The investigation which reviewed the competitive problems stemming from the joint international distribution of Turkish TV shows by MED YAPIM and AY YAPIM through MADD, and the exchange of competitive sensitive information between the undertakings in terms of Article 4 of the Act no 4054 has been concluded by the Board under the procedures of commitment and settlement.

The settlement process resulted in imposing administrative fines of 75,790,035.98 TL and 47,811,989.24 TL on AY YAPIM and MED YAPIM, respectively, for violating Article 4 of the aforementioned Act by sharing competitively sensitive information on employee wages.

Moreover, with regard to the competitive issues stemming from the joint international distribution of Turkish TV shows produced by MED YAPIM and AY YAPIM through MADD, the Board accepted the structural and behavioral commitments submitted by the parties and rendered them binding. 

Within that framework, as part of the structural commitments submitted by MED YAPIM, AY YAPIM and MADD, the undertakings committed to dissolve MADD, which was assessed as potentially constituting an anti-competitive agreement under Article 4 of the relevant Act, and not to engage in any further joint distribution activities.

In addition to this structural commitment, the other behavioral commitments submitted by the parties are as follows:

• When conducting their own distribution activities, AY YAPIM and MED YAPIM will distribute only the content for which they or the economic unity they belong to hold the rights; and in cases where they do not conduct their own distribution activities, they will ensure the distribution of the content they produce through independent distributors;
• Except for situations of being within the same economic unity, where AY YAPIM and MED YAPIM carry out both production and distribution activities, they will not have joint shareholders, managers, or employees with another undertaking that conducts production and distribution activities together; nor will they possess instruments that provide joint control;
• AY YAPIM and MED YAPIM will not enter into exclusive agreements with national television channels, actors, casting agencies/managers or casting directors, scriptwriters, directors, or independent distributors;
• In their international distribution agreements concluded with end buyers including, in particular, international television channels, AY YAPIM and MED YAPIM will not impose exclusivity clauses that would prevent such buyers from entering into agreements with other producers or distributors from Türkiye;
• Series and other content will be offered to international customers in an open, transparent, and unbundlable manner, preserving the possibility for each piece of content to be sold individually.

The commitments above have been made indefinitely binding for the undertakings concerned, and the investigation regarding the joint distribution of TV series has been terminated accordingly.