EU Commissioner Margrethe Vestager. Photo: Shutterstock.com

The European Commission has fined NBCUniversal and other Comcast companies €14.3 million ($15.86 million) for illegally restricting cross-border sales of licensed merchandise, such as "Jurassic Park" toys, "Minions" school bags and "Big Lebowski" mugs.

The move is the EU's latest regulatory effort to enforce competition rules governing its single market.

"This is the third decision dealing with sales restrictions on licensed products sold across Europe," Margrethe Vestager, the EU's antitrust chief, said in a statement. "Universal's strategy to prevent traders from selling licensed products across customer groups and countries is against EU antitrust rules. Such sales restrictions undermine the very foundations of the EU Single Market and cannot be tolerated."

NBCUniversal's actions affected a wide range of products—from toys and sweets to clothes, mugs and household products, she said. Its contracts with licensees divided up the European single market and took away choice from consumers, which may have led to higher prices.

The decision to fine NBCUniversal and other companies belonging to the Comcast Corp. group follows an investigation the Commission began in June 2017 into conditions on sales of licensed merchandise.

The Commission found that the company imposed a range of measures that restricted merchants' ability to sell NBCUniversal's merchandise. They included a ban on online sales, clauses preventing merchants from selling goods outside of their designated market, and obligations to pay the company a share of sales from outside those markets.

The investigation found that these measures, which were in place for six-and-a-half years, carved up the EU's market into a series of smaller markets and hurt consumers by preventing them from being able to buy products at the lowest price.

The decision to fine NBCUniversal follows two earlier penalties on companies for similar offenses. Last year, the Commission fined Nike €12.5 million ($13.8 million) for restricting traders from selling licensed merchandise outside their home market. A few months later, it also fined Sanrio, the company that owns the Hello Kitty brand, €6.2 million ($6.8 million) for restricting cross-border sales of its products.

READ MORE:

EU Fines Nike $14.2M for Anti-Competitive Practices

EU Fines Hello Kitty Owner $7 million in Antitrust Ruling