competitionlaw

Introduction The interim orders recently handed down by the District Court of Milan in the Landoll v MECS case [1] and in the L’Oréal v IDS case [2] well illustrates the interaction between competition law and IP law where branded goods are marketed through selective distribution networks. Consistently with the settled EU case law, these orders indicate that violation from a third party of competition compliant selective distribution system may trigger the exemption from the exhaustion principle, allowing the supplier to enforce his trademark rights against the infringer. This note reviews the approach taken by the Court of Milan to determine when the supplier can successfully invoke trademark protection. The legal background The exhaustion principle lays down that the exclusive rights conferred on the trademark proprietor are exhausted in relation to the trademarked that have been place in the market in the EEA by the proprietor or hid consent [3] . Article 5(2) of the ...

The General Court of the EU has confirmed a previous decision of the EU Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO) rejecting an opposition against the registration of a composite EU trademark for a drug filed by a proprietor of earlier signs. The later mark was composed by a combination of word and figurative elements. Concurring with the EUIPO, the Court identified in the word element the distinctive dominant element of the later sought mark and ruled that the conflicting marks were not confusingly similar in spite of the common figurative elements they had in common. These figurative elements, indeed, constituted a common feature in the pharmaceutical sector. The paper is available here .

Upon the receipt of a complaint filed by Ama Spa (Ama), the in-house provider of waste management services for the municipality of Rome, the Italian Competition Authority (ICA) has opened an antitrust investigation against several operators (decision of 12 December 2018, case I831, Gare Ama Servizio smaltimento rifiuti ). The ICA feared that these firms had coordinated their behaviours in connection to two tender competitive procedures organized by Ama for procuring waste management services it required. Those tender procedures were launched in February and July 2018 and were aimed at awarding the public contracts for the provision of services for transport and disposal of waste and other materials produced by the plants run by Ama for the treatment of urban waste. The minimum prices quoted in the tender notices issued in February and July 2018 were higher than those applied by Ama in its previous procedures. These prices were also in line with the winning bids for the contracts f...

Applying its 2014 Aviation Guidelines, the European Commission ruled that operating aid granted by the German authorities to the airport of Erfurt-Weimer is compatible with the internal market (Decision of 27.06.2018, case SA.46945 - Germany Erfurt-Weimer Airport ). The notified national measures consisted of operating aid to the owner of the airport, FEG, aimed to ensure the existing capacity of the airport and sustainably secure its functioning. The aid was combined with the FEG’s new business strategy to develop higher traffic more dependent on charter flights and less on low cost carriers. The Commission considered the public support to FEG as State aid within the meaning of Article 107 TFEU and then considered whether it met the compatibility conditions in the 2014 Aviation Guidelines. a)The condition of contribution to a well-defined objective of common interest There was no other airport within the catchment area of the beneficiary (a travelling distance of 100 km or ...

What if a cartelist sells the business that was responsible for the competition infringement to a third party? Who should be liable for the infringement under EU competition law? The transferor or/and the transferee? The general rule for attribution of competition liability under EU law is the principle of personal liability whereby it is the transferor if it still exists to be liable for the infringement committed by the transferred business. The principle of personal liability does not apply in a situation where the transferor or the original infringer is still in existence though no longer operating in the relevant market affected by the cartel and is connected with the transferee by structural links. In this case, the competition liability is allocated to the transferee on the basis of the criterion of economic continuity as an exception to the principle of personal liability.   This approach was followed by the General Court of the EU (GC) in its judgment recently delivere...

The European Commission has recently approved operating aid granted by Germany to the manager of the Rostock airport (FRLG) on the basis of the compatibility conditions for operating aid in the 2014 Aviation Guidelines (Decision of 10.08.2018, case SA.49709 - Germany-Rostock Airport ). The notified national measures examined by the Commission was a non-repayable grant paid out in instalments covering the initial funding gap of the airport for the January 2018-April 2019 period. The Commission was of the view that the financial aid granted to FRLG amounted to State aid within the meaning of Article 107 TFEU and went on ascertaining whether the measure was compatible with the internal market meeting the compatibility conditions in the 2014 Aviation Guidelines. a)The condition of contribution to a well-defined objective of common interest Within the catchment area of the beneficiary (a travelling distance of 100 km or a travelling time of 60 minutes) there was no other airports o...

Introduction In Bornholm Airport [1] and Sumburgh Airport [2] , the European Commission has declared the PSO compensation granted, respectively, by the Danish and the Scottish authorities to the Bornholm Airport and the Sumburgh Airport to be compatible with the internal market. The Commission held that the national authorities had correctly qualified the aided airports as a genuine service of general economic interest (SGEI). And the public financial support granted to the airports met the compatibility conditions laid down by the SGEI Framework for the application of the SGEI exception in Article 106(2) TFEU. The facts of the case The Bornholm Airport is a small regional airport in the Danish island of Bornholm. Since 2014 an SGEI was entrusted to the airport by a contract concluded between the manager of the airport and the Danish authorities (the Entrustment Act). In 2016 the length of the entrustment was prolonged until 2020. The entrusted public tasks consisted of ...