Student at Maharashtra National Law University, Mumbai, India
The research paper discusses the concept of Hub and Spoke Cartel, which is not so familiarized and well-known concept under the Indian Competition Law, until now after its recognition by the Competition Amendment Act, 2023. This is particularly a form of collusion scheme which includes agreement both at the vertical and horizontal level that leads into producing anti-competitive effect on the market. As a distinctive feature from a normal or conventional form of cartelization, it includes a ‘hub’ the vertical level who deals with the major aspects of cartelization and act as a facilitator in effecting a tacit horizontal agreement, the connecting ‘rim’, among the competitors at the horizontal level acting as ‘spokes’. This research paper discusses about the major characteristics and elements of a Hub and Spokes Cartel (H&S Cartel) and how it differs from a normal cartel. It also gives a brief mention about the objective of an H&S Cartel and what purpose do they serve. The paper also deals with distinguishing HS Cartel from RPM (resale price maintenance). Further it discusses about the scheme of functioning of H&S Cartel in the digital sector through online platform operators and price algorithms. Finally the paper discusses about some major case laws in other jurisdictions analyzing the concept of such cartels.
Research Paper
International Journal of Law Management and Humanities, Volume 6, Issue 4, Page 860 - 871
DOI: https://doij.org/10.10000/IJLMH.115419This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution -NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits remixing, adapting, and building upon the work for non-commercial use, provided the original work is properly cited.
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