Nervous Neelie? Court Orders EU Commission to Pay Damages for Wrongly Blocking Merger
July 01, 2007
A judgment issued by the European Court of First Instance on July 11, 2007, is likely to make Neelie Kroes, the EU Commissioner for Competition, and her staff much more cautious in their approach to merger filings. From now on, the Commission must be prepared to be sued for damages if it makes serious errors in the way in which it handles these cases, and is likely to make the merger process more arduous for notifying parties, as the Commission 'tightens' its review process.
