The Year 2005 at DG Competition: The Trend towards a More Effects-Based Approach

This first review of the European Commission’s Directorate General for Competition (DG COMP) gives an overview on DG COMP’s mandate and the main developments of 2005. The discussion includes institutional and policy developments, as well as the main competition policy decisions and Court judgments in the merger, antitrust, and state aid areas. It is argued that the trend towards a more effects-based analysis in EU competition policy had an impact on the assessment of competition cases, as well as on the development of soft law. For example, the effects-based approach was put high on the agenda with the publication of the Article 82 discussion paper. Similarly, the publication of the State Aids Action Plan (SAAP) launched a “more economic approach” in European state aid assessment. In line with its objective to focus resources on key sectors, two major inquiries were launched in the energy and financial sectors. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2006Competition policy, effects-based approach, antitrust, state aids, mergers,

Exclusivity and Antitrust in Media Markets: The Case of Pay-TV in Europe

This paper challenges the traditional economic reasons supporting copyright licensing exclusivity in dealership agreements in media markets. It is argued how exclu- sive dealings in contents distributions acted in Europe as barriers to entry and/or raising rivals’ costs strategies against new Pay-TV operators. The removal of exclusive dealing clauses, as recently implemented by the European Commission, can be economically justi- fied when it generates positive impact on technological innovation and on the development of alternative transmission platforms for the delivery of multimedia services. Recent European Antitrust decisions seem to encourage a new ‘open access approach’ for premium contents distribution in media industry