The Netherlands Competition Authority ("NMa") has imposed fines amounting to €20 million in total on Dutch media company Koninklijke Wegener N.V. and five of its executives. The NMa found that Wegener had failed to comply with a merger remedy imposed on it in 2000 in connection with its acquisition of publishing company VNU Dagbladen.
In 2000, Wegener, which already owned regional newspaper PZC, purchased a second newspaper, BN/De Stem, as part of its takeover of VNU Dagbladen. Both PZC and BN/De Stem are published in the south-western region of Holland. In order to maintain competition in the region, Wegener agreed to maintain the autonomy and independence of the two newspapers as a condition of the acquisition.
Following complaints and a subsequent investigation in 2009, the NMa concluded that the ongoing obligation had not been complied with and that Wegener was in fact running a single news organisation with harmonised editorial and commercial policies. The level of co-operation between the two titles meant the papers were no longer competing with each other. The NMa found that the merger conditions had been breached from at least 2002.
In line with the growing trend for competition authorities to target implicated individuals as well as the company, five Wegener executives were deemed to have played a personal role in the violation and were individually fined between €150,000 and €350,000 (€1.3 million in total). Four of the five were appointed in 2002 as special supervisory directors to make sure the remedy was carried out properly and were therefore viewed as being very close to the breach.
The NMa states that it adopts a so-called 'high-trust' approach, which if violated will result in severe fines in order to deter others from engaging in similar behaviour, which notably can be imposed on both companies and individuals for maximum deterrent effect. If Wegener fails to comply with this fining order, it runs the risk of additional penalty payments of € 1 million per quarter, up to a maximum of €20 million.
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