PARIS – Pierre Cardin and its Germany-based licensee Ahlers should pay a 5.7-million-euro nice for agreeing to limit cross-border gross sales in addition to gross sales to particular clients, the European Fee mentioned Thursday.
An investigation launched in 2022 by the EC, the chief arm of the European Union in control of implementing the laws of the European Parliament and the EU, discovered that the 2 firms had entered into “anticompetitive agreements and engaged in concerted practices to defend Ahlers from competitors in these EEA nations the place the corporate held a Pierre Cardin license” between 2008 and 2021.
The breakdown of the cumulated 5.7-million-euro nice, or $6 million at present trade charges, reveals that the French vogue home has been ordered to pay 2.2 million euros and Ahlers 3.5 million euros.
Within the ruling, one of many events submitted a declare for incapability to pay the nice and was granted a discount, though it didn’t point out which firm this utilized to.
Firms that breach the EU’s antitrust guidelines face fines of as much as 10 % of their international turnover.
In July 2023, German group Röthers took over Ahlers, which was in insolvency. Its belongings, together with manufacturers in its portfolio like Pierre Cardin and Baldessarini, had been folded right into a subsidiary referred to as R.Model Group. In response to German press, Röthers additionally negotiated a brand new license settlement with Pierre Cardin.
Neither Pierre Cardin nor R.Model Group instantly responded to a request for remark.
Antitrust regulators performed an unannounced inspection of the French model and the German clothes producer in 2021, adopted by the opening of a proper investigation in early 2022 into the 2 firms.
In a assertion of objection despatched in July 2023, the European Fee mentioned the 2 firms appeared to have agreed to limit cross-border gross sales in addition to gross sales to particular clients.
The aim of this coordination between the 2 firms was “to make sure Ahlers’ absolute territorial safety within the nations lined by its licensing agreements with Pierre Cardin” inside the European Financial Space, it mentioned on the time.
The EC has been more and more lively in pursuing suspected anti-competitive practices. The value fixing practices fall below the antitrust laws that prohibit agreements between firms that distort competitors inside the single market buying and selling bloc. Lately, it has stepped up its efforts to implement guidelines in opposition to curbs on cross-border imports and on-line gross sales.
In 2023, antitrust regulators performed unannounced inspections into numerous undisclosed firms in a number of nations of the 27-member bloc to research enterprise practices that would result in fragmentation within the single market. Among the many firms inspected was Gucci.
A number of magnificence and perfume firms linked to the provision of perfume or perfume substances additionally got here below investigation the identical yr.
