Following a decision by the Federal Court of Justice (BGH), the Federal Cartel Office can continue to classify the online giant Amazon as a company with outstanding cross-market importance and thus subject it to greater scrutiny. The BGH announced on Tuesday that the court had rejected Amazon’s complaint against the classification by the Bonn antitrust watchdog. Amazon said it did not agree with the decision and would consider further legal remedies.
In January 2021, the legislature gave the Cartel Office new tools to take more effective action against overpowering online corporations. The Federal Court of Justice’s Cartel Senate has now decided for the first time on a complaint against a decision by the Cartel Office based on the new rules. Cartel Office chief Andreas Mundt said the decision would provide momentum for the ongoing proceedings against Amazon. According to the BGH, Amazon “has a dominant position on the German market for online marketplace services for commercial traders”.
The group has “outstanding financial strength and outstanding access to data relevant to competition, such as customer and user data, data from the operation of trading platforms and advertising platforms.” Likewise, as the operator of numerous online marketplaces, Amazon has a key position for retailers’ access to their sales markets, the court noted. The Federal Cartel Office rightly determined that Amazon has “outstanding cross-market importance for competition.”
The Bonn competition authorities assigned this position to Amazon in July 2022, which leaves them open to further antitrust action. Amazon took legal action against this decision. The dispute is specifically about the control powers of the competition authorities over the online retailer. The Federal Cartel Office had determined that the US group had “outstanding cross-market importance for competition”. On this basis, it is possible that the group will be more closely monitored and that, in a second step, the competition authorities will prohibit it from engaging in certain behaviors.