On 11 October 2007 the Bundeskartellamt searched two business sites of Bayer Vital GmbH in Leverkusen and Cologne. The company, part of the Bayer group, is responsible for the distribution of non-prescription pharmacy medicines (so-called OTC medicines). Since 2004 there has been no resale price maintenance for OTC medicines and the costs of these drugs are no longer reimbursed by the statutory health funds.

The reason for the search is that Bayer Vital is suspected of having influenced in an anticompetitive manner the resale prices of its products in pharmacies.

It had concluded so-called “target agreements” with several pharmacies for products supplied directly and via wholesalers. Apart from granting the usual conditions acceptable under competition law such as quantity discounts or discounts for achieving certain turnover goals, Bayer Vital is also suspected of having granted an additional discount of up to 3 per cent to those pharmacies mainly observing Bayer’s non-binding price recommendation and refraining from large and long-term price reductions for the respective Bayer products. This extent of influence by a producer on the sales price of a retailer (here: pharmacy) is prohibited under national and European competition law, a fine may be imposed.

After the publication of this information in the weekly journal “Stern“, representatives from Bayer contacted the Bundeskartellamt and offered their cooperation in the matter. Against this background the purpose of the search is only to secure the relevant documents as evidence. The Bundeskartellamt assumes that Bayer will hand these over of its own accord.