European Union antitrust authorities who are investigating publishers of electronic books, raided the headquarters of several companies suspected of price manipulation, and joined other regulatory organizations that are investigating agreements between publishers and retail sector.The European Commission announced on Wednesday the carrying out searches in companies of different member countries, but did not identify the companies or countries involved in the operation Tuesday.
“The Commission has reason to believe that the companies concerned may have violated EU antitrust rules prohibiting cartels and other restrictive business practices,” the statement said the organization.
The Office of Legal Trade (OFT) in the UK in response to complaints, an investigation began in January about the arrangements for sales of electronic books from certain publishers, and some retailers, to determine whether it violated competition rules.
“We are working closely with the OFT and aware of their investigations,” said Amelia Torres, spokeswoman for the European Commission.
Among the companies involved in trading of electronic books are Germany’s Bertelsmann, British Pearson and Bloomsbury Publishing, and France’s Hachette Livre, a subsidiary of Lagardère.
The Penguin division of Pearson, and Harper Collins, editor of News Corp., are under investigation by the OFT but said they had been searching by European Union authorities.
The world’s largest publisher, Random House and Bertelsmann’s other subsidiaries have not been addressed by the Commission, according to Andreas Grafemeyer, spokesman for the company.
The Bloomsbury declined to comment immediately.
Devices like the Kindle, Amazon.com, IPAD, Apple, and electronic readers from Sony have created a rapidly growing market for electronic books, which generally sell for less than the price of the printed editions.
In the United States, the justice ministry in Connecticut in October began investigating the deal between Amazon and Apple with publishers to offer electronic books at low cost, saying it could prevent rivals from offering attractive prices.
