In our last issue, we reported on a crackdown on resale price
maintenance by the competition authorities in China and Taiwan (
Competition World, October 2013, "Resale price
maintenance: Crackdown in East Asia"). But it is not just in
these emerging markets that competition authorities are taking
action against resale price maintenance. Competition authorities in
Europe are also taking the issue very seriously. The past few
months have seen action by the UK's competition authority, the
OFT (Office of Fair Trading), in two separate resale price
maintenance cases, showing that - even in a relatively developed
competition law system like the UK, where recent investigations
have focused on sophisticated forms of anti-competitive practice
such as indirect information exchanges and price parity
arrangements – resale price maintenance is still considered a
serious problem worth challenging. At the same time, two
significant resale price maintenance cases are under
