competitionlaw

In the Enervit case (Case I718, Enervit – Contratti di distribuzione) the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) has opened an Article 101 TFEU investigation against into allegedly anticompetitive vertical agreements. The holder of a pharmacy and of an on-line sale web site reported to the ICA a number of Enervit vertical arrangements as for the distribution of its food supplement products. The markets affected by such arrangements were the markets for food supplements for athletes as well as the markets for food supplements for fitness and well-being in each of which Enervit had a 15-20% share. The ICA applied the principles in the Guidelines on Vertical Restraints of the European Commission to assess the distribution agreement entered by Enervit with the complainant. The agreement provided for a maximum discount to be applied on Enervit products. The producer also granted a further 10/15% discounts to retailer that applied the minimum resale prices indicated in the pricing list. Ac...

By a decision made on 22 October 2013 Italian Competition Authority (ICA) has opened an Artice 101 TFEU investigation into an alleged resale price maintenance agreement (RPM) in the case I766 Inverter Solar edEolici – Imposizione Prezzi Minimi (Inverter) . Power-One Italy (POI) is part of a group trading worldwide in the markets for the production and commercialization of photovoltaic and aeolian inverters. A report lodged with the ICA alleged that POI imposed a RPM on the dealers that belonged to its distribution network. The allegation was based on two documents attached to the report. First, the letter of 17 October 2012 having as object “ Minimum selling price”. By this letter the vice-president of POI reminded distributors, resellers and partners of the fact that since January 2012 a minimum reselling price system was introduced in all our price lists. The  letter also requested dealers to comply with the RPM obligation, stressing that POI would terminate the contract wi...

Industria Chimica Italiana (ICE) is the dominant player in the market for the production and sale of cholic acid that is an input for the preparation of an active principle, ursodeoxycholic acid or udca, used in the pharmaceutical industry. The udca is marketed by an ICE subsidiary, Prodotti Chimici e Alimentari  (PCA),  and by RGR. RGR filed a complaint with the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) reporting that ICE would have abused its dominant position in many ways. The ICA then opened an Article 102 TFEU investigation against PCA ( Case A473 RGR v PCA ). ICE has been supplying RGR with cholic acid since long. However, starting from 2009 when it bought PCA, ICR has progressively increased the prices applied on RGR for the supplies of cholic acid. The ICE price increases had no justification, and in any event they did not depend on a rise in the production costs incurred by ICE. Moreover, RGR may not shift its requirements to other suppliers. There exist only two other ...

Unsurprisingly, following the completion of a market investigation on the agri-food sector , the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) has recently opened an Article 101 TFEUinvestigations into the business practices carried out by Centrale Italiana(CI). CI is a company incorporated by several Italian large supermarket chains, Coop Italia, Despar Servizi, Gartico and Discoverde. CI works as a purchase supercentre on behalf of its members plus another large grocery, Sigma. At a higher level CI negotiates in a centralized way with suppliers the most important commercial terms to be inserted in the procurement agreements that its members and Sigma will then conclude with producers. These terms include, in particular, discounts and trade spending that are the charges to be paid by suppliers to groceries for promotional, distributive and sale services. The CI members and Sigma may also individually negotiate with suppliers more favourable commercial terms than those obtained by CI itself. ...

By the recent decision in I F P&C/Topdanmark (Case COMP/M.6957) the European Commission confirmed that also the acquisition of a minority shareholdings can be considered as a concentration for the purpose of the EU Merger Control Regulation (EUMCR) 139/2004, falling then within the regulatory jurisdiction of the Commission under the EUMCR. In this case the Commission applied the criteria in Paragraph 59 of the Consolidated Jurisdiction Notice to establish whether by the acquisition of the minority shareholding the purchaser would gain the sole control on the other party to the merger. By the planned transaction IF P&C bought the acquisition of a 25,17% shareholding, corresponding to the 26,51% of voting rights, of Topdanmark. On the basis of the criteria in the Notice, the Commission found IF P&C to have acquired the sole control over Topdanmark, which amounted to a concentration for the purpose of the EUMCR. First, a prospective analysis showed that a shareholder wi...

By the decision made on 6 November 2013 in the Sanità privatanella regione Abruzzo or Health Services Providers in the Region of Abruzzo ) the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) has opened a competition investigations against a number of health services providers that were alleged to have entered into a market sharing agreement. According to the provisions enacted by the regional authorities of Abruzzo, in order to provide health services on behalf of the national health system, private operators have to be awarded by regional authorities the authorization to supply such services. Each year the regional authorities allocate to each authorized operator a sum of money through which fund the health services it provides. The market for the provision of health service by private operators in the region of Abruzzo is an oligopoly dominated by the undertakings against which the ICA opened an investigation, Synergo, Villa Serena, Di Lorenzo and Villa Letizia and are all managers of nursin...