“We will vigorously challenge the FCO’s conclusion, which is based on unique German regulation and directly conflicts with EU competition law consumer standards. As a result of this decision, Amazon would be the only retailer in Germany forced to promote uncompetitive prices to customers, which makes no sense for customers, selling partners, or competition.
It represents a fundamental misunderstanding of how the competitive retail category works and directly challenges Europe’s Single Market principles. It also conflicts with Germany’s growth ambitions, as it would create a patchwork of inconsistent solutions in the EU, impacting small and medium-sized businesses selling across the Single Market and undermining Germany’s aim to reduce regulatory barriers and increase competitiveness.
We will appeal this unprecedented regulatory outcome. In the meantime, we will continue operating our store as usual to ensure customers and selling partners experience no disruption while we prepare our legal response.
The Amazon store is built to ensure consumers can confidently find the best value based on price and delivery speed – and that's why they keep returning. If the Amazon store is singularly mandated to promote uncompetitive or even abusive pricing in the store, it will lead to a bad shopping experience for them. It would mislead customers into thinking they're getting good value when, in reality, they're not.
Our customer-first approach ensures people can shop with confidence, while supporting the success of more than 47,500 selling partners in Germany through clear and fair policies that apply equally to all offers in our store. Small and medium-sized businesses selling through our store offer customers vast selection, convenient delivery, and competitive prices every day – and they freely and independently set their own prices. Just like any other retailer, we don't want to promote uncompetitive prices. Doing so would negatively impact our customers' trust in the shopping experience, and our selling partners' success.
The FCO pursued this case under Sec. 19a of Germany's general competition law, a specific regulatory regime which currently only applies to a handful of companies. Today’s decision, which drives the fragmentation of the European Single Market when more harmonization is needed, calls the provision into question and whether it effectively supports innovation, competition, and consumer benefit.” Rocco Bräuniger, Country Manager Amazon.de.
