HP has administered a public thrashing to a computer dealer for lying over where the vendor's kit was going to gain bigger reseller discounts.

The errant company is called Maxicom PC Inc - no we hadn't heard of them either - and HP wants it to return $4m in pricing discounts for "computer equipment that Maxicom PC had received based on misrepresentations that the equipment would be resold to specified end-user customers".

HP filed suit in a Florida court last month and settled with Maxicom yesterday - terms were undisclosed. As is often the way in such spats, the vendor dubs this "grey market litigation", when it appears to be a straightforward case of cheating.

There is nothing wrong per se with a grey market, also known as parallel trading. But vendors want to stamp out all unauthorised trading, so it suits their purpose to blacken legitimate grey market activity by lumping it in with illegal activity.

Now for the obligatory quote, from the press release, of course:

"HP is committed to supporting our authorized business partners and protecting our mutual customers," said Adrian Jones, HP's US channel chieftain. "We’re committed to prosecuting those parties who use fraudulent means to obtain HP products for the purpose of selling them through unauthorized channels." ®