618 COMPETITION LAW IN TOURISM When analysing some examples of dominant clauses, we can find: • Unjustified application to third parties of dissimilar conditions for similar services, hence putting them in a severely disadvantageous situation against their competition. • Preventing the access of competitors to infrastructures essential for the production, distribution or merchandising of goods, services or productive factors. • Unjustifiably hinder market access to potential entrants. It is essential for the enforcement authority to establish the concept of “relevant market”, and in this regard, the law states: “To assess if certain practice does not affect conditions of competition, it is necessary to determine the relevant market where it takes place”. Another key element is the substitutability concept, that is, if the relevant market has substitute mechanisms differentiating or competing with the provided product or service to which it is possible to resort. In order to examine the practices, conducts or recommendations, it is necessary to take in consideration if they generate earnings due to economic efficiency, the possibility of obtaining them through alternative mechanisms and the benefits transferred to consumers. For this purpose, it is fundamental to establish the concept of economic concentration: “operations that imply a modification of the controlling structure of the companies involved by means of: fusion of companies, acquisition of shares, capital stocks or company holdings, purchase of commercial, industrial or civil premises, total or partial purchase of business assets and any other type of legal transaction involving the transfer of the control, in whole or in part, of economic units or companies”. This first summary intends to bring us closer to the following subject, as it relates to the distribution of a tourism product, which in this case is airfares, the changes in these traditional distribution systems and how these changes can be seen, considering the preceding rules, as economic concentration factors.
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