EU To Investigate Delivery Hero, Glovo Over Food Delivery Cartel Concerns (techcrunch.com) 5
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: The European Commission announced a formal investigation into Berlin-based food delivery giant Delivery Hero and its Spanish subsidiary, Glovo, on Tuesday, citing cartel concerns. The Commission will launch an in-depth probe into agreements between the online delivery firms to establish whether any anticompetitive activity has taken place. "The Commission is concerned that, before the takeover, Delivery Hero and Glovo may have allocated geographic markets and shared commercially sensitive information (e.g., on commercial strategies, prices, capacity, costs, product characteristics)," the Commission wrote in a press release. "The Commission is also concerned that the companies may have agreed not to poach each other's employees. These practices could have been facilitated by Delivery Hero's minority share in Glovo." The move follows unannounced raids conducted on the two companies' local offices in July 2022 and November 2023.
From July 2018, Delivery Hero held a minority share in Glovo -- going on to acquire sole control in July 2022, per the Commission, which noted that this is the first investigation it has undertaken into anti-competitive agreements "that may have occurred in the context of a minority shareholding by one operator in a competitor." [...] Earlier this month, the German delivery giant warned investors it could ultimately face an antitrust fine of up to 400 million euros over the EU antitrust issue.
From July 2018, Delivery Hero held a minority share in Glovo -- going on to acquire sole control in July 2022, per the Commission, which noted that this is the first investigation it has undertaken into anti-competitive agreements "that may have occurred in the context of a minority shareholding by one operator in a competitor." [...] Earlier this month, the German delivery giant warned investors it could ultimately face an antitrust fine of up to 400 million euros over the EU antitrust issue.
Huh? (Score:2)
Why investigate them for collusion when regulators did nothing to stop the merger/takeover?
Re: (Score:2)
Because it's illegal?
I'd like to add that this is a core problem in capitalism. It requires perfectly rational and natural behavior to be made illegal. From the point of view of the companies here, they are merely cooperating to achieve better results for both of them. The incentive to cooperate like this and in similar ways will always be present in markets and will always require huge investments in regulation and enforcement to be 'prevented' from occurring (although the stable state is still an oligopol
ugh (Score:3)
The EU attacking American companies again.
Oh wait what?
With Uber's bribery of EU commisioners, (Score:1)
no one of the EU commissioners found it necessary to investigate Uber.
Pay up or get investigated when you're outperforming the competition in the EU!
That's fucking stupid (Score:3)
A company fully controls another, claimed to be its subsidiary in the writeup, and they aren't supposed to share data? Why in the actual fuck would you buy a foreign company and not be able to know everything about its market? How ELSE are you supposed to manage a company without key indicators?
Why don't they go after the supermarkets, where the price of milk is the same everywhere and 10% more than a smaller distributor who's not in the cartel, and "generic" pharma, they all mysteriously cost the same and raised prices to match the non-generics.
Normal people don't use Glovo. Delivery services such as uber eats are expensive for us paycheck-to-paycheck peeps.
I'd like to have cheap staple foods and basic medications.