Because they didn't have to pay him $30k. They had a registered trademark and a right to use the name. And in the end, they didn’t have to spend nearly that amount. All they had to do was send a few emails to the npm maintainers.
An initial consult is often free, and even a $500 consult would have been worth every penny because the lawyer would have (correctly) told him to back off and let them have the name.
In any event, escalating - even when you think the other party is being a dick - is never the right answer.
When I was sued I was able to get an hour with many of the initial attorneys I called. The biggest challenge in most cases was ensuring there were no conflicts.
And as an attorney, if I go back into practice someday, of course I’ll do the same.
I have a hard time seeing your position here. Because of their actions they broke their own build and made a lot of folks in the open source community upset. Was it even worth it to waste the time fixing their broken build? To investigate the failure and replace a dependency of a dependency? To lose credibility in the community they've evidently just decided to become involved with? I really don't see how that's not worth 30 grand. They have a right to use their name but they don't have the right to use someone else's work.
It is a principle of American and English law that the person who uses someone else’s property unlawfully is responsible for the foreseeable injuries caused to others by its use - not the lawful owner of the property.
I’d say they made a logical decision.