The abuse of dominant position by undertakings on a relevant market constitutes an anticompetitive practice. However, the mere existence of an undertaking´s dominant position is not prohibited.
The Office intervenes, inter allia, also against undertakings, who abuse their dominant position. The purpose is to prevent the dominant companies from abusing their strong market position and the Office focuses on those kinds of conduct, which are the most harmful to consumers.
The cases of abuse of dominant position must be grounded on the theory of damage, which is an economically logical and a consistent explanation of how the dominant player‘s conduct negatively affects a consumer.
Dominant position as such is not prohibited. Undertakings naturally try to "win the market" by increasing efficiency, innovations, higher quality and lower prices. However, undertakings must not abuse their dominant position and thus restrict competition pressure and hinder the entry to the market for competitors.
The abuse of dominant position can take several forms. According to the Act on Protection of Competition (Article 5 Par. 3) the most frequent forms of abuse of dominant position are:
Further information on the abuse of dominant position can be found at Slovak version of the Office´s website.
slovenčina