmaker.  This, according to the Supreme Court, is a violation of U.S. copyright laws.

Due to the absence of justice Kagen, who worked with the case prior to becoming a justice, the ruling was tied at 4-4, a ruling that favors Omega, whom the court ruled retained the rights to its watches, even when imported to the United States. Because there was a tie and no subsequent ruling, the previous ruling in a similar case stands, which is bad news for Costco.

In its defense, Costco attorneys asked that the Supreme Court extend a 1998 case that sold products made in a country back to the United States, determining whether copyright laws could be attributed to items imported from overseas.  

Without justice Kagen, this is the first of twenty cases that has resulted in a tie.