Exclusivity and Antitrust in Media Markets: The Case of Pay-TV in Europe

This paper challenges the traditional economic reasons supporting copyright licensing exclusivity in dealership agreements in media markets. It is argued how exclu- sive dealings in contents distributions acted in Europe as barriers to entry and/or raising rivals’ costs strategies against new Pay-TV operators. The removal of exclusive dealing clauses, as recently implemented by the European Commission, can be economically justi- fied when it generates positive impact on technological innovation and on the development of alternative transmission platforms for the delivery of multimedia services. Recent European Antitrust decisions seem to encourage a new ‘open access approach’ for premium contents distribution in media industry.