On July 17, 2019, the German Bundeskartellamt (Federal Cartel Office, “FCO”) terminated its dominance probe into Amazon’s business terms towards sellers on its marketplace after Amazon agreed to various changes, see press release here here. Amazon will implement the changes within 30 days, not only in Germany, but for all of its marketplaces in Europe,…
On June 4, 2019, the Düsseldorf Court of Appeal quashed the decision of the Federal Cartel Office (“FCO”) prohibiting Booking.com to operate so-called narrow most favored nation (MFN) clauses (or best price clauses) on its hotel booking platform with hotels in Germany, see press release here. It thereby set a (preliminary) end to a long saga…
After Google has been fined several times for breach of (EU) competition rules the last couple of years, it might now be Apple’s turn. Last month (March 2019), Spotify filed a complaint against Apple with the European Commission. The Dutch Authority for Consumers & Markets (“ACM”) immediately responded by stating that ACM is finalizing its…
Debate in the competition law community has intensified around the issue of enforcement in digital markets in recent months with (yet another) significant antitrust fine being levied against Google,[1]Amount of actual fine may vary the Bundeskartellamt’s Facebook decision, and (most recently) the European Commission’s Report on Competition policy for the digital era.[2]http://ec.europa.eu/competition/publications/reports/kd0419345enn.pdf The emergence of…
