The Competition Authority has been investigating alleged illegal collusion between Samskip and Eimskip. The Eimskip case concluded on 16 June when the company signed a settlement with the Competition Authority, which includes, among other things, Eimskip's admission of serious breaches of competition law and the payment of an administrative fine. See more here.
The settlement also includes Eimskip's commitment to take measures to prevent further infringements and to strengthen competition, in accordance with Article 3 of the settlement. Paragraph 3 of Article 3 of the settlement states that Eimskip commits to cease all commercial cooperation with Samskip. This also entails that Eimskip undertakes not to cooperate with other companies in any form of transport service if Samskip also has a cooperation agreement with that company. This does not apply if Eimskip can demonstrate to the Competition Authority that the nature of the collaboration in question is such that there is no risk of distorting competition between Eimskip and Samskip.
Following the settlement with Eimskip, Samskip filed an appeal with the Competition Appeals Board, in which the company demanded that paragraph 3 of article 3 of the settlement with Eimskip be annulled. Samskip argued, among other things, that the Competition Authority had breached the administrative law principles of the right to be heard, proportionality and equality with the aforementioned terms of the settlement. In its appeal to the Appeal Board, Samskip argued that the order constituted an unlawful restriction on the company's freedom of contract and enterprise, which strengthened Eimskip's dominant market position while weakening Samskip's. Before the Appeal Board, the Competition Authority argued that Samskip's appeal should be dismissed. Furthermore, the authority argued that the said undertaking by Eimskip was both lawful and necessary in light of the serious breaches of competition law that Eimskip had acknowledged.
With Decision of the Competition Appeals Board of 2 December 2021 the case brought by Samskip was dismissed by the committee. The ruling of the appeals committee states that„the party who settles a case [has] the authority to submit to conditions and a government fine in order to prevent further breaches and to promote competition, thereby acting in his own best interests. By its very nature, such a settlement generally entails a restriction on the cooperation of the parties who have settled an investigation into an unlawful collusion case.“Samskip had no right to be a party to the settlement with Eimskip and cannot refer the said provision of the settlement to the Appeal Board. In this regard, it was noted that Samskip's case was still pending. The Appeals Committee therefore considered it unavoidable to dismiss Samskip's complaint.
