Amazon has reached a final deal with EU antitrustregulators over concerns that its use of data undermined rivals, in a move that will close two of the most high-profile probes in Brussels.The US ecommerce group has committed to increasing the visibility of rival products by giving them equal treatment on its «buy box», which generates the majority of purchases on the site.
The commitments, which are set to remain in force for five years, have been «market tested» with rivals and agreed with EU officials, these people said. «There’s very little to discuss,» a person with knowledge of the process said.
The move represents an EU win as it will serve as a blueprint for the tech group’s compliance with the new Digital Markets Act, a piece of legislation aimed at curbing the power of Big Tech.
It sets out new obligations on large online platforms to give equal treatment to data, banning so-called self-preferencing whereby a company ranks its products ahead of rivals on its own marketplace.
Amazon’s deal with Brussels comes three years after EU regulators opened a probe into the group’s alleged anticompetitive practices in how it handles data from competitors. Amazon will now let sellers using its Prime scheme choose any logistics group and negotiate terms directly, instead of being locked into using Amazon’s logistics services.
Basically, Amazon won a 3-year delay of doing this, didn't they? Because it took these proceedings 3 years to conclude. I think that's a win for Amazon.
ReplyDeleteExactly! Amazon knew they couldn't get out of doing this, at least not in the EU. So they did the next, best thing: drag it out as long as they could.
DeleteLike others have already said this is a win for the EU but it took so long to get here... I wish such things could be done much quicker. Maybe within a year.
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