European Law

Inside Stibbe - Brussels, 9 December 2019 – Stibbe welcomes EU law, competition, and regulated markets lawyer Sophie Van Besien as a new partner in its Brussels office. Her expertise will enhance Stibbe’s service offering in the Benelux and contribute to the further development of its EU/competition and regulated markets practice. Sophie joins Stibbe on 9 December 2019.

Short Reads - Big tech firms, whether entering or already active on payments markets, are under scrutiny. PSD2 has opened up the payments markets to non-bank companies, but this comes with both risks and opportunities. EU regulators are examining anticompetitive risks, for example the possibility of leveraging a strong position in one market into another market. Competition, innovation, privacy and security for financial transactions will all be hot topics as scrutiny increases on providers of payment services.

Short Reads - The Court of Appeal of Arnhem – Leeuwarden recently applied the competition law notion of an 'undertaking' in a civil damages suit between TenneT and an entity belonging to the Alstom group of companies. The Court of Appeal ruled that Cogelex formed a single undertaking with its 48% shareholder Alstom. Cogelex could therefore be held liable under civil law for the competition law infringement of its 48% parent company. The Court of Appeal based its decision on a broad application of the ECJ’s reasoning in its Skanska judgment of 14 March 2019.

Short Reads - The European Court of Justice recently ruled that the European Commission does not have to take additional precautionary measures to respect the right of legal professional privilege when conducting a new dawn raid at the same company. Companies are well-advised to mark clearly all communications covered by legal privilege as 'privileged and confidential' and to keep all privileged communication separate from other communication.

Inside Stibbe - Brussel, 9 december 2019 – Stibbe verwelkomt Sophie Van Besien, gespecialiseerd in Europees recht, mededingingsrecht en gereguleerde markten, als nieuwe vennote in het Brusselse kantoor. Sophie’s expertise zal Stibbe’s dienstverlening in de Benelux versterken en bijdragen aan de verdere ontwikkeling van zijn EU/competition en regulated markets praktijk. Sophie vervoegt Stibbe op 9 december 2019.

Short Reads - The Stibbe Annual Competition Update will take place on 23 January 2020 at our offices in Amsterdam.

Articles - The European Commission recently issued guidance on the participation of third country bidders in public procurement. It clarified bids may be excluded, but remains silent on whether they may be accepted and under which conditions. The Commission is of the opinion that contracting authorities or entities can exclude bids if no access is secured. However, it does not discuss if and under which conditions contracting authorities or entities can allow foreign bids if no access is secured.

Short Reads - Benelux competition authorities have published a joint memorandum on how best to keep up with challenges in fast-moving digital markets. As well as calling on the European Commission to issue an economic study on digital mergers, the memorandum calls for an ex ante intervention tool to fill the gap between interim measures and ex post enforcement. This tool would pre-emptively impose behavioural remedies on digital gatekeepers without first having to establish an actual competition law infringement.