2 October 03: Market Analysis to advise on European Commission's renewed investigation into the FA Premier League's sale of television broadcasting rights
The European Commission has announced that it will issue a second Statement of Objections on the sale of live Premier League broadcasting rights in the UK TV market. This follows the FAPL's July auctions in which BSkyB once again retained all of the exclusive rights to broadcast live Premier League matches. Last December the Commission issued a Statement of Objections alleging that the FAPL's rights selling arrangements are anti-competitive and tantamount to price-fixing. The Commission's primary concern is that the repeated sale of the exclusive broadcasting rights to BSkyB is foreclosing the market to other broadcasters and limiting media coverage of soccer events to the detriment of UK consumers. Market Analysis is advising a number of the companies responding to the Commission's ongoing investigation. For the Commission's Press Release go to: http://europa.eu.int/comm/competition/antitrust/cases