Nielsen Wants SCOTUS To Hear Its Antitrust Case

Nielsen has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review a high-stakes antitrust fight over how radio ratings are sold, seeking to overturn lower-court rulings that treat its national audience data as a monopoly product used to force broadcasters to buy local ratings they do not want. The petition targets decisions that blocked Nielsen’s 2024 “Network Policy” and limited what it can charge for a standalone Nationwide report. U.S. District Judge Jeannette Vargas in New York granted Cumulus Media a preliminary injunction in late 2025, finding the policy likely an illegal tie under the Sherman Act. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed that injunction on July 13, 2026, and later denied rehearing. 

Nielsen argues those rulings clash with Supreme Court precedent on bundling, pricing, and a firm’s right to choose customers and terms. At the core is Nielsen’s unique Nationwide report—the only complete national radio ratings product in the United States. Courts found Nielsen holds 100% of that market. 

Local ratings are a separate product; Eastlan competes in some metros. Cumulus, owner of hundreds of stations and the Westwood One network, wanted Nationwide while shifting some local markets to Eastlan. 

Nielsen’s policy withheld local markets from the national report unless the broadcaster bought Nielsen local data everywhere it owned stations. After Cumulus threatened suit, Nielsen offered a standalone Nationwide price that the district court said was about 10 times what Cumulus had been paying and well above what other networks paid. Judges called that a “constructive tie”: a price so high it coerced the bundle. 

The injunction bars enforcement of the Network Policy and “commercially unreasonable” standalone rates. A rate at or below the highest 2026 Nationwide price Nielsen charges any other broadcaster is treated as presumptively reasonable. Nielsen has warned that court-set pricing could make Nationwide unworkable and even force the product’s retirement. Cumulus, which filed Chapter 11 earlier this year, says it needs the data to sell national ads and that missing markets punch holes in the report—“Swiss cheese” that advertisers will not buy. 

The fight is not over on the merits. The injunction is interim relief while liability is litigated. A separate Second Circuit appeal over a later district order that specified sale terms and a daily fine was stayed in mid-September. Supreme Court review, if granted, would test whether constructive tying and judicial price guardrails go beyond modern antitrust law—or whether a sole national ratings supplier can be stopped from using that bottleneck to lock up local measurement. For radio, the outcome will decide who sets the price of the currency that sells national airtime.