Overview   Cartels

The European Commission has fined three automotive starter battery manufacturers, Exide, FET (including its predecessor Elettra) and Rombat, as well as the trade association EUROBAT, a total of around €72 million for participating in a long-running cartel concerning automotive starter batteries, together with Clarios (formerly JC Autobatterie), in breach of EU antitrust rules. This cartel restricted competition and may have led to higher prices for the manufacturing of cars and trucks in Europe.

The Commission takes note of today’s judgment of the General Court dismissing Bategu’s action for annulment against a Commission decision adopted on 15 Februrary 2023 reject-ing a complaint.
In its decision, the Commission had rejected Bategu’s claims that rolling stock original equipment manufacturers coordinated their behaviour with the purpose of boycotting Bategu’s products and delaying the implementation of European fire protection standard EN 45545-2. The Commission also rejected the claim that the original equipment manufacturers abused their collective dominant position to do the same.

The European Commission has opened a formal antitrust investigation to assess whether Deutsche Börse and Nasdaq have breached EU competition rules by coordinating their conduct in the sector for listing, trading and clearing of financial derivatives in the European Economic Area. Nasdaq and Deutsche Börse are financial services providers operating large exchanges in the financial derivatives sector.

The Commission takes note of today’s preliminary ruling of the Court of Justice in Case C 2/23.
In particular, the Court held that EU law does not preclude mechanisms for administrative assistance that would require a national competition authority to transmit its files, including leniency statements and settlement submissions and the information obtained from them, to the national criminal authorities, upon request, provided that such mechanisms do not jeopardize the effectiveness of leniency programs and settlement procedures as tools to detect and establish competition law infringements.
The Court however clarified that once leniency statements and settlement submissions end up in criminal files, pursuant to Article 31(3) of the ECN+ Directive, access to these statements and submissions can only be granted to persons under investigation for the purposes of exercising their rights of defence, in particular where complaints against those persons are based on information contained therein. Access cannot be granted to other parties, in particular injured parties who seek compensation for the harm caused by the competition law infringement. The Court further clarified that this access limitation does not extend to documents and information provided in order to explain, specify in detail and prove the content of leniency statements or settlement submissions.
Today’s preliminary ruling by the Court of Justice importantly clarifies the scope of the protection afforded by Union competition law to leniency statements and settlement submissions. It contributes to the protection of leniency programmes which are a key tool for the effective enforcement of competition law, while allowing for administrative assistance between national law enforcement and regulatory authorities and guaranteeing the rights of defence of defendants in proceedings that do not relate to the enforcement of competition law.

The Commission takes note of the judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union dismissing Teva’s and Cephalon’s appeal against the 2023 judgment of the General Court. In its 2023 judgment, the General Court dismissed an action for annulment against a 2020 Commission decision.
In its 2020 decision, the Commission imposed a total fine of around €60.5 million on Teva and Cephalon for agreeing to delay the market entry of a generic version of Cephalon's drug for sleep disorders, modafinil, after Cephalon's main patent had expired.
Today’s judgment by the Court of Justice ultimately upholds the Commission’s 2020 decision.

The European Commission is carrying out unannounced inspections at the premises of several companies active in the ski equipment sector.
The Commission has concerns that the inspected companies may have violated EU antitrust rules that prohibit cartels and restrictive business practices (Article 101 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union).

The Commission takes note of the judgment of the General Court. In its judgment, the General Court dismissed Red Bull’s appeal against a 2023 Commission decision ordering an inspection at several of Red Bull’s premises.
The judgment confirms that the Commission decision was well founded, that it was adopted on the basis of sufficient indicia of anticompetitive behaviour, and that it was neither arbitrary nor disproportionate.
In addition, the judgment confirms that the manner in which inspections were carried had no bearing on the legality of the inspection decision.

The European Commission has fined fashion companies Gucci, Chloé and Loewe for fixing resale prices, in breach of EU competition rules. The Commission's investigation revealed that the three companies restricted the ability of the independent third-party retailers they work with to set their own online and offline retail prices for products designed and sold by Gucci, Chloé and Loewe under their respective brand names. This kind of anticompetitive behaviour increases prices and reduces choice for consumers.
See also COMP Flash.

The Commission takes note of the judgment of the General Court. In its judgment, the General Court dismissed Laudamotion’s appeal against a 2023 Commission decision.
In its 2023 decision, the Commission rejected Laudamotion’s complaint against Lufthansa, claiming that Lufthansa breached Article 101 of the Functioning of the European Union (“TFEU”) by entering into an agreement with now-bankrupt Air Berlin in 2016.
The General Court fully upheld the Commission’s assessment and decision.

