The FTC Settlement With John Deere Is a Huge Win for the Right-to-Repair Movement
On Wednesday, the US Federal Trade Commission announced a settlement with tractor manufacturer John Deere over a 2025 lawsuit that accused the company of behavior
On Wednesday, the US Federal Trade Commission announced a settlement with tractor manufacturer John Deere over a 2025 lawsuit that accused the company of behavior that “unlawfully acquired and maintained monopoly power in markets for repair services for Deere farm equipment.” The full statement lays out obligations for John Deere’s repair services, requiring the company to give farmers and third-party repair shops access to the same equipment and repair resources it provides to official John Deere dealers. This includes software capabilities, such as reading and resetting codes and pairing with other software, which customers have long had limited access to, creating delays when diagnosing equipment problems.
Delayed fixes can mean delayed harvests, which many farmers saw as a fundamental threat to their livelihoods. Under the agreement, John Deere will be required to provide this level of access, equipment, and services for the next 10 years, monitored by the FTC. “After years of fighting for the right to repair, this order gives farmers real hope,” Willie Cade, a board member of the repair advocacy organization Repair.org, wrote in an email to WIRED. “But promises on paper must become tools in farmers’ hands, and we will be watching implementation every step of the way.” Farmers have been fighting against John Deere’s repair practices for more than a decade, but the FTC began its fight in 2021, led by then-chair Lina Khan under the Biden administration.
In April, John Deere agreed to pay out $99 million in a separate class action lawsuit brought against the company in 2022. Repair and consumer advocates say this FTC settlement does far more to help farmers than a payout did. John Deere has maintained that it already has robust repair resources for its customers, including service manuals and diagnostic equipment. In John Deere’s press release, the company says the settlement is in line with what it has been doing all along, saying that “the agreement reinforces Deere’s continued innovation toward more flexible repair options, emphasizing increased access and transparency for customers. It formalizes Deere’s ongoing commitment to expanding access to diagnostic and repair tools.” The consumer advocacy group US PIRG issued a statement about the settlement, citing the organization’s 2022 official complaint to the FCC about John Deere’s repair policies.
“We should be able to fix our own stuff,” wrote PIRG’s Right to Repair campaign director Nathan Proctor. “This settlement from the FTC gives farmers more and better options to repair their equipment. It is a win for farmers and all of us who want a more fixable world.”
The BriefWire