Brussels, 05/07/2000 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission condemned the French company Edition Nathan for having concluded restrictive distribution agreements concerning educational material in several Member States. The agreements in question, concluded between the French group and its three sole distributors in Italy, Sweden and French speaking Belgium, concerning educational material aimed at pre-school children and sold in nearly all the Member States through a network of independent distributors. The Commission investigation showed that these agreements prevent the distributors from marketing the Nathan products outside their own exclusive territories and restricted their freedom to set prices and commercial conditions of sale. This practise also penalised the schools and other groups in France since the foreign distributors where excluded. Such agreements, which partition markets between Member States, are a violation of Article 81 of the Treaty (unlawful agreements) and are detrimental to the interests of school, which should have benefited from competition among distributors.
Given the limited scope of the agreements at a geographic level and the co-operation between companies brought into question during the procedure, the Commission nevertheless imposed small fines. Thus Nathan avoids a fine of EUR 60,000, a benefit from a considerable reduction due to attenuating circumstance, and its Belgian distributor Bricolux SA EUR 1,000.