HP-2020-000016 - [2025] EWHC 1451 (Ch)

In assessing the relevance of barriers to entry to the assessment of MGA’s dominance in the present case, it is important to have regard to the relevant time period. The vigorously competitive nature of the toys market indicates that barriers to entry are not high, as such. It is common ground that the toys market is (as described above) characterised by continuous innovation and rapid product lifecycles. The question in the present case, however, is whether a new product could have entered the market (or expanded its existing market share) during the relevant time period so as to constrain the market power of MGA in relation the supply of LOL Surprise.

It is clear that there was no realistic possibility of any serious competition to LOL Surprise emerging during the second half of 2017 in response to the success of LOL, bearing in mind the lead times for the development and launch of a new toy. Mr Larian said that the development period for a toy usually takes between 16–18 months. The toy experts’ evidence was that this normally takes around 18 months for large global companies and around 12 months for smaller companies. Those estimates are consistent with the time taken for the development and launch of Worldeez, from initial designs in early 2016 to the launch in the summer of 2017. For a new product to hit the shelves in late 2017, therefore, its development would have needed to start the previous year. There was no prospect of that happening overnight, to enable a new product to enter the market quickly enough to pose an effective competitive constraint to LOL Surprise during that period. Nor was there any plausible suggestion that LOL Surprise was in fact constrained by the potential for repackaging of existing products.