Can my Romanian SME sue a dominant supplier for refusing to sell unless we accept exclusivity?

Yes, potentially. A supplier cannot lawfully use exclusivity demands to foreclose you from buying from competitors if that conduct leads to an anti-competitive agreement or an abuse of dominance, especially where it creates input shortages and pushes you out of downstream contracts. Under EU and Romanian competition rules, exclusivity and refusal-to-supply scenarios are assessed very factually, so the key issue is market power, the actual terms imposed, and the effect on your business.

From an evidence standpoint, you should keep all written communications from the supplier referring to exclusivity or threats to stop deliveries; the draft contract or clause they want signed; purchase history showing your prior sourcing pattern; proof of the supplier’s importance in the relevant input market; evidence of shortages, delayed production, lost sales, penalties, or lost customers; and any documents showing you tried to mitigate the damage by sourcing elsewhere.

As for damages, a court claim is possible in principle, but it is not enough to show commercial pressure. EU rules expressly allow damages actions for competition-law infringements, but these claims usually require careful market definition, concrete evidence, and a robust loss calculation.

Given the stakes, we would first need to assess whether this is an exclusivity restriction in a vertical relationship, an abuse of dominant position, or both, and then decide whether the better route is an urgent complaint to the competition authority, a damages action, interim relief, or a combined strategy. For a reliable view, we should review the supplier’s clause, your supply dependence, and the losses already materialising.