Amazon Under Closer Surveillance From German Anti-Cartel Watchdog for Possible Abuse of Market Position

Germany’s anti-cartel watchdog said Wednesday it has placed e-commerce giant Amazon under closer surveillance for any possible abuse of its market position.

The Federal Cartel Office said it had determined Amazon to be a company of “paramount significance for competition”, a move that will allow it to act more effectively to “intervene and prohibit potential anticompetitive practices”.

Amazon joins Google parent Alphabet and Meta, the group behind Facebook, in falling under reinforced monitoring made possible by the German Competition Act.

The act, which came into force in January 2021, allows the cartel authority to intervene earlier, particularly against the world’s tech giants.

Amazon was a “key player in the e-commerce sector” and had created a “digital ecosystem” as both seller and marketplace, said Federal Cartel Office chief, Andreas Mundt.

The watchdog estimated that “over every second euro spent” in online retail in Germany was via Amazon’s local website.

As a platform for sellers, Amazon holds “over 70 percent” of the market, giving it a “dominant” position, according to the Federal Cartel Office.

The regulator is currently conducting two other investigations into Amazon’s practices under its normal procedure.

In one case, it is examining whether Amazon uses “price control mechanisms and algorithms” to influence seller pricing on its marketplace.

In the other, it is looking at the extent to which agreements with big-brand manufacturers that “exclude third-party sellers from selling brand products” constitute a competition law violation.


For all the latest Technology News Click Here 

 For the latest news and updates, follow us on Google News

Read original article here

Denial of responsibility! TechNewsBoy.com is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.