Samsung Fined EUR39 Million by Dutch Regulator for Online Price Fixing

By Joe Hoppe

Samsung Electronics Benelux BV will be fined 39 million euros ($45.6 million) for exercising undue influence on the online retail prices of television sets at seven sets of retailers, a Dutch regulator said Wednesday.

The Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets said Samsung's Dutch distributor monitored the online prices of retailers using automated programs, and urged retailers to raise prices if it saw rates fall below its desired market price.

Retailers followed Samsung recommendations, as it would often intervene and urge other outlets to raise prices, while also urging Samsung to confront competitors and urge them to raise prices, the regulator said.

It added that retailers knew they couldn't price themselves out of the market, and as such Samsung was found to have unduly intervened directly in the competition between outlets--protecting their own margins, at the expense of consumers.

"Samsung knew it could not compel retailers to increase their prices. That is why Samsung associates used the term 'recommendations', but, in reality, those recommendations were neither personal nor non-binding," the competition regulator's Chairman Martijn Snoep said.

The regulator noted that while monitoring online retail prices and giving non-binding price recommendations is allowed, influencing prices--such as informing retailers about planned prices of competitors--is a step too far.

Write to Joe Hoppe at joseph.hoppe@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 29, 2021 09:50 ET (13:50 GMT)

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