Italy's Antitrust Authority announced the start of a preliminary investigation into Amazon and five of its subsidiaries for suspected abuse of the company's dominant position. The competition probe centres on advantages Amazon offers third-party sellers on its e-commerce platform for using its logistics services.
In particular, Amazon gives third-party vendors using the logistics and fulfillment services improved visibility on its platform. This could help them realise higher sales than sellers who do not use Amazon Logistics, creating an unfair advantage based on discrimination by Amazon. The benefits may represent an abuse of Amazon's dominant position on the e-commerce platform market and harm competition for other warehouse and logistics firms active in the e-commerce market and other martketplaces, ultimately harming consumers, the regulator said.
The Authority's officials carried out inspections in the offices of some of the companies involved, with the help of the Special Antitrust Unit of the Guardia di Finanza. The five companies covered by the investigation are Amazon Services Europe Sarl, Amazon Europe Core Sarl, Amazon EU Sarl, Amazon Italia Services Srl and Amazon Italia Logistica Srl. The regulator has one year to complete the investigation.
