The President of the Bundeskartellamt, Andreas Mundt, presented the authority’s brochure “2019 Annual Report.” The publication is aimed at readers interested in economic policy and provides an overview of the Bundeskartellamt’s activities in 2019 and the first few months of the current year.
The digital economy is still in the focus of the Bundeskartellamt’s work. Last year the authority was successful in obtaining adjustments in Amazon’s business terms for sellers active worldwide on Amazon Marketplace to the benefit of the sellers. As to the proceeding against Facebook, the Federal Court of Justice confirmed the Bundeskartellamt’s decision against Facebook’s unrestricted collection and use of data without the users’ consent in June 2020 in provisional legal protection proceedings.
Andreas Mundt said, “Our authority continues to conduct a number of proceedings with the aim to control the economic power of the internet giants. Newcomers must still be able to gain access to the markets in the future. The large platforms must treat competitors, customers and consumers fairly. I hope that additional tools, as described in the Federal Economic Affairs Ministry’s draft for the amendment to the German Competition Act, will be made available to us as soon as possible to enable us to take even faster and more effective action in future.”
