December 29 (SeeNews) - Romania's competition authority imposed a 32.28 million lei ($8.1 million/$6.7 million euro) fine on online retailer eMAG for abuse of dominant position, the regulator said on Tuesday.
The fine was issued on the basis of the findings of an investigation started in 2017, the Competition Council said in a statement.
During the investigation, the competition authority found that between January 2013 and June 2019, eMAG abused its dominant position on its online platform eMAG Marketplace by positioning and displaying its own products more favourably, to the detriment of offers from partners with which it was in direct competition.
The company has acknowledged the findings of the investigation and benefited from a reduction of the fine, the council said.
The competition authority also said that it required the company to adopt a series of measures regarding the algorithms used to promote offers on the platform.
In a separate press release on Tuesday, eMAG, which operated under the legal name of Dante International, said that it has cooperated with the anti-trust body in addressing some of the problems of its Marketplace platform.
eMAG was founded in 2001 by Romanian entrepreneurs, and later expanded in Bulgaria, Hungary and Poland. South Africa-based Naspers media group acquired a 70% stake in eMAG in 2012.
(1 euro=4.8735 Romanian lei)
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