Last week, the European Commission published on its website a revised explanatory note on how it conducts on-the-spot inspections of business premises where it suspects a company has breached competition law (so-called “dawn raids”). During a dawn raid the European Commission has the power to examine and copy not just hard copies of business records,…
The EU’s General Court issued on 14 November two important judgments regarding the extent of the European Commission’s powers to dawn raid companies for suspected competition law infringements (Case T-135/09 Nexans v Commission and Case T-140/09 Prysmian v Commission). The Court held that the European Commission must precisely delimit the products concerned by a dawn…
At the end of March, the European Commission fined Czech energy companies Energetický a průmyslový and EP Investment Advisors EUR2.5 million for obstructing a dawn raid which European Commission officials carried out as part of an antitrust investigation. This is the first time that the European Commission has fined a company for the specific violation…
