Swiss Championship TV rights: the competition authority suggests a fine of €134m for Swisscom

The secretariat of Comco, the Swiss competition authority, has requested a fine of 143m Swiss francs (€134.3m on 29/07/2015) against the telecommunications group Swisscom, "due to alleged illegal conduct in marketing sports content via pay TV," on 23/07/2015.

The Swiss broadcaster CT Cinetrade AG, 49% owned by Swisscom, holds the domestic broadcasting rights to the Raiffeisen Super League and the Brack.ch Challenge League over the 2012-2017 period, for 28m Swiss francs (€26.3m) per season. The matches are broadcast live on the sports pay-TV channel Teleclub on pay-per-view on Teleclub Sport Live. Access to these channels is only available to Swisscom TV subscribers.

upc cablecom, Swisscom's main competitor on the Swiss pay-TV market, has argued since 2012 that sports content broadcast exclusively by Teleclub should be made available to other market participants. Comco opened its investigation into Swisscom in April 2013 and the final decision is expected in the first quarter of 2016. Swisscom will possibly then appeal to the Federal Administrative Court and then to the Swiss…