DG COMP is working on a follow-up to the comprehensive 2024 report: “Protecting competition in a changing world: Evidence on the evolution of competition in the EU during the past 25 years”. This report identified important changes over the past 25 years in the competitive environment (rising concentration, markups and profits, declining business dynamism). It also identified a number of likely structural and institutional drivers of those changes (rise of intangible investments, globalisation, regulation and M&A). The 2024 report did however not explore whether changes in management practices (strategies and tactics) may also have contributed to some of the detected trends.
The present study seeks to address this gap by exploring whether the rise of modern pricing and revenue management strategies and tactics may have partly contributed to some of the observed changes in the competitive environment, inter alia by increasing the risk of collusion.

The European Commission has today launched a public consultation, inviting all interested parties to comment on drafts of a revised Technology Transfer Block Exemption Regulation (‘TTBER') and revised Guidelines on the application of Article 101 of the Treaty to technology transfer agreements.

On 11 September 2025, the Commission published drafts of the revised Technology Transfer Block Exemption Regulation (TTBER) and the Technology Transfer Guidelines for stakeholder comments. 
Through the consultation, the Commission aims to gather stakeholder feedback on the changes it proposes to address the issues identified in the evaluation phase. Since the launch of the impact assessment, the Commission has gathered further evidence on possible changes to the current rules. This evidence has been taken into account in the preparation of the draft revised TTBER and Guidelines.
See also the European Commission's press release.

The European Commission has fined Eurofield SAS and Unanime Sport SAS, the ultimate parent of Eurofield at the time of the infringement, a total of around €172,000 for providing an incomplete reply to a request for information issued in the context of the Commission's investigation in the synthetic turf sector.

The Commission takes note of today’s preliminary ruling of the Court of Justice in the Nissan Iberia case (C 21/24).
It follows from the Court’s ruling that the EU law prohibition of restrictive agreements, including cartels (Article 101 TFEU), read in the light of the EU law principle of effectiveness and of the EU Damages Directive, means that the time limit in national law for bringing an action for damages alleged to result from an infringement of that prohibition as found in a decision of a national competition authority cannot begin to run until that decision is no longer subject to court challenge.
According to the Court, judgments in which such a decision of a national competition authority have been definitively upheld must be officially published, freely accessible to the public and with the date of publication clearly set out.

The Commission takes note of the judgment of the General Court in relation to the Commission’s decision of 2 December 2021 that imposed a fine on Credit Suisse, now UBS, for its participation in 2012 in one of the Forex cartels ( AT.40135).
The Court fully confirmed that Credit Suisse participated in the cartel and rejected all pleas in that regard, but reduced the amount of the fine from EUR 83 million to EUR 29 million, on the basis that the Commission should have taken into account alternative data for such calculation.
The judgment only concerns the participation in the cartel by, and the fine imposed on, Credit Suisse. All other banks settled their case with the European Commission.
The Commission will carefully study the judgment and reflect on possible next steps.
See also Curia's press release (in PDF format).

In this episode of the Antitrust Code podcast by Concurrences, Maria Jaspers (European Commission) and Despina Pachnou (OECD) discuss key themes from the Compendium of International Cartels book, published by Concurrences.
They examine leniency programs, looking at their effectiveness in detecting cartels and the challenges they present.

The European Commission has issued informal guidance on the compatibility with EU competition rules of a sustainability agreement for the joint purchasing and the setting of technical specifications for electric container-handling equipment used in ports. This would accelerate the shift from diesel to electric equipment in EU ports, contributing to reducing CO2 emissions.

The European Commission has issued an informal guidance letter to provide antitrust guidance for the creation of a licensing negotiation group in the automotive sector (the Automotive Licensing Negotiation Group or ‘ALNG') that would negotiate licences to use technologies covered by standard essential patents (‘SEPs'). With this guidance letter, the Commission aims to contribute to increasing the competitiveness of the EU's automotive sector, as set out in the context of the Industrial Action Plan for the European Automotive sector put forward in March 2025.

The Commission takes note of the judgment of the General Court. In its judgment, the Court dismisses the majority of Michelin’s appeal against the Commission decision ordering an inspection at Michelin, but annuls it insofar as it relates to an earlier suspected infringement period.
The General Court considers that the Commission had sufficiently serious indicia concerning the main period covered by the Commission decision to conduct an unannounced inspection at the premises of Michelin to investigate its suspected participation in a cartel in violation of Article 101 TFEU. Nevertheless, the General Court finds that the indicia were not sufficient for an earlier period and annuls the inspection decision insofar as it relates to that earlier period.
The judgment confirms that the inspection decision was neither arbitrary nor disproportionate in respect of the suspected infringement during the main period.
The Commission will carefully study the judgment and reflect on possible next steps.
The inspections carried out at other premises were neither challenged, nor annulled.

The European Commission has fined Alchem International Pvt. Ltd. and its subsidiary Alchem International (H.K.) Limited (together ‘Alchem') €489,000 for breaching EU antitrust rules. The Commission has found that, for more than 12 years, Alchem participated in a cartel concerning an important pharmaceutical ingredient.