Press Release: Mergers: Commission revises Remedies Notice and amends Merger Implementing Regulation

The European Commission revised its guidelines on remedies in merger control in order to ensure that competition concerns are dealt with more effectively and to clarify to companies involved in merger cases how best to address competition concerns. Remedies are modifications to a proposed transaction suggested by the parties involved with a view to eliminating possible competition concerns identified by the Commission. The main changes include the introduction of a form for submitting information on remedies, details on divestiture and access remedies and clarifications on the role of the Trustee. The Commission also modernised the Remedies Notice in the light of the revised Merger Regulation (EC) No. 139/2004, the Commission's experience in a large number of cases, the Commission Mergers Remedies Study and recent judgements of the European Courts. The Remedies Notice also took into account comments received from the public consultation held in 2007 on a draft Notice. In addition, the Commission adopted amendments to the Merger Implementing Regulation (Commission Regulation (EC) No. 802/2004) in line with the changes to the Remedies Notice.