In accordance with the EU Merger Regulation, on 30 March 2022 the Commission approved the acquisition of several companies organised under the Senator International (“Senator”) group by A.P. Møller-Mærsk A/S Group (“APMM”).

Both undertakings concerned are all active on a global level. More particularly, Senator is a family-owned company headquartered in Germany and primarily specialized in air and ocean freight forwarding, shipping and logistics. APMM, instead, is an integrated transport and logistics company headquartered in Copenhagen and offering services comprising, amongst the others, container liner shipping, inland transportation and supply chain management services. Following the acquisition, APMM will acquire the shares and assets of Senator International Spedition GmbH(“SI GmbH”), Senator International Holding LLC (“SI LLC”) and Senator International Freight Forwarding LLC (“FF LLC”), as well as their subsidiaries and affiliated companies. 

According to the Commission the acquisition, as originally notified on 22 February 2022, would raise no competition concerns given the very limited horizontal overlaps between the companies’ activities in the markets for air freight forwarding and contract logistics services. Furthermore, neither APMM nor Senator would have the ability or the incentives to engage in foreclosure practices.

Marco Stillo