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The Competition Authority (AdC) imposed on MEO – Serviços de Comunicações e Multimédia, SA (MEO) a fine of eighty-four million euros for combining prices and sharing markets with NOWO – Communications, SA (NOWO) in mobile communications services and fixed.
The information was made available today by the AdC in a statement on the website itself.
The cartel between MEO and NOWO was in effect for more than 11 months ...
According to information from the AdC, this cartel between MEO and NOWO implied price increases and a reduction in the quality of the services provided, as well as restrictions on the geographic availability of the same services, which penalized consumers throughout the territory national.
After the signing of an MVNO (mobile virtual network operator) contract between these companies, MEO and NOWO entered into an anti-competitive agreement whereby NOWO undertook not to launch mobile services outside the geographic areas where it provided fixed services, without thus competing , with MEO in the Lisbon and Porto areas.
Within the scope of this cartel, NOWO also agreed with MEO not to offer mobile deals at 5 euros or less (or at lower prices compared to the prices of similar offers on the market). NOWO also agreed to implement price increases and lower the quality of fixed and mobile service package offerings.
On the other hand, MEO committed itself, in essence, to improve the contractual conditions of the MVNO contract signed with NOWO, especially with regard to the prices charged between them, in the context of the use of infrastructures, and to solve operational problems in the field performance of that contract.
The cartel between the two companies was in effect at least between the beginning of January and the end of November 2018, when the AdC carried out the search and seizure procedures at the facilities of the two companies.
It should be remembered that the Competition Law expressly prohibits agreements between companies that significantly restrict competition, in all or part of the national market, reducing the well-being of consumers and / or companies. Violation of competition rules not only reduces the welfare of consumers, but also undermines the competitiveness of companies, penalizing the economy as a whole, the statement can read.
Adc
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