• Denmark: Viasat infringes Conditions imposed by Competition Council’s Decision in Distribution of TV Channels Case On 27 June 2012, the Danish Competition Council (the Council) found that Viasat had infringed the conditions imposed by the Council’s decision of 30 September 2009 on Viasat’s business terms regarding the distribution of Viasat’s own TV channels TV3 and TV3+. In its decision of 2009, the Council decided that Viasat’s business terms regarding the distribution of the TV channels were an infringement of section 6 of the Danish Competition Act and Article 81 EC Treaty (now Article 101 TFEU). The Council had found that the business terms restricted competition between the TV channels because Viasat’s business terms reserved the most favourable package placement for commercial TV channels to Viasat’s own TV channels. The Council concluded that the business terms in question restricted competition by limiting competitors’ ability to be placed in the most favorable package (with maximum carriage). As a consequence, the Council decided that Viasat had to cease preconditioning package placements in all of its business terms and also cease preconditioning other terms with similar anticompetitive object and effect. (See ECN Brief 1/2010). The decision with conditions imposed by the Council was upheld by the Danish Competition Appeal Tribunal on 8 June 2010 and the Maritime and Commercial Court on 6 January 2012. In its recent decision of 2012, the Council established that Viasat has infringed the conditions by requiring the local cable networks to pay for a Viasat Standard Package (including the TV channels TV3, TV3+ and TV3 Puls) for all households receiving any other commercial TV channels. Since all households receiving other commercial TV channels have to pay for Viasat’s TV channels, the requirement is capable of having the effect that Viasat’s TV channels are placed in the most favorable commercial package, ensuring that the households who are already paying for Viasat’s TV channels also receive them. Thus, the potential effect of the new requirement is similar to the effect of the preconditioned package placement relative to other commercial TV channels and has a similar anticompetitive object and effect as the business terms examined in the 2009 case. In the course of the investigation, the local cable networks have reported to the Danish Competition and Consumer Authority that they have not been offered the opportunity to negotiate the business terms. The Council’s decision of 27 June 2012 has been appealed to the Maritime and Commercial Court by Viasat. See press release (in Danish) 31.