The online sales giant was in the crosshairs of the European Union. Targeted for competition violations, in particular in the use of data from independent retailers selling on its site, Amazon has reached an agreement to close two investigations by Brussels, the European Commission announced on Tuesday December 20.
In July, the American group had proposed changes in its practices to meet the concerns of Brussels. “The Commission has accepted the commitments offered by Amazon”announced the European commissioner for competition, Margrethe Vestager, during a press conference. “Now Amazon will have six months, until June 2023”, to settle down, she said.
“We are satisfied to have addressed the concerns of the European Commission and to have resolved these issues”reacted a spokesperson for the distributor. “While we still disagree with several of the European Commission’s preliminary conclusions, we are committed to a constructive approach”he pointed out.
The American platform has a dual role: it provides independent sellers with a marketplace on which they can sell products directly to consumers, and it sells products itself as a retailer, in competition with these sellers. .
Towards a centralized complaints system
The European Commission had opened an investigation in July 2019, accusing Amazon of relying on commercial data from independent retailers to calibrate its offer, considering that this distorted competition. It had opened a second investigation in November 2020 for suspicion of preferential treatment of sellers using its logistics and delivery services.
To close the first file, Amazon undertook in particular “to refrain from using non-public data relating to the activities of independent sellers on its marketplace, or derived from them, for its retail activities that compete with these sellers”. Regarding the second investigation, he notably promised, as part of his Prime program, to allow sellers “to freely choose any carrier for their logistics and delivery services”.
Amazon was also suspected of bias in granting sellers access to the “Buy Box” (“shopping box” “ ), a button allowing customers to place items directly into their shopping cart and which highlights a seller’s offer for a chosen product. The platform is committed to ensuring a “equal treatment to all sellers when ranking their offers for the purpose of selecting the winner of the “Buy Box”” and “to display a second offer competing with that of the winner if there is a second offer sufficiently differentiated from the first as regards price or delivery”.
These commitments were negotiated with the Commission, which obtained some improvements from Amazon. The group has undertaken, in particular, to introduce a centralized complaint filing system open to all sellers and carriers who wish to report non-compliance with certain competition rules.