Canal+ loses BeIN competition case
June 19, 2014
France’s Canal+ has lost its unfair competition claim against Al Jazeera’s BeIN Sports. The commercial court threw out Canal+’s suit where the pay TV operator had claimed €293 million in damages for unfair competition. Canal+ was ordered to pay legal costs of €100,000.
The judges ruled that Canal+ had failed to make their case and that BeIN Sports is in a dominant position because of the financial muscle at its disposal, the court said the same could be said of Canal+’s owner Vivendi.
The court also ruled that Canal+ had failed to show that the subscription price charged by its rival is abnormally low. The judges also said that there was no evidence that the entry of BeIN Sports in the market had an inflationary effect on the cost of sports rights and noted that Canal+ had paid more than its rival to secure Ligue 1 football rights.