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Showing posts from May, 2015

The Italian Competition Authority targest an allegedly anti-competitive agreement for football TV rights

By the decision made on 13 May 2015 the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) has opened an article 101 TFEU investigation against two major TV operators, Sky and RTI, the Italian Football League (ILA) and its advisor for the marketing of TV rights, Infront, concerning the sale of TV rights for the Serie A League for the 2015-2018 period ( CaseI780, Diritti Televisivi Serie A ). The Legislative Decree no. 9/2008 has introduced the centralized system for the sale of football TV rights, which are jointly held by the ILA and the partecipating football clubs. In June 2014 the ILA organized a competitive tender procedures for the award, among other things, of the following contracts: i) contract A for the TV rights for the satellite platform; ii) contract B for the TV rights for the digital terrestrial platform and iii) contract D for the TV rights for all platforms for minor clubs' matches. On the basis of the criteria draft by the advisor Infront, the ILA had to award the contracts

The Italian Competition Authority finds a cartel in the market for catering services on motorways

In the case I775, Proceduredi affidamento dei servizi ristoro su rete autostradale ASPI (ASPI ) , the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) found two major catering operators, My Chef and Chef Express, to have infringed Article 101 TFEU by coordinating their conducts with regard to a number of tender procedures organized to select the suppliers of catering services on the Italian motorway network. The relevant market included the 16 contracts for the provision of catering services on the motorway network managed by ASPI and awarded to My Chef and Chef Express, 8 contracts were concluded with My Chef and the remaining 8 to Chef Express. The ICA took the view that the parties coordinated their conducts with the aim to allocate between themselves the contracts tendered out by ASPI through a sophisticated mechanism. To this end, the parties exploited the mathematical formula developed by the ASPI advisor, RB, to select the winning bids. The formula implied a global assessment of the tec