North Las Vegas, NV (January 26, 2009) — Since December, Konami has twice attempted to convince the courts to issue a restraining order against Upper Deck in Konami’s case against Vintage. Both times, the courts have not been persuaded by mere allegations and have denied Konami’s motions. To date, California courts have sided with Upper Deck on all rulings. In Europe, Upper Deck International obtained an injunction against Konami, forcing them to honor their contractual commitments there.
On December 11, 2008, following several attempts to negotiate with Konami for the betterment of the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game, Upper Deck filed a breech of contract suit against Konami, citing unfair business practices and several instances where Konami had made moves to undermine and ultimately take over the Yu-Gi-Oh! business from Upper Deck. Konami representatives have tried on several occasions to obtain proprietary information from Upper Deck regarding key programs used to support, market and distribute the Yu-Gi-Oh! brand in North America and Europe. Upper Deck has refused to lower itself to the unfair and backstabbing tactics that Konami has used over the past several years toward their ultimate goal of removing Upper Deck from the Yu-Gi-Oh! business.
The day following Upper Deck’s suit, Konami added Upper Deck as a defendant in its three month-old lawsuit against Vintage, an absurd allegation with dubious timing considering Upper Deck’s history of fighting Yu-Gi-Oh! counterfeit cards over the last six years.
Since the start of the Yu-Gi-Oh! distribution in the USA and Europe, Upper Deck and the Yu-Gi-Oh! consortium (Shueisha, ADK, TV Tokyo and Sensei Takahashi) have suffered irrevocable harm by Konami's unwillingness to give Upper Deck legal support in fighting against the manufacture and importation of billions of counterfeit Yu-Gi-oh! cards. Upper Deck has spent millions of dollars fighting against Yu-Gi-Oh! counterfeits and even raided Chinese factories itself because Konami refused to do so or, in some cases, simply reacted too late.
To think that Upper Deck would be involved in YGO counterfeit activity is therefore not only absurd, it simply does not make sense.
Upper Deck estimates that Yu-Gi-Oh! counterfeit activity since 2003 has resulted in damages to the company of several hundreds of millions of dollars in the European and North American territories.
Despite Konami’s unfounded charges against Upper Deck, the company is continuing to support the Yu-Gi-Oh! community with the upcoming Upper Deck Day, a special tournament that will offer high-level Dueling and great prizes, including a Gold Sarcophagus to the winner at each location. Please visit UDE.com for more information about Upper Deck Day.
