Brussels, 11/12/2000 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission has authorised the American firms Quantum HDD, subsidiary of the diversified group Quantum Corp, and Maxtor Corp to merge. The two companies manufacture and sell hard disk drives throughout the world for office computers. The Commission considered that the merged entity would be in competition with a certain number of large competitors, including IBM, Seagate and Western Digital. Nor do the two companies impose exclusive contracts on their customers, the latter generally having several suppliers ensuring security of supplies. This freedom also enables them to exercise competitive pressure on the producers. Given these elements, the Commission considered that the concentration would not raise problems of competition.