Antimonopoly Committee fines Ukraine's 2 largest pharma distributors UAH 4.8 bln

The Antimonopoly Committee of Ukraine (AMCU) has fined the country's two largest pharmaceutical distributors—BaDM LLC and the Ukrainian-Estonian joint venture Optima-Pharm Ltd – a combined UAH 4.8 billion for violating antitrust laws. The companies jointly held over 85% of the wholesale pharmaceutical market in 2022–2023.

Following a Thursday hearing, AMCU imposed a fine of more than UAH 2.374 billion on BaDM and more than UAH 2.432 billion on Optima-Pharm.

The penalties were issued for engaging in anticompetitive concerted actions. From March 2020 through December 2023, the companies simultaneously – or within days of each other – set identical or nearly identical retail prices for various drugs, including Spazmolgon and Evcazolin Aqua. These price alignments occurred without clear or transparent pricing mechanisms and lacked objective justification, according to AMCU's market analysis.

The regulator concluded that these practices restricted competition in the wholesale drug market. "Such use of anti-competitive market-capture methods led to a joint 17% increase in market share during the period under investigation, and to a sharp rise in net profits – 11-fold for Optima-Pharm and 3.5-fold for BaDM – compared to 2019," the Committee stated.