On June 16, 2022, the Paris Court of Appeals (the “Court”) ruled that “decisions to protect the confidentiality of business secrets taken during the course of the investigation, which have not been challenged pursuant to Article R. 463-15 of the French Commercial Code, continue to bind the College when adopting and drafting the decision on the merits, otherwise such decisions would be deprived of any effectiveness” (the “Ruling”).[1]
On June 16, 2022, the French Competition Authority accepted binding commitments from Meta to introduce new policies enhancing advertising service providers’ access to its online advertising technologies.
On June 15, 2022, the General Court annulled the Commission’s decision and corresponding fine of €997 million in the Qualcomm case[1] due to procedural violations and a flawed substantive assessment. The General Court first found that the Commission had infringed Qualcomm’s rights of defense by failing to properly inform Qualcomm of meetings with third parties, and failing to hear Qualcomm on the consequences of substantial changes between the Statement of Objections (“SO”) and the final decision.
On June 1, 2022, the General Court heard arguments from Meta (previously Facebook) and the Commission in the case relating to Meta’s challenge of a Commission decision dated May 4, 2020, issued in the context of the Commission’s antitrust investigation into Facebook’s data- related practices.[1]
On May 17, 2022, the Italian Competition Authority (the “ICA”) imposed a fine of €3,501,020 on Leadiant Biosciences Ltd. and Essetfin S.p.A. (jointly “Leadiant”) for violating Article 102 TFEU by charging excessive prices for the sale to the Italian National Health System (the Sistema Sanitario Nazionale or “SSN”) of a drug used for the treatment of Cerebrotendinous xanthomatosis (“CTX”), a rare condition that affects the human body’s ability to metabolize cholesterols.[1]
The Italian Competition Authority (the “ICA”) fined ferry operator Caronte & Tourist (“C&T”) €3.7 million for having charged excessive prices on a ferry transportation route between Sicily and Calabria between 2017 and 2019 (the “Decision”).
On April 20, 2022, the Cour de cassation, the French Supreme Court, upheld the judgment of the First President of the Paris Court of Appeal validating dawn raids carried out by the French Competition Authority (“FCA”) in the wine and spirits sector in 2019. The Cour de cassation held that the scope of the French legal professional privilege (“LPP”) (secret professionnel) is not limited to attorney-client correspondence relating to conduct in the scope of the proceedings at stake but to any and all proceedings, even unrelated to competition law, where any outside lawyer is representing his or her client’s rights of defense.[1]
On April 11, 2022,[1] the TAR Lazio annulled an ICA decision finding that Telecom Italia S.p.A. (“Tim”) had infringed Article 102 TFEU for allegedly abusing its dominant position in the market for Short Message Service (“SMS”) termination (the “Decision”).[2] The Court followed the same reasoning as that set out in its September 2021 judgment, in which it overturned the €5.7 million fine imposed by the ICA on Vodafone Italia S.p.A. (“Vodafone”) in a parallel decision.
The Regional Administrative Court of Lazio, Italy (the “TAR Lazio”), annulled a decision by which in 2020 the Italian Competition Authority (the “ICA”) had imposed a fine on CTS Eventim-TicketOne Group (“TicketOne”) for allegedly abusing its dominant position in the Italian market for the sale of tickets for pop and rock music concerts.[1]
The Italian Competition Authority (the “ICA”) fined ferry operator Caronte & Tourist (“C&T”) €3.7 million for charging allegedly excessive prices on a ferry transportation route between Sicily and Calabria between 2017 and 2019 (the “Decision”).[1]