Chillin'Competition

Dear Santa,

I have been very brave this year. So here’s my Xmas list for 2013:

• A Commission Article 10 inapplicability decision;
• An article 102 TFEU collective dominance case;
• A judgment quashing a Commission decision under Article 102 TFEU;
• Many, very many rulings in the spirit of Post Danmark;
• No ruling in the spirit of TeliaSonera;
• A recognition that dominant firm conduct can be de minimis, and in turn presumably lawful;
• Individual penalties for EU competition law infringements;
• Less articles on Article 6 ECHR and, more generally, on procedural issues;
• The clear recognition that the “restriction by object” concept is probabilistic in nature (i.e. a restriction by object means nothing but conduct which will very likely exert anticompetitive effects);
• A guidance letter from the Commission;
• DG COMP to take a few complaints lodged by SMEs, and not only open investigations when Google, Microsoft, Samsung or Apple are concerned;
• Shorter judgments;
• Judgments in understandable English (or French);
• A recognition that coordination theories of harm related to horizontal cooperation agreements should be assessed on the basis of the Airtours standard;
• Impact studies in competition cases (on this, am not so sure actually);
• A flexible traineeship at DG COMP 🙂

Thanks Santa. You can deliver all this throughout 2013, not need to bring everything tomorrow.

Nicolas

PS: to all readers, a terrific Xmas