European Union: Opened consultation on draft revised Market Definition Notice

On 8 November 2022, the European Commission opened a public consultation on the draft revised Market Definition Notice until 13 January 2023. The Notice provides guidance on the principles that the Commission employs in its assessment of "relevant markets" to enforce European Union competition legislation. In particular, the draft Notice outlines a market definition for digital ecosystems and multi-sided platforms. According to the Notice, the digital ecosystems consist of a "primary core product and several secondary (digital) products whose consumption is connected to the core product" enabled by technological links or interoperability. In its assessment, the Notice states, the Commission will apply to the digital ecosystems and multi-sided platforms the same principles it previously used to determine the "relevant markets" in the aftermarkets and bundle markets. Furthermore, in cases in which the aftermarket or bundle market approach cannot be applied, the Commission will assess the "network effects, switching costs and (single and/or multi)-homing decisions" in the delimitation of relevant markets. In the case of multi-sided platforms, the Commission aims to follow one of the two main approaches. The first approach will "define a relevant product market for the products offered by a platform as a whole" and consider all the user groups, including business users. The second approach will "define separate relevant product markets for the products offered on each side of the platform". Finally, the Notice specifies that the Commission will assess "non-price elements" to identify "relevant markets", noting that multi-sided platforms predominantly offer a product at a zero monetary price in order to increase the number of platform users to monetise its other products based on the increasing number of users.