EU Commission investigates restrictions affecting cross border provision of pay TV services

Press Release, here. J. Almunia's Statement here.

Brussels to launch antitrust probe into sales of pay-TV rights

Financial Times, here.

"Joaquín Almunia, the EU competition commissioner, last year sanctioned a “fact finding” effort in light of the (Murphy) ruling to see whether barriers to cross-border access merited antitrust scrutiny and possible enforcement action.

Some investigators are now poised to step up their inquiries into whether “absolute territorial protection clauses” break competition law. These stop licensees from selling to other countries or accepting unsolicited demands from overseas customers to pay to access the content.

......

Maurits Dolmans, a partner at Cleary Gottlieb, said the 2011 Premier League case concerned satellite sports broadcasting and the court left open whether it could be applied at all to other distribution channels and other forms of content.

“The Commission will have to take into account different economic factors,” he said. “Forcing EU-wide licensing may be attractive for consumers in richer countries, who may pay less, but not necessarily for consumers in poorer countries, who might be forced to pay more.”

Will the final whistle be blown on the exploitation of territorially exclusive sports media rights?

J. Walkey, P. O'Dowd, R. Eccles, here.