The Antitrust investigates a possible abuse of dominant position by Ferrovie dello Stato. The Authority communicates it in a note, emphasizing that the investigation refers to various markets: access to the national railway infrastructure, the management of advertising spaces within the main Italian stations and, above all, high speed. The Authority's decision came after a series of reports sent by competitor Ntv, which runs the Italo train.
According to the Antitrust, FS may have operated through its subsidiaries RFI, Trenitalia, Grandistazioni, Centostazioni and FS Sistemi Urbani to "slow down the entry into the high-speed rail services market by the new entrant operator Ntv, to the benefit of Trenitalia , to the detriment of the final consumer".
According to the complaints - the Authority continues - the group would have put into practice "a strategy aimed at hindering access to the railway infrastructure and making the offer of high-speed services by Ntv unprofitable: it would be margin compression behavior to the detriment of the only competitor in high-speed passenger transport and obstructive behavior in accessing the railway infrastructure (failure to assign train paths during peak hours and lack of access to the Milano San Rocco maintenance facility ); discrimination and obstruction of NTV activities in numerous stations belonging to the high-speed network; inefficiencies in the management of numerous stations served by Ntv. Such conduct, if verified, could have a decisive impact precisely in the most delicate phase of Ntv's start-up, significantly raising entry costs and favoring Trenitalia".
It had already arrived in recent days a first reply to Ntv's accusations by the managing director of FS, Mauro Moretti: “Our customers are already accusing us and Ntv of having too high prices – said the manager -. What do we do, do we increase them again? We have never seen a new entrant ask the incumbent to raise prices”.
