The Regional Court of Munich has ruled against ARTE Deutschland TV, finding the broadcaster guilty of anti-competitive discrimination and ordering it to pay damages to Rosenheim-based telecommunications company komro.
In its decision on 16 July 2025, the court determined that ARTE must pay komro the same carriage fees per household for all units served in 2015 as it paid to cable operator Unitymedia Kabel BW. Additionally, ARTE is required to disclose the carriage fees it has paid or owes to Vodafone or its predecessors between 1 January 2016 and 31 December 2021 (case number 37 O 16941/23). Once this information is provided, the court will decide on damages for the years 2016 to 2021. The ruling is not yet legally binding.
For years, ARTE has resisted paying carriage fees to network operators represented by cable association DNMG, particularly komro. DNMG supports its members in pursuing legal claims when necessary. Following a 2021 ruling by Germany’s Federal Court of Justice (BGH) stating that smaller cable operators must be treated equally regarding carriage fees, DNMG successfully negotiated carriage fee agreements with public broadcasters ZDF and ARD. ARTE, however, remained defiant, prompting over 100 additional lawsuits across Germany in Kiel, Hamburg, Potsdam, Mannheim and Munich.
The Munich court decision marks the first ruling in this series of proceedings against ARTE. DNMG network operators are represented by a competition law team from CMS Hasche Sigle.
ARTE argued that it does not engage in market activity, does not seek carriage services, and that its primary mission is cultural exchange rather than national public service. It also claimed to have no commercial interest in signal distribution, as its operations are funded through broadcasting fees.
The court dismissed these arguments, stating that producing and broadcasting content by publicly funded broadcasters is not a sovereign task exempt from market rules. On the contrary, because ARTE is financed by licence fee payers, there is a legitimate expectation that its programmes are widely distributed. The court deemed ARTE’s unequal treatment in paying carriage fees to be anti-competitive discrimination within the German cable transmission market.
Ingo Schuchert, managing director of DNMG and responsible for negotiations, criticised ARTE’s approach: “It feels Kafkaesque. The Federal Court of Justice has repeatedly ruled in favour of the network operators. ARD and ZDF, ARTE’s German shareholders, have already reached settlements with DNMG. Why ARTE continues these costly legal disputes – some ongoing since 2012 – at the expense of licence fee payers is incomprehensible. We hope this Munich ruling will lead ARTE to agree on fair and non-discriminatory terms to resolve these cases.”
