Category Archives: Abuse of dominance

Case T-355/13 easyJet Airline Co. Ltd. v Commission: Complaints, Abuse and National Competition Authority

The judgment of the General Court of 21 January 2015 in EasyJet Airline Co. Ltd. v Commission, T-355/13, EU:T:2015:36, contains some interesting things about:

  • the Commission’s discretion to reject complains about breaches of the competition rules and judicial review of that discretion on the one hand and how the Commission and
  • how national competition authorities interact in the framework of the “European Competition Network” on the other.

A few facts first.

Continue reading

Case C-295 P Telefónica SA v Commission: the EU judicature’s unlimited jurisdiction in competition cases

The Court of Justice (“CoJ”) handed down its judgment in a very interesting abuse of dominance case, namely Case C-295/12 P Telefónica SA v Commission on 10 July 2014. The judgment deals with many interesting 102 TFEU related issues; so several posts will follow. In this post though, I would like to touch upon the very well-structured reiteration of the previous case-law of the CoJ regarding the EU judicature’s obligation to carry out a review exercising its powers of unlimited jurisdiction, basically Case C-386/10 P Chalkor v Commission, Case C-272/09 P KME v Commission and Case C-501/11 P Schinlder Holding  v Commission. Continue reading

Case T-286/09 Intel : Characterisation of rebates

It is time to get deeper into the frenzy of the judgment in Case T-286/09 Intel which we summarised very quickly here in our first post on the case. Let us start by looking at the characterisation of rebate schemes by the General Court.

The big question which is on lots of people’s minds is where the judgment leaves the more “economic approach” adumbrated by the Commission in its Guidance on the Commission’s enforcement priorities in applying Article 82 [EC] to abusive exclusionary conduct by dominant undertakings (OJ 2009 C 45 p. 7; ‘the Article 82 Guidance’) ?

The Court answers that question in two parts. Continue reading

Case T-286/09 Intel v Commission: Exclusivity rebates and abuse of a dominant position

Right then, folks, brace yourselves…. The much awaited judgment of the General Court in Case T-286/09 Intel v Commission EU:T:2014:472 came out today.

It’s a whopper ! 255 pages. Summarising it is reminds me of Monty Python’s sketch of the “Summarising Proust Competition“. The Court has taken the trouble to publish extracts or highlights. But even the abridged version is quite long.

There’s a lot in the judgment: substantive law, procedure, evidence, international jurisdiction….Far too much to deal with in a single post so we’ll have several instalments. Today’s will be just a basic summary and introduction.

In short, the Commission wins. And wins everything.  Continue reading