One win the ECA can claim now: Apple is playing ball with the competition watchdog’s demands to end “anti-competitive restrictions” in Egypt: Apple has agreed to amend its contracts with regional and Egypt-based distributors to remove clauses the Egyptian Competition Authority (ECA) had said violated antitrust regulations, ECA head Amir Nabil tells Masrawy. According to Nabil, the iPhone maker will remove clauses that bar its regional distributors from selling to its Egyptian distributors, which the market watchdog said has limited “intra-brand competition.” The changes will officially be put into effect and announced “soon,” Nabil said.

Background: The ECA had accused the company and some of its distributors in December of having violated antitrust regulations and ordered them to amend their contracts. An ECA probe at the time alleged that Apple barred its regional distributors from selling Apple products to Egypt-based distributors, and likewise barred Egyptian distributors from soliciting orders from regional distributors. These alleged actions, the ECA said, have caused the prices of Apple products in Egypt to rise more than those sold in comparable regional markets.