Bundeskartellamt prohibits the acquisition of the Italian CVS Ferrari group by Cargotec Corporation, Finland

On 24 August 2007 the Bundeskartellamt prohibited the acquisition of the Italian CVS Ferrari group by the Finnish Cargotec Corporation after talks on commitments had failed.

The planned merger had considerable effect on competition in Germany. The merger affects at least Europe-wide markets for machinery used to transport freight containers, i.e. which is bought by container ports, container rail terminals and other logistic services providers. A thorough examination was carried out of the markets for various machinery used to transport and stack containers such as so-called terminal tractors, container stackers, reach stackers and straddle carriers. The Bundeskartellamt’s investigations into the worldwide markets for these products proved successful.

With 60-70 per cent of the market share in the reach stacker market, CVS Ferrari and Cargotec, which operates in this market under the name Kalmar, would have been able to operate largely independently of other market participants. The remaining share of the market is distributed mainly among six competitors worldwide with correspondingly low market shares and production quantities.

The investigations also revealed that Cargotec and Fantuzzi (brand name: Noell) already have a dominant duopoly on the straddle carrier market with roughly equal market shares worldwide and European-wide. The acquisition of CVS Ferrari would have further strengthened this duopoly. This became especially clear from the fact that CVS Ferrari was planning a market entry into this segment. Prototypes of a straddle carrier were already in operation. The sale of CVS Ferrari to Cargotec would have eliminated this emerging competition from the outset.