As we previously announced, the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) issued a ruling in the CK Telecoms case last week, annulling the CK Telecoms judgment and referring the case back to the General Court (“Court”). This appeal was in response to the Court’s decision on May 28, 2020, invalidating the European Commission’s (“EC“) ban on the acquisition of Telefonica Europe Plc by Hutchison 3G UK Investments Ltd. In this article, we delve deeper into the background of this important case and the reasoning behind the CJEU ruling.

On 10 July 2023, the Agency for the Protection of Competition of Montenegro initiated a proceeding against the Association of Tourist Agencies of Montenegro for an alleged breach of the Competition Law.

Whereas competition law regimes around the globe struggle to find the right enforcement tools in a fast changing world, leading some jurisdictions to introduce revolutionary and highly sophisticated new intervention powers for competition authorities, Hungary is to experiment a simpler approach: an “increase of the hammer’s size”.

The Foreign Subsidies Regulation (FSR), one of the EU’s latest state aid instruments, entered into force on January 12, 2023. Now, after six months, it starts to apply. This regulation establishes rules to govern foreign subsidies that could distort the EU’s internal market. It empowers the European Commission (“Commission”) to investigate financial contributions provided by non-EU countries to companies operating in the EU. If these contributions are found to be distortive subsidies, the Commission can enforce corrective measures to remedy these effects.

In one of our previous texts (available here) we wrote about the connection between the protection of competition and protection of personal data, namely whether competition authorities may consider infringements of personal data in their investigations.

Former White & Case Counsel David Ilczyszyn has joined Rovenska & Partners in Prague as a Partner in early July 2023.