News

DCC acquisition provisionally cleared

DCC Energy UK’s acquisition of several heating and transport fuel distribution businesses, including Butler Fuels, has been provisionally cleared by the Competition Commission (CC).
The case was referred by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) in April, and the final report is expected to be published by the CC by 18 September 2012.
DCC bought the businesses in September 2011 from Rontec LLP, which had previously bought them from Total Downstream UK in June 2011.
In its findings, the CC has provisionally stated that customers supplied by the various businesses would not be adversely affected by a decrease in competition, as a result of the deal.
Chairman of the DCC/Rontec Inquiry Group and CC deputy chairman, Simon Polito, commented: “Central to our decision has been the effect on customers requiring small-scale deliveries across a number of sites, and whether they would be likely to use a number of different suppliers as an alternative to a single supplier with nationwide coverage. We found that these customers are generally quite sophisticated in their purchasing practices. A number of them already multi-source and are also prepared to switch in response to a price increase, so we decided the impact of the merger on these customers would be small.”
http://www.competition-commission.org.uk/