There’s a lot in the Court of Justice’s judgment of 19 March 2015 in Case C-286/13 P Dole Food Company and Dole Fresh Fruit Europe v Commission, EU:C:2015:184. There are some neat procedural points, interesting things on the calculation of competition fines and quite a section on what constitutes a restriction of competition “by object”.
It will take several posts to cover all those points so I’ll just deal with the substantive, “restriction by object” point.
A while ago on 16 September 2014, Maria wrote a post on Case C- 67/13 P Groupement des cartes bancaires (“CB”) v European Commission. Many wondered whether that judgment would substantially change the understanding of restrictions of competition “by object” and “by effect”. A look at the Court’s judgment in Case C-286/13 P leads to the conclusion that rumours of a substantial change are either premature or unfounded.
EU litigation 