[Techtaffy Newsdesk]

MovieTickets.com has joined a lawsuit against one of its founding shareholders, AMC Entertainment.  The lawsuit was previously filed on behalf of National Amusements and Hollywood Media, each founding shareholders of MovieTickets.com, in Circuit Court for Palm Beach County by trial attorney, Eugene Stearns of Stearns, Weaver, Miller, Weissler, Alhadeff & Sitterson. The plaintiffs have asked for a jury trial.

MovieTickets.com began 12 years ago when Hollywood Media along with two exhibitors, National Amusements and AMC entered into a Joint Venture Agreement in order to create and grow the company.  MovieTickets.com has grown from its two founding exhibitors to 247 exhibitors in 19 countries/territories. The company added over 3,000 screens in 2011, bringing its total representation to 19,500 screens and nearly 20 million registered users. The company maintains a 99.6 per cent exhibitor retention rate.

The lawsuit contends that when AMC’s demands for greater control and a larger share of MovieTickets.com were not met, AMC breached and continues to breach the MovieTickets.com Joint Venture Agreement, which obligates AMC to exclusively provide its ticket inventory to MovieTickets.com. It further specifies breaches by AMC of its contractual and common law duties of good faith, fair dealing, and loyalty and violations of Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act.

Among other things, the company alleges that AMC used its inside position with MovieTickets.com and access to MovieTickets.com’s proprietary information in order to advance AMC’s own goals in contravention of its duty of loyalty to the joint venture and to the detriment of MovieTickets.com, a company, whose estimated market value would, as stated in the Complaint, have been in excess of $500 million had AMC fulfilled its obligations and commitments.