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Weekly Lists
March 17, 2017 www.intellinews.com I Page 22
bne:TMT
Apple Russia found guilty of price fixing on iPhones
Apple Rus has been found guilty by Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) on fixing prices for a models of iPhone 5 and 6 se- ries, Vedomosti daily and TASS reported on March 14, citing the deputy head of the regulator Andrei Tsarikovsky.
The ruling caps a string of cases where Russian authorities have applied pressure on foreign tech and digital companies. Earlier in March, Vedomosti sources said the FAS is also now consider- ing slowing data traffic to websites of foreign companies defying the decisions of Russian courts.
In the Apple case, which saw a seven-month investigation by FAS, most retailers in Russia were reportedly setting the prices on the iPhones prior to the launch of the sales, which was coordinated with Apple Rus.
The Czech competition office (UOHS) announced on March 13 that it will probe the mobile voice and data market for signs of collusion between competitors.
The move reflects ongoing jockeying ahead of elections in October. Prime Minister Bohuslav Sobotka took control of the Ministry of In- dustry and Trade earlier this month after sacking Jan Mladek for his failure to back efforts to put pressure on the country’s three major mobile operators. Parties across the political spectrum have recently taken up the cause of consumers, who have been paying some of the highest charges in Europe for years.
The probe will look into claims that O2 CR, T-Mobile, and Vodafone have colluded to keep charge high, and abused their dominant mar- ket position. The anti-monopoly office will carry out the investigation over the coming weeks.
A handful of Romanian serial entrepreneurs who have achieved success in the software field are now launching innovative hardware products that span areas from education to agriculture to medicine.
The strong local IT sector has also created a spawning ground for startups. Initially most of these were in software, which has already produced some stars like antivirus company Bitdefender. But, ac- cording to Tudor Stanciu of TechHub Bucharest, now a growing number of hardware startups have been launched, with most still at an early stage.
Regulator launches probe into Czech mobile operators
The new wave of Romanian IT start-ups