loopnet.com and CoStar Make Up

A legal dispute between US commercial portal loopnet.com and commercial real estate information and marketing company CoStar Group has been settled.

A joint statement reads:

“The settlement resolves false advertising litigation in New York, breach of contract and unfair competition litigation in California, and copyright litigation in Maryland. No monetary consideration was involved.”

LoopNet Chairman and CEO Richard Boyle and CoStar CEO Andrew Florance are quoted as saying:

“We both welcome this settlement and feel that it is in the best interest of our customers, shareholders and employees. We are pleased to put this litigation behind us, and focus on the needs of our customers and building value for our shareholders.”

On 8 June this year, LoopNet released a statement detailing the release of documents by the Superior Court of the State of California relating to LoopNet’s lawsuit against CoStar that alleges unlawful copying and use of LoopNet data.

Just over a month later, loopnet.com claimed a significant legal victory over CoStar when the California Superior Court denied CoStar’s Motion for Preliminary Injunction, confirmed LoopNet’s right to enforce its Terms of Use against CoStar, rejected as “unreasonable” the CoStar CEO’s interpretation of the parties’ 2005 Settlement, and rejected as completely unsubstantiated CoStar’s claim it was somehow harmed when it was not able to engage in unfettered data mining from LoopNet’s website.

loopnet.com says it has more than 3.5 million registered members and sees an average of 945,000 unique visitors per month. In October this year, it released figures that put its traffic between six and 11 times higher than that of its nearest competitor.

CoStar describes itself as “the number one provider of marketing/information services to commercial real estate professionals in the United States and the United Kingdom” and says it provides “access to the most comprehensive database of commercial real estate information” throughout the US, the UK and France.

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