A workshop co-organized by the Polish Competition Law Association and Dentons on “The Court of Justice Judgment in Case C-413/14 P, Intel v Commission” was held on 5 October, 2017.

The September judgment of the Court of Justice in the Intel case puts into effect a more economic approach to antitrust case law in at least one – rather paradoxical – sense.  The judgment is namely extremely economical in words, in particular in the part in which we would have appreciated a rather less economical approach to drafting.  The laconic and Pythian language of the Court triggered an explosion of conspiracy theories on the judgment’s implications.  Do potential effects of rebate schemes applied by dominant undertakings eventually have significance (in other words: do the facts of the case matter)?  If so, at which stage of analysis?  Or maybe such rebates are still by-object infringements and if the facts contradict this, then the worse for the facts?  And what is a “by-object infringement” according to the Court anyway?  Could it be there is room for a rule of reason under Article 102 of the Treaty, too?  How do we reconcile the Intel and Post Danmark II judgments?  Last not least, is the Intel judgment a revolution, a subtle erosion of the formal approach, or just a “procedural answer to a substantive problem”?

An attempt at answering these and other questions was made during the workshop by James Venit, Dentons’ Brussels office partner, who represented Intel in proceedings before the European Commission and the General Court.  In the end, the participants concluded that at the heart of the problem lies EU competition law’s flawed approach to the concept of “by object” infringements.

The official part of the event was followed by a cocktail reception. Please take a moment to look at the photos.