Select your location for location specific information:
Prohibition of cartels; information on exempted agreements
Corporate cooperations or cartels to promote performance-enhancing cooperation are exempt from the ban on cartels under certain statutory conditions.
Responsible for you
Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Wirtschaft, Landesentwicklung und Energie
Secure contact form
Street address
Prinzregentenstr. 28
80538 München
Postal address
80525 München
Phone
Fax
Website
Standort im BayernAtlas
Route planner
Timetable for public transport
Procedure details
Description
Agreements between undertakings, decisions by associations of undertakings and concerted practices which have as their object or effect the prevention, restriction or distortion of competition are prohibited.
Cooperation that is beneficial overall for effective competition on the relevant market is permitted. Each entrepreneur bears the risk of making the correct legal assessment as to whether a cooperation violates antitrust law or not.
In practice, cooperations in production, marketing, purchasing, research and development as well as agreements on standards and for the purpose of environmental protection are significant.
For small and medium-sized companies, cooperation in the form of an SME cooperation pursuant to Section 3 ARC is also an option.
Competent authorities:
Insofar as the restrictive effect on competition of the conduct to be assessed in Germany does not extend beyond the state of Bavaria: Bavarian State Ministry of Economic Affairs, Regional Development and Energy.
Otherwise, the Federal Cartel Office is responsible, or the European Commission (Directorate-General for Competition) in the case of Europe-wide effects.
Related links
Related issues
-
Antitrust supervision; information on dominant companies
Companies that have the ability to disrupt competitive processes due to their market position are subject to abuse control. Special market power must be determined on a case-by-case basis.
-
Communicate indications of antitrust violations
If you have indications of possible infringements of cartel law you can send them to the Bundeskartellamt as a submission or complaint.
-
Prohibition of cartels; information on the prosecution of infringements
Agreements between companies, decisions by associations of companies and concerted practices that have as their object or effect the prevention, restriction or distortion of competition are prohibited.
Status: 15.05.2025
Editorially responsible for prodecure description: Bayerisches Staatsministerium für Wirtschaft, Landesentwicklung und Energie
Contains machine translated content.
Show the original content