The Federal Anti-Monopoly Service (Fas) said that Apple’s local subsidiary told 16 retailers to maintain the recommended prices of phones in the iPhone 5 and iPhone 6 families.

Non-compliance with the pricing guidelines may have led to the termination of contracts, it found.

Apple has not yet responded to a request for comment.

At the time of the investigation, Apple denied that it controlled its products’ pricing, telling Reuters that resellers “set their own prices for the Apple products they sell in Russia and around the world”.

The regulator said Apple had now ended its price-fixing practices but has not said whether the company faces a fine.

The FAS claimed that Apple Rus monitored the retail prices for the iPhone 5c, 5s, 6, 6 Plus, 6s and 6s Plus.

“In the case of the establishment of ‘inappropriate’ prices, the Russian subsidiary of Apple sent emails to resellers asking them to change,” the watchdog said.

The deputy head of the FAS, Andrey Tsarikovsky, added that “Apple actively co-operated” with the investigation and that the company had “adopted the necessary measures to eliminate violations of the law”.

That included training employees in the “anti-monopoly legislation norms” in Russia.

In May, the FAS found that Google used its dominant position to force its own apps and services on users and fined it £5m ($6m).

And, in November, the regulator opened an investigation into whether Microsoft abused its position in the security market with Windows 10, following a complaint from Moscow-based anti-virus firm Kaspersky.

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Source: BBC

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The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) said they regularly and systematically exchanged information and discussed prices.

The biggest fine was given to the Storm agency, which has used models like Kate Moss and Cara Delevingne.

However, the CMA stressed that big name “top models” were not involved in the price-fixing.

It said the five agencies got together regularly to agree on a minimum level of prices – which is against the law.

The CMA also accused the Association of Model Agents (AMA), the trade association, of sending round emails to its members telling them to keep prices high.

Competition
The CMA investigation looked at a wide range of modelling assignments, from small magazine shoots to big advertising campaigns.

It said that the customers affected included well-known High Street chains and online fashion retailers.

“Strong competition benefits consumers, the economy and society,” said the CMA’s John Wotton.

“In this case the agencies and the AMA colluded with each other over their approach to pricing and, in some instances, the agencies agreed to fix minimum prices.”

Storm Model Management was fined £491,000; Models One was fined £394,000, and FM Models has been told to pay £251,000, although it has since gone bust.

Smaller fines were given to Viva Model Management and Premier Model Management.
The AMA was fined £2,500.
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Source: BBC

The post Top model agencies fined £1.5m for price-fixing appeared first on Citi 97.3 FM - Relevant Radio. Always.