Italy: Conclusion of Italian competition investigation into Apple and Amazon for an anti-competitive agreement

On 16 November 2021, the Italian Competition Authority concluded its investigation into Apple and Amazon for limiting resellers of "authentic" Apple and Beats branded products' to access the Amazon.it marketplace. Specifically, the Authority discovered that an agreement was signed on 31 October 2018 between the two companies which barred official and unofficial resellers of Apple and Beats items from using Amazon. This discrimination of chosen individual subjects represents a violation of Article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). The inquiry found that the objective was to impose a quantitative limit on the number of sellers, allowing only Amazon and a select group of individuals to operate on Amazon.it. Cross-border sales were also restricted under the terms of the agreement, as retailers were discriminated based on their location.