Italy’s competition authority announced on Tuesday that it has imposed a fine exceeding 255 million euros (300 million dollars) on the low-cost airline Ryanair, accusing it of exploiting its dominance to prevent travel agencies from accessing its services.
This move comes one day after an antitrust authority imposed a 98 million euro fine on the American giant Apple, also accusing it of exploiting its dominance in the smartphone applications market.
The Italian competition authority stated that Ryanair followed an “abusive strategy” that made it difficult for travel agencies to combine flights from the Irish company with other services between 2023 and at least April 2025.
Undermining agencies’ ability to purchase Ryanair flights
The authority reported that the company’s strategy aimed to “prevent, hinder, complicate, or make the process of travel agencies purchasing Ryanair flights via the company’s website more costly (economically or technically), whether in addition to flights offered by other airlines or other travel and insurance services.”
It continued: “These practices undermined the agencies’ ability to purchase Ryanair flights and combine them with flights from other airlines and/or additional travel services, thereby reducing direct and indirect competition among agencies.”
Italy had previously imposed a three million euro fine on Ryanair in 2019 for its policy of forcing passengers to pay for cabin baggage. An administrative court ultimately decided to overturn that fine.
