Tag: Unfair Methods of Competition

Drug Testing Compliance Group, LLC, agreed to settle charges that it illegally invited one of its competitors to enter into a customer allocation agreement in violation of Section 5 of the FTC Act.  The proposed settlement prohibits DTC Group from communicating with competitors about rates or prices (although it does not bar public posting of rates). The settlement also prohibits the company from soliciting, entering into, or maintaining an agreement with any competitor to divide markets, allocate customers, or fix prices; and from urging any competitor to raise, fix, or maintain prices, or to limit or reduce service.

Step N Grip, LLC, which sells products online to keep rugs from curling at the edges, settled charges that it invited its closest competitor to fix and raise prices for their competing rug devices, in violation of Section 5 of the FTC Act. Under the settlement agreement, Step N Grip is required to stop communicating with its competitors about prices. It is also barred from entering into, participating in, inviting, or soliciting an agreement with any competitor to divide markets, to allocate customers, or to fix prices; and from urging any competitor to raise, fix, or maintain its price or rate levels or limit or reduce service. The order is in effect for 20 years.

On 4/8/2013, Bosley, Inc., the nation’s largest manager of medical/surgical hair restoration procedures, settled Federal Trade Commission charges that it illegally exchanged competitively sensitive, nonpublic information about its business practices with one of its competitors, HC (USA), Inc., commonly known as Hair Club, in violation of Section 5 of the FTC Act. In settling the FTC’s charges, Bosley has agreed not to communicate such information in the future, and will institute an antitrust compliance program. The FTC alleged that for at least the past four years, Bosley exchanged competitively sensitive, nonpublic information about its business operations with Hair Club. The information exchanged by the companies’ CEOs included details about future product offerings, surgical hair transplantation price floors and discounts, plans for business expansion and contraction, and current business operations and performance.

The FTC approved an order settling charges that Robert Bosch GmbH’s acquisition of the SPX Service Solutions business of SPX Corporation would have given it a virtual monopoly in the market for air conditioning recycling, recovery, and recharge devices for vehicles. Under a settlement with the FTC, Bosch agreed to sell its automotive air conditioner repair equipment business, including RTI Technologies, Inc., to automotive equipment manufacturer, Mahle Clevite, Inc. Bosch also agreed to resolve allegations that, before its acquisition by Bosch, SPX harmed competition in the market for this equipment by reneging on a commitment to license key, standard-essential patents (SEPs) on fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms. The FTC alleged that SPX reneged on its obligation to license on FRAND terms by seeking injunctions against willing licensees of those patents. Bosch has agreed to abandon these claims for injunctive relief. 

U-Haul International, Inc. and its parent company settled FTC charges that they violated Section 5 of the FTC Act by inviting U-Haul’s closest competitor, Avis Budget Group, Inc., to collude on prices for truck rentals. U-Haul and Budget control more than 70 percent of the “do-it-yourself” one-way truck rental business in the United States. The FTC’s complaint alleges that on several occasions between 2006 and 2008, U-Haul tried to increase rates for one-way truck rentals by privately and publicly communicating with Budget, the second-largest truck rental company in the United States. The proposed settlement order against U-Haul and its parent company AMERCO bars them from inviting a competitor to divide markets, allocate customers, or fix prices, as well as participating in, maintaining, organizing, implementing, enforcing, offering, or soliciting any other company to engage in such conduct.