Amazon acts to end EU antitrust investigations, avoid fine

Amazon acts to end EU antitrust investigations, avoid fine

by Joseph Anthony
266 views

Amazon (AMZN.O) has offered to halt online selling and marketing practices EU antitrust regulators regard as anti-competitive to try to end two investigations and avoid a possible hefty fine, ahead of EU rules that will target such methods from next year.

The European Commission in 2020 charged Amazon with using its size, power and data to push its own products and gain an unfair advantage over rival merchants that also use its platform.
The US online retail giant has offered to refrain from using sellersโ€™ data for its own competing retail business and its private label products, the EU competition said on Thursday.
It will treat sellers equally when ranking their offers for the โ€œbuy boxโ€ on its website that generates the bulk of its sales, confirming a Reuters story.
It will also set up a second buy box for a rival product if it differs substantially in price and delivery from the product in the first box.
Sellers and offers on its Prime programme will be chosen based on non-discriminatory criteria, with sellers also allowed to choose their own logistics and delivery services company instead of Amazonโ€™s competing logistics services.
Rivals and customers have until Sept. 9 to provide feedback on Amazonโ€™s proposal before the Commission decides whether to accept the offer or demand more.
Amazon, which risks a fine of up to 10 per cent of its global turnover if found guilty of breaching EU rules, criticised the new tech rules known as the Digital Markets Act, which come into force next year and will designate it as an online gatekeeper subject to onerous rules.
โ€œWhile we have serious concerns about the Digital Markets Act unfairly targeting Amazon and a few other US companies, and disagree with several conclusions the European Commission made, we have engaged constructively with the Commission to address their concerns,โ€ the company said.
It said the concessions would โ€œpreserve our ability to serve European customers and the more than 185,000 European small and medium-sized businesses selling through our storesโ€.
This is not the first time Amazon has decided to head off EU sanctions. In 2017, it scrapped some clauses in its distribution deals with European e-book publishers, leading regulators to end their investigation without a fine.
In 2019, it overhauled its terms of service for third-party merchants and convinced the German antitrust agency to drop its seven-month investigation.
REUTERS

You may also like

Leave a Comment

Chijos News is an independent online publication that provides readers with the latest breaking Nigerian news, world news, entertainment, sports, business, and many more.

@2024 – Chijosnews.com. All Rights Reserved.

-
00:00
00:00
Update Required Flash plugin
-
00:00
00:00