European Regulators Will Focus on Distributors’ Restrictive Airline Contracts
Photo Credit: A photo from a 2015 public appearance by Margrethe Vestager, European Commissioner for Competition, which has launched an investigation into two of the largest travel distribution technology companies in the world, Amadeus and Sabre. European Commission
Skift Take
It's anyone's guess whether travel distribution giants Amadeus and Sabre might have run afoul of the European Union's rules. But a look at the history of those companies' airline contracts provides clues as to what might be top of mind with investigators.
European Commission antitrust regulators left an array of unanswered questions when they opened an investigation into the business practices of airline distribution-tech providers Amadeus and Sabre.
But one thing we do know is that investigators have asked Amadeus and Sabre preliminary questions about their so-called "full content" clauses, which require airlines to share virtually all of their flight information and fares with the global distribution system in question. However, there have been a variety of loopholes, too, so the notion of full content is somewhat of a misnomer.
The tech giants typically coupled that contract language with a parity provision that requires the airlines to offer all of their fares at equivalent prices and comparable volumes of inventory as the airlines distribute elsewhere, with no extra fees.
At issue is whether the practice of preventing airlines from saving some of their offers for exclusive distribution outside of Amadeus and Sabre — such
