Page - (000604) - in Autonomes Fahren - Technische, rechtliche und gesellschaftliche Aspekte

Product Liability Issues in the U.S. and Associated Risk Management584 ‡ The defendant breached its duty of care by failing to conform its conduct to the standard of conduct required, and ‡ The defendant’s conduct proximately caused the plaintiff’s injury [31]. 26.4.3 Breach of warranty claims In most states in the U.S., a plaintiff may also include a breach of warranty claim in a product liability complaint. Warranties are affirmations or promises concerning a product or its performance, features, or characteristics, such as those concerning the safety of a product. The basis of a breach of warranty claim is that the seller’s product does not perform as promised, or does not have the features or characteristics promised. Design defects, manufacturing defects, or failures to warn may all provide the basis for a warranty claim. As with strict liability, the question is whether or not the product adheres to the promises made, regardless of whether the seller is at fault for the failure to conform to the promise. Nonetheless, warranty claims are subject to defenses with various degrees of effectiveness, including the historical defense of “privity” (plaintiff’s lack of contractual relationship with the defendant), the requirement that the plaintiff provide the seller notice of the breach, and the ability for sellers to disclaim warranties [31]. In most U.S. jurisdictions, purchasers of a product or their family members can sue companies in the chain of distribution under a warranty theory despite the lack of privity [31]. In order to assert a breach of warranty claim, a plaintiff must typically prove: ‡ The defendant made a warranty, ‡ The product did not comply with the warranty at the time of the sale, ‡ The plaintiff’s injury was proximately caused by the defective nature of the product, and ‡ As a result, the plaintiff suffered damage [31]. A warranty claim will typically allege one of three kinds of warranties. “Express warran- ties” are those actually stated by the seller, such as in a sales contract, warranty program documentation, advertisements, or sales collateral. They may be written or oral. In addition to the express warranties, the law will sometimes recognize two kinds of “implied warran- ties” regarding the sale of consumer products that arise by operation of law, as opposed to anything the seller actually said. One kind of implied warranty is the “implied warranty of merchantability.” This implied warranty requires the seller to make sure the product is fit for the ordinary purposes of such product. For instance, a consumer would expect that the head of a hammer would not fly off the first time it is used after purchase. This kind of implied warranty is the one most likely to be asserted against a seller of an AV in future cases. The second typical implied warranty is the “warranty of fitness for a particular purpose.” Where the seller knows the particular purpose for which the consumer will use the product, and the buyer is relying on