The Czech Office for the Protection of Competition (ÚOHS) has concluded its administrative proceedings regarding potential abuse of dominance by Alma Career in the online job advertising sector. This decision came after Alma Career presented commitments aimed at ensuring interoperability with competing services.

According to Kamil Nejezchleb, the vice-chairman of ÚOHS, this case exemplifies a typical situation involving a potential local digital dominant player whose actions could negatively impact the national market. The swift resolution through the proposed commitments is expected to open the market to more competition.

Alma Career, which operates well-known job portals jobs.cz and prace.cz, was under investigation for allegedly using its dominant position to create barriers for competitors. The authority examined whether Alma Career was discouraging advertisers from using rival services through pricing and technical obstacles.

During the proceedings, Alma Career submitted several proposals for commitments, which were subjected to market tests. The final commitments include the implementation of a two-way API that allows automated connections between competing Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) and Alma Career's job portals. This will enable job postings from competing ATS to be automatically placed on Alma Career's portals and allow responses from applicants to be sent back to the ATS.

Additionally, Alma Career committed to including the costs of developing and operating all APIs in the service fees for its job portals and ATS, thus avoiding separate charges for system integration. The ÚOHS believes these commitments will foster effective competition in the market, with the authority planning to continuously evaluate the effectiveness of the commitments made.