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More generation antitrust activities: Spain’s festival watchdog has opened an investigation into a possible anti-competitive habit through Dutch online giant Booking. com, following some court cases brought through the Spanish Association of Hotel Managers and the Madrid Regional Hotel Association.
The national festival regulator said today that it will read whether certain Booking. com practices constitute an abuse of dominant position in the provision of intermediation services to hotels and, therefore, whether it imposes unfair advertising situations in hotels located in Spain and imposes advertising policies. which would possibly have exclusionary effects on other online agencies and online sales channels.
The National Commission of Markets and Competition (CNMC) also said it would investigate Booking. com’s conduct which includes practices that constitute an exploitation of a position of economic dependence on hotels in Spain – and therefore amount to “unfair festival acts”. Harm to the public interest due to the distortion of the loose festival they have induced,” as stated in their press release.
“After examining the legal cases won and the data accumulated in the context of the initial investigation, the Competition Directorate of the CNMC considers that there are reasons for the option of Booking. com B. V. has infringed Articles 2 and 3 of the SCA [Spanish Competence Law] and Article 102 TFEU [Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union],” the CNMC added.
Booking. com reached out for comment. Update: The company has now sent this statement:
“We have and will continue to work in collaboration with the CNMC on its problems regarding Booking. com Spain. Booking. com has worked and will continue to work collaboratively with our accommodation partners in the travel ecosystem, which has only recently noticed signs of recovery as we participate in an even more dubious future with the global economic environment. We continue to work tirelessly to protect and meet the critical demand of our accommodation partners, helping them fill their rooms every day.
The Spanish watchdog has up to 18 months to carry out its investigation and make a final decision. It also concluded that the initiation of formal proceedings prejudged the final outcome.
The market strength of Booking. com, a veteran of the first wave of web startups, in the area has long been a source of fear for European Union lawmakers, supposedly helping to force a recent restart of the bloc’s antitrust regime that is due to begin. off next year.
Booking. com is a very likely candidate to be appointed as a gatekeeper under this pan-European Digital Markets Act (DMA), which would result in ex ante regulation of its core platform service, requiring compliance with a set of initial operational measures and situations across its regional operations that aim at fair relationships with other corporations that rely on the platform to succeed in their own customers.
However, the WFD is unlikely to spring into action next year, as the guardian appointment procedure will take several months (if not several) as the Commission prepares to take on a new role in Big Tech regulation.
This means that, in the meantime, investigations of national festivals, such as the one announced today through the Spanish CNMC, will have to fill the gap. In this case, depending on the established (slower) festival regulatory teams that typically require a thorough investigation of a complaint before any intervention is taken, a procedure that can take years for mandatory corrective orders to be issued.
New EU regulations for Big Tech will come into force in spring 2023, says Vestager