Region: European Union

The European Commission has updated its horizontal block exemption regulation and related guidelines to introduce new rules on sustainability agreements, prompting the Dutch competition watchdog to promise to bring its own sustainability guidelines in line with those of the agency.

01 June 2023

The EU’s General Court has dismissed a request by the European Commission to expedite Illumina’s appeal against the authority’s decision blocking its €5.9 billion acquisition of Grail.

31 May 2023

The EU’s General Court has rejected an application by Meta to stop the European Commission gaining access to company documents as part of its probe into the social media giant’s data practices and classified ad service.

24 May 2023

It is of the “utmost importance” for the future of state aid enforcement for the EU’s highest court to find that Apple owes Ireland over €13 billion in back taxes, the European Commission has argued, as the company insisted it is paying that tax in the US.

24 May 2023

The European Commission has closed its investigation into Alcogroup and its subsidiary Alcodis after failing to find sufficient evidence of their alleged participation in a cartel that rigged ethanol benchmarks.

23 May 2023

The Dutch antitrust authority was entitled to use secret phone recordings as evidence against three companies penalised for operating a cartel in the ship waste collection market, the European Court of Human Rights has ruled.

18 May 2023

The EU’s General Court has rejected attempts by 11 energy providers to annul the European Commission’s decision to approve one part of a €43 billion asset swap between two of Europe's biggest energy companies.

17 May 2023

The European Commission has approved oil and gas supplier MOL’s €301 million acquisition of rival OMV’s Slovenian subsidiary, subject to the companies selling 39 petrol stations to Shell.

17 May 2023

The European Commission has warned in a statement of objections that Korean Air’s proposed €1.31 billion purchase of rival Asiana Airlines could harm competition on air passenger routes between Korea and France, Germany, Italy and Spain.

17 May 2023

The European Commission has approved Microsoft’s $68.7 billion purchase of Activision Blizzard subject to cloud gaming licensing commitments, less than three weeks after the UK’s antitrust enforcer blocked the deal.

15 May 2023