Parental Liability In Eu Competition Law

In enforcing EU competition law, the Commission employs a unique doctrine of parental antitrust liability: it imposes fines on the parent company of an infringing subsidiary in cases where the parent exercises decisive influence over the subsidiary's commercial policy. Critics of this contentious aspect of EU competition law believe that the doctrine is unfair, ineffective, obscure, disproportionate, contrary to due process, and based upon a dubious, if not extremely flimsy, justificatory foundation. Such criticism raises serious and unanswered questions about the legitimacy of the Commission's efforts to enforce competition law. Parental Liability in EU Competition Law: A Legitimacy-Focused Approach is the first monograph to be dedicated to this controversial topic. Written by Professor Peter Whelan, the book contends that, although the general concept of parental liability can be justified in principle, the current EU-level doctrine of parental antitrust liability in fact suffers from a distinct and problematic lack of legitimacy. More specifically, the said doctrine displays significant deficiencies with respect to effectiveness, fairness, and legality. Given this undesirable state of affairs, Parental Liability in EU Competition Law offers a fully-rationalised, reformulated approach to parental antitrust liability for EU competition law violations that is built around the notion of parental fault. That approach provides a solid normative account of how to impose parental antitrust liability in a manner that is theoretically robust, effective in practice, fair in substance, and legally sound.

This new Sixth Edition of a major work by the well-known competition law team at Van Bael & Bellis in Brussels brings the book up to date to take account of the many developments in the case law and relevant legislation that have occurred since the Fifth Edition in 2010. The authors have also taken the opportunity to write a much-extended chapter on private enforcement and a dedicated section on competition law in the pharmaceutical sector. As one would expect, the new edition continues to meet the challenge for businesses and their counsel, providing a thoroughly practical guide to the application of the EU competition rules. The critical commentary cuts through the theoretical underpinnings of EU competition law to expose its actual impact on business. In this comprehensive new edition, the authors examine such notable developments as the following: important rulings concerning the concept of a restriction by object under Article 101; the extensive case law in the field of cartels, including in relation to cartel facilitation and price signalling; important Article 102 rulings concerning pricing and exclusivity, including the Post Danmark and Intel judgments, as well as standard essential patents; the current block exemption and guidelines applicable to vertical agreements, including those applicable to the motor vehicle sector; developments concerning online distribution, including the Pierre Fabre and Coty rulings; the current guidelines and block exemptions in the field of horizontal cooperation, including the treatment of information exchange; the evolution of EU merger control, including court defeats suffered by the Commission and the case law on procedural infringements; the burgeoning case law related to pharmaceuticals, including concerning reverse payment settlements; the current technology transfer guidelines and block exemption; procedural developments, including in relation to the right to privacy, access to file, parental liability, fining methodology, inability to pay and hybrid settlements; the implementation of the Damages Directive and the first interpretative rulings. As a comprehensive, up-to-date and above all practical analysis of the EU competition rules as developed by the Commission and EU Courts, this authoritative new edition of a classic work stands alone. Like its predecessors, it will be of immeasurable value to both business persons and their legal advisers.

Contribution claims in antitrust are controversial and under-researched in the legal literature. This book provides the first comprehensive analysis of contribution claims in EU competition law. By drawing on the historical and current practice of EU and national courts, as well as national laws of major EU jurisdictions, it explains contribution claims in antitrust law in concrete and practical terms. It also provides much needed clarity on the relationship between competition law and joint and several liability, as well as guiding those concerned by contribution claims through the issues that are likely to arise. Topics examined include the requirements competition law sets for contribution claims; the criteria for dividing antitrust liability between individual co-infringers; the impact of EU Directive 2014/10; and whether liability sharing agreements can resolve the problems joint and several liability brings to EU competition law.

PT A presente dissertação centra-se no conceito de empresa no âmbito do direito da concorrência. Em particular, pretende-se responder à questão de saber como transpor este conceito, desenvolvido através de uma longa e labiríntica jurisprudência do Tribunal de Justiça da União Europeia (TJUE) a qual define empresa como qualquer entidade que exerça uma atividade económica, independentemente do seu estatuto jurídico -, do âmbito do public enforcement para o private enforcement. Numa primeira parte, procura-se esmiuçar a jurisprudência do TJUE, para entender a lógica subjacente à mesma e identificar os objetivos que a orientam. Pergunta-se, depois, em que medida esta pode ou deve ser aplicada no domínio das ações de responsabilidade por infrações jusconcorrenciais, as quais se têm tornado cada vez mais populares na sequência da entrada em vigor da Diretiva de Private Enforcement e das normas nacionais que a transpuseram. ENG Competition law has its own specific subjects, identified as undertakings by the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. The concept of undertaking has been progressively constructed by the case law of the Court of Justice over the last decades. The Court defines undertakings as economic units, regardless of their legal status. The Court’s disregard of legal personality in favour of economic reality has proved to be rather controversial, especially when used to attribute liability to a legal person other than the one that commits the antitrust infringement on the ground that they belong to the same economic unit or undertaking. The case law on the concept of undertaking was originally developed in the context of public enforcement but, with the increasing popularity of actions for damages for competition law infringements throughout Europe, many questions are emerging about how to transpose the concept to the realm of private enforcement. This book provides a structured analysis of EU case law on the concept of undertaking, as developed in public enforcement, and aims to provide answers to the challenges of applying the concept in actions for damages for competition law infringements.

In this book the author examines the compliance of the European anti-cartel enforcement procedure with the presumption of innocence under Article 6(2) of the European Convention on Human Rights.

Investigating, dissolving, and punishing cartels is increasingly a top priority for the European Commission and for national competition authorities. This work offers the most up-to-date and comprehensive examination of the substantive law and procedure of EU competition law as it applies to cartels as well as to other horizontal agreements. This unique work supplies the views of both private practitioners and public enforcers. The private practitioners discuss their day-to-day experience and share the insights which they believe their fellow-practitioners should be aware of. The public enforcers act in tandem with the private practitioners and add in their contribution the specific points of attention which they recommend practitioners should take into account. The work sets out the ways in which a cartel is defined and organized, how a cartel may be detected and investigated, the issue of liability for cartels (including parental and successor liability), the various sanctions available to investigating authorities, and the prospects for private enforcement and damages actions brought by victims of cartels. It addresses the procedure before the European Commission and the European Courts. Finally, the book deals with information exchanges (including an economic perspective), joint R&D agreements, specialization agreements and other common types of horizontal agreements like joint purchasing, joint selling and standardization. Containing practical advice for practitioners, overviews of the various stages of cartel enforcement, procedural checklists, analysis of the most recent legislation including the new EU damages directive, and written by authors with extensive experience in advising the Commission's legal service in relation to competition law, this is the most comprehensive text available on cartels in EU competition law.

What rules or principles govern the assessment of evidence in EU competition enforcement? This book offers, for the first time, a comprehensive academic study on the topic. Its aim is twofold. Firstly, it produces a typology of evidence standards in competition proceedings at the EU level, thereby systemising the guidance that is currently dispersed in the case-law of the EU Courts. Secondly, it examines the applicable evidence rules and principles with a view to better understanding their role in EU competition enforcement. In so doing, the book illustrates that evidence standards are not mere technicalities and their significance should not be underestimated. Rigorous and engaging, this work provides a much-needed analysis of a key question of EU competition enforcement.

The Research Handbook on Private Enforcement of Competition Law in the EU provides wide-ranging coverage of a key aspect of competition law enforcement which is undergoing constant and rapid growth in significance. The Handbook examines the private enforcement of competition law across the EU and beyond, shedding light on pertinent and underlying issues.