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IP/05/1441
Brussels, 17th November 2005
Competition: Commission receives improved
commitments from FAPL over sale of media rights
The European Commission has received improved commitments from the
English Football Association Premier League (FAPL) regarding the sale of the
FAPL’s media rights for the 2007 season onwards. The commitments follow an
investigation by the Commission, under EC Treaty competition rules on
restrictive business practices (Article 81), into the sale by the FAPL of media
rights to the Premier League competition on behalf of the individual clubs. The
commitments provide for the FAPL to sell a number of packages of media rights,
showcasing the League as a whole throughout each season. Live TV rights will be
sold in six balanced packages with no one bidder being allowed to buy all six
packages. Packages will be sold to the highest standalone bidder for each
package, and bids other than simple standalone bids will be disregarded. The
auction will be monitored by a Trustee, selected by the Commission, who will
report to the Commission as to whether the commitments entered into by the FAPL
have been followed.
Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said, “I am pleased to bring this
long running case closer to a satisfactory outcome. The commitments offered by
the Premier League should ensure that the media rights are sold in a fair and
transparent manner and give British football fans greater choice and better
value.”
The Commission sent a Statement of Objections on this case in December 2002
(see IP/02/1951).
The Statement of Objections recognised that there are in principle benefits to
joint selling to football fans and media operators as well as to the clubs of
the Premier League. However the Commission raised concerns that in practice the
FAPL’s implementation of the joint selling agreement deprived media
operators and British football fans of choice, led to higher prices and reduced
innovation. The FAPL submitted provisional commitments to the Commission in
December 2003, which included a commitment that no single broadcaster would be
allowed to buy all of the packages of live match rights from 2007 onwards (see
IP/03/1748).
These commitments were the subject of a public consultation, following which the
Commission sought clarifications from the FAPL concerning the adequacy and
detail of the provisional commitments.
The FAPL’s revised commitments address the points raised in the public
consultation, including: specifying the precise terms of the no single buyer
rule and the conduct of the auction process; creating more evenly balanced
packages of rights; and increasing the availability of rights to broadcast via
mobile phones.
The Commission will now prepare a draft decision that would render the
FAPL’s revised commitments legally binding (under the terms of Article 9
of Regulation 1/2004). This will be sent to the competition authorities of the
Member States for consultation, following which the Commission would issue a
final decision. Any final decision would be issued no later than the first
quarter of 2006.
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