Amazon has promised to treat sellers on its website fairly in an effort to settle two European Union antitrust investigations, a concession that signifies a change in the company’s strategy after the bloc passed a strict digital-competition law aimed at curbing the power of tech giants.
The U.S.online retail giant offered to make a number of commitments to ease competition concerns, and the European Commission, the 27-nation bloc’s top antitrust enforcer, said it will now seek feedback on them from ‘interested parties.’
The commission launched an investigation four years ago over concerns Amazon was violating competition law by using non-public data from merchants selling products on its platform to gain an unfair advantage over them.
It also opened a separate investigation into whether Amazon favors its own retail business and merchants that use its logistics and delivery system over other sellers.
Amazon has promised to treat sellers on its website fairly in an effort to settle two European Union antitrust investigations, a concession that signifies a change in the company’s strategy after the bloc passed a strict digital-competition law aimed at curbing the power of tech giants.Pictured: BANDAR SLOT DEPOSIT PULSA TANPA POTONGAN Amazon founder Jeff Bezos
The investigations are part of the bloc’s wider efforts to curb the power of big technology companies.
Amazon has since offered to treat sellers equally when ranking their offers for the ‘buy box’ on its website and which generates the bulk of its sales.
Sellers will also be allowed to choose their own logistics and delivery services company instead of Amazon’s competing logistics services.
The European Commission said rivals and customers had until Sept.9 to provide feedback to Amazon’s proposal before it decides whether to accept the offer and end its two investigations.
Amazon had faced a possible fine of up to 10% of its annual worldwide revenue, which could have amounted to billions of dollars.
Amazon said it has ‘serious concerns’ that new EU digital regulations are ‘unfairly targeting Amazon and a few other U.S.companies’ and disagrees with several of the commission’s conclusions.
Amazon said while it disagrees with several of the Commission’s conclusions it has engaged constructively with the EU competition watchdog.
Amazon has since offered to treat sellers equally when ranking their offers for the ‘buy box’ on its website and which generates the bulk of its sales (file image)
It said it had ‘engaged constructively with the commission to address their concerns and preserve our ability to serve European customers and the more than 185,000 European small and medium-sized businesses selling through our stores.’
The Commission in 2020 charged Amazon with using its size, power and data to push its own products and gain an unfair advantage over rival merchants that sell on its online platform.
Britain’s competition watchdog opened a similar probe into Amazon last week, looking into concerns that the online retailer is abusing its dominance to undermine rivals.