Poland’s Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) has imposed record-breaking fines totaling over 904 million PLN (approximately €210 million) on the country’s largest pharmaceutical wholesalers for participating in an illegal information-sharing cartel that spanned more than a decade.
The regulatory action targets Neuca, Farmacol, and Polska Grupa Farmaceutyczna (PGF), entities that collectively control over 70 percent of the Polish wholesale drug market. According to UOKiK, the companies abused IT infrastructure within their pharmacy partner programs to exchange sensitive, non-public data regarding current drug prices, discounts, and trade terms offered to individual pharmacies. Starting in 2015, this systematic access to detailed market information allowed the distributors to avoid head-to-head price competition, coordinate pricing strategies, and preserve high profit margins rather than offering better conditions to buyers.
The watchdog emphasized that the anti-competitive scheme directly harmed retail pharmacies and ultimately inflated prescription costs for consumers at the counter. Instead of competing through lower prices or better service terms, the participants adjusted their quotes to match rivals, explicitly seeking to prevent price wars in the supply chain.
Individual penalties include nearly 499 million PLN (€116 million) for Neuca, over 404 million PLN (€94 million) across Farmacol group entities, and smaller fines for subsidiary operations. PGF escaped financial sanctions entirely by applying for leniency, providing key evidence gathered during searches, and cooperating fully throughout the investigation.
The European Commission issued a positive opinion supporting UOKiK’s legal classification and factual findings. The decision is not yet final, and the penalized wholesalers retain the right to appeal the antitrust ruling in court.
