The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Justice gives judgement on the Intel case and overrides the decision that imposed a penalty of 1.060 million euros requiring a new revision of the case

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The Intel Judgement of the European Court of Justice, of 6th September 2017, regarding the abuse of a dominant position because of loyalty rebates with an alleged market exclusionary effect, overrides the Judgement of the European General Court in this matter and returns it for a major analysis.

The European Court of Justice, in the exercise of its appeal functions, has just overrode the Judgement of the European General Court of 12 June 2014 (which confirmed the penalty of approximately 1.060 million euros imposed to Intel by the Commission for the abuse of a dominant position), for its further examination regarding factual and economic data related to whether such rebates (imposed to the major computer producers, such as Dell, HP, NEC, Lenovo and others) have really caused the exclusionary effect of Intel’s competitors, given that the following factors, among other, have not been analyzed:

  • The percentage of the market affected by the criticized practice;
  • The existence of a strategy aimed at excluding from the market the equally efficient competitors;
  • Whether, apart from the rebates, improvements that benefited the competitors in efficiency terms were offered.

And, generally, if an equally efficient competitor would have been obliged to charge prices that would not have been viable.

Therefore, and as the Judgement states, the main general principle is that not every market exclusionary effect is necessarily detrimental to competition, but that the dominant undertaking has a special responsibility not to allow its behavior to impair genuine, undistorted competition on the internal market.

Hence, the General Court’s abstention on analyzing the Intel’s above mentioned alleged circumstances has taken the Court of Justice, in the exercise of its appeal functions, to override the Judgement and return it to the General Court for further analysis.