The European Commission decided, on Wednesday 20 January, to impose fines of €7.8 million (see EUROPE 12230/8) on Valve, owner of the online PC gaming platform Steam, and the five publishers Bandai Namco, Capcom, Focus Home, Koch Media and ZeniMax.
Valve and the publishers restricted cross-border sales of certain PC video games on the basis of the geographical location of users within the European Economic Area (EEA), entering into the so-called ‘geo-blocking’ practices. The fines imposed on the publishers (over €6 million) were reduced due to their cooperation with the Commission during the investigation. Valve chose not to cooperate with the Commission and was fined more than €1.6 million.
Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice-President in charge of competition policy, pointed out that the European videogame industry is currently worth more than €17 billion. The sanctions adopted “serve as a reminder that under EU competition law, companies are prohibited from contractually restricting cross-border sales. Such practices deprive European consumers of the benefits of the EU Digital Single Market and of the opportunity to shop around for the most suitable offer”.
Steam is one of the world’s largest online PC video gaming platforms.
The Commission found that by bilaterally agreeing to geo-block certain PC video games from outside a specific territory, Valve and each publisher partitioned the EEA market in violation of EU antitrust rules.
Valve and the publishers engaged in the following geo-blocking practices: - bilateral agreements and/or concerted practices between Valve and each of the five PC video game publishers; - licensing and distribution agreements concluded bilaterally between four of the five PC video game publishers (Bandai, Focus Home, Koch Media and ZeniMax) and some of their game distributors. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)