Anti-Competitive Conduct
Federal and state antitrust laws prohibit anticompetitive behavior and unfair business practices that harm other businesses and consumers.
Examples of these unlawful, anticompetitive practices include:
- Price Fixing – an agreement among competitors to raise, fix, or otherwise maintain the price at which their goods or services are sold.
- Pay-for-Delay – an agreement between a brand drug manufacturer and a would-be generic competitor to delay the release of a generic version of the branded drug, depriving consumers of lower-priced generics.
- Bid-Rigging – competitors agree in advance who will submit the winning bid during a competitive bidding process. As with price fixing, it is not necessary that all bidders participate in the conspiracy.
- Monopolization – one or more persons or companies totally dominates an economic market.
- Unfair Competition – an attempt to gain unfair competitive advantage through false, fraudulent, or unethical commercial conduct.
- Market Division – an agreement between competitors not to compete within each other’s geographic territories.
- Group Boycotts – two or more competitors agree not to do business with a specific person or company.
- Exclusive Dealing Arrangements – an agreement that a buyer will only buy exclusively from the supplier.
- Price Discrimination – charging different prices to similarly situated buyers. Certain types of price discrimination may be illegal under the Robinson-Patman Act.
- Tying – when a company makes the purchase of an item conditioned on buying a second item.