On September 30, 2021, the Paris Court of Appeals upheld the FCA’s decision of April 24, 2020 (the “Decision”) to dismiss Molotov’s complaint regarding certain practices allegedly carried out by the two main private free-to-air television broadcasters in France, TF1 and M6. The Court held that, in line with the FCA’s findings, neither the evidence on file nor that adduced by the complainant were sufficient to establish any of the alleged infringements.
On 27 September 2021, the CAT issued its judgment on an application by the proposed Class Representative Mr Le Patourel, for a Collective Proceedings Order (CPO), and an application by BT (a) to strike out the claim pursuant to Rule 41(1) (b) of The Competition Appeal Tribunal Rules 2015 (the Rules) on the basis that there were no reasonable grounds for making it and/or (b) for summary judgment to dismiss the claim pursuant to Rule 43(1)(a) of the Rules on the basis that it had no real prospect of success.
On September 22, 2021, the General Court dismissed Altice’s appeal against two fines totalling €124.5 million imposed by the Commission in 2018 (the “Decision”)[1] for exercising control over PT Portugal before the acquisition had received merger control clearance, i.e., gun-jumping.
On September 22, 2021, the Cour de cassation upheld the 2018 judgement of the Paris Court of Appeals[1] which had confirmed the French Competition Authority (the “FCA”)’s infringement findings nonetheless reducing the amount of the financial penalties imposed on 21 companies in 2015.[2] This ruling closes a 13-year saga and provides a deep-dive analysis into the FCA’s fine calculation methodology.
In a decision issued on September 21, 2021,[1] the ICA fined Yellow Tax Multiservice S.r.l. (“Yellow Tax”) for non-compliance with a previous decision finding an infringement of Article 101 TFEU.
On September 21, 2021, the Milan Court of Appeal dismissed an appeal filed by Digital World Television (“DWT” or “Appellant”),[1] a company active in the distribution of audiovisual programs for adults, against the judgment delivered in 2019 by the lower court, which had also dismissed DWT’s claims for damages against Sky Italia (“Sky” or the “Defendant”) for an alleged abuse of dominant position and/or abuse of economic dependence.[2]
In March 2021, the Commission adopted a Communication (the “Guidance”)[1] on the application of the referral mechanism pursuant to Article 22 of the EU Merger Regulation (“EUMR”). The Guidance encourages national competition authorities (“NCAs”) to refer to the Commission certain transactions[2] that do not meet national merger control thresholds and would otherwise escape merger control review in the EU. The Commission had long discouraged the referral of such cases, considering that they were generally unlikely to have a significant impact on the internal market.
On 13 September 2021, the CAT published an application to commence collective proceedings under section 47B of the CA98 against Google alleging that it has abused dominant positions in breach of Article 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) and the Chapter 2 Prohibition of the Competition Act.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit recently issued a 2-1 decision in In re Vitamin C Antitrust Litig., dismissing antitrust claims against two Chinese pharmaceutical companies for reasons of international comity in a case that has lasted over 15 years.[1]
On September 15, 2021, the TAR Lazio annulled the ICA decision finding telecom operator Vodafone Italia S.p.A. (“Vodafone”) in breach of Article 102 TFEU for allegedly abusing its dominance in the market for Short Message Service (“SMS”) termination.[1]