The Competition Council fined five companies for agreements on the medical equipment market
The Competition Council reports on Friday, May 22, that it has sanctioned five companies with total fines of 6.42 million lei for an agreement on the medical imaging equipment market in Romania. The institution states that the companies have agreed to limit the sale of Esaote brand medical imaging equipment on Romanian territory.
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According to a statement sent by the institution, it is about the companies Esaote SpA (Italy), Esaote Europe BV (Netherlands), DTL Medical SRL (Romania), Camed Medical Systems GmbH (Germany) and BMS Ultraschall (Germany).
“Following the investigation, the competition authority found that Esaote SpA, its subsidiary Esaote Europe BV and the distributors DTL Medical SRL, Camed Medical Systems GmbH and BMS Ultraschall, agreed to limit the sale of Esaote brand medical imaging equipment on Romanian territory”emphasizes the Competition Council.
The institution specifies that, in the period 2020-2022, the sanctioned companies concluded contracts and adopted a behavior that restricted parallel sales in and from Romania, with the effect of isolating the national territory within the European market.
Thus, in the 2020-2022 period, the sanctioned companies concluded agreements and adopted practices that limited the sale of equipment in and from Romania, isolating the national market from the rest of the European market.
Specifically, through the contracts concluded with the DTL and Camed distributors and the way they acted after some public tenders, the suppliers prevented the distributors from accepting requests from other countries.
“In this context, Camed Medical Systems GmbH and BMS Ultraschall, both from Germany, could not sell equipment to customers in Romania, at their request, and DTL Medical SRL could not sell at the request of customers outside the territory of Romania.
Through this practice, Romania was isolated from the rest of the domestic market, being restricted intra-brand competition for Esaote equipment.”
The Competition Council claims that the agreement between the companies involved restricted competition on the Esaote brand medical imaging equipment market, affecting in particular prices and hospitals' access to more advantageous offers.
The institution reminds that the competition law prohibits agreements that limit competition and specifies that the fines applied are enforceable and will be collected by the state through the National Tax Administration Agency.
The decision will be published on the authority's website after the removal of confidential information.
