Dreptul comunitar al afacerilor. blog

Rezultatul procesului la TPI a fost oarecum pevizibil. Comisia a aplicat corect sanctiunea amenzii.

Gasiti hotararea aici.

Un rezumat gasiti pe ECJBlog, si o prezentare cu trimitere la documentele aferente si declaratii pe EurActiv.com.

Bibliografia:

Pierre Arhel, L’affaire Microsoft (À propos de la décision du TPICE du 17 septembre 2007), Petites Affiches, nr. 233/2007.
L’arrêt Microsoft du 17 septembre 2007 est sans doute l’un des plus importants rendus par le Tribunal de première instance en matière de concurrence. Sur le fond, il approuve entièrement la décision de la Commission ayant condamné l’entreprise pour deux comportements distincts à savoir le refus de fournir les informations relatives à l’interopérabilité du système d’exploitation Windows avec des produits concurrents et la vente liée du système d’exploitation Windows et de Windows Media Player. Il annule cependant la décision en ce qu’elle a ordonné la désignation d’un mandataire indépendant chargé d’évaluer et de vérifier la mise en oeuvre par Microsoft des mesures correctives ordonnées par la Commission.

Thomas O. Barnett, Interoperability Between Antitrust And Intellectual Property, George Mason Law Review, Volume 14, Number 4, Summer 2007

Ugo Patroni Griffi, Alfonso Papa Malatesta, L’interoperabilità del software: una essential facility? Implicazioni del “caso Microsoft”, Studi in onore di Gerhard Schricker, Giuffre Editore, 2005, p.469-507.

Olivia Dufour, Microsoft, une victoire éclatante pour la Commission européenne!, Petites Affiches, No 190, 21 septembre 2007.

Jean-Claude Zarka, Microsoft et la justice européenne, Gazette du Palais, nr. 127/2007.

Harry First, Strong Spine, Weak Underbelly: The CFI Microsoft Decision, New York University School of Law. New York University Law and Economics Working Papers, April 23, 2008, Paper 129.

On September 17, 2007, the European Court of First Instance decided Microsoft’s appeal of the European Commission’s 2004 decision finding that Microsoft had violated Article 82 of the EC Treaty by failing to provide certain interoperability information to Sun Microsystems and by refusing to dis-integrate Windows and the Windows Media Player. In this short comment I review the CFI’s decision, focusing on three ways in which the decision properly stiffens the strong spine of European competition law – its treatment of intellectual property, tying, and leveraging. The comment also discusses the EC’s remedy orders in Microsoft, which I argue reveal the soft underbelly of European competition law, a soft underbelly that the European Microsoft case shares with the U.S. Microsoft settlement.

T.T. Nguyen, Competition Rules in the TRIPS Agreement – The CFI’s Ruling in Microsoft v. Commission and Implications for Developing Countries, International Review of Intellectual Property and Competition Law (Germany, Volume 39, Number 5, 2008 [*]

The ruling of the European Court of First Instance (CFI) in Microsoft v. Commission[1] in 2007 was a pivotal judgment in the area of interaction between competition law and intellectual property rights (IPRs). It has been, and continues to be, a subject of many controversial discussions from both legal and economic perspectives not only in the European Union (EU) but also all over the world. It also illustrated that the application of IPR-related competition law is a complex and controversial issue in both developed and developing countries. One can say that, in this legal process, competition authorities in developing countries face even greater and more serious problems. Developing countries, therefore, rarely use flexibilities concerning competition rules under the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) of the World Trade Organization (WTO)[2] to address IPR-related anti-competitive practices in reality.

[1] CFI, Case T-201/04, Microsoft v. Commission, 17 September 2007, 39 IIC (2008), http://curia.europa.eu/en/

[2] The TRIPS Agreement is Annex 1C of the Marrakesh Agreement Establishing the WTO signed in Marrakesh, Morocco on 15 April 1994, www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/trips_e/t_agm0_e.htm

Martine Behar-Touchais, «Etre interopérable ou ne pas être: telle est la question!», au sujet de l’arrêt Microsoft du Tribunal de première instance des Communautés européennes du 17 septembre 2007, aff. T-201/04, in Communication, commerce électronique, mars 2008, no 3, p. 8-12. [*]

 Christian Ahlborn, David S. Evans, The Microsoft Judgment and its Implications for Competition Policy Towards Dominant Firms in Europe(April 2008).

Abstract SSRN:
The European Court of First Instance (CFI) rejected Microsoft’s grounds for annulling the Commission’s Decision that the software maker had abused its dominant position in computer operating systems by refusing to supply certain protocols for interoperating with rivals’ computers and by tying Windows Media Player to its Windows operating system. This article argues that the Court’s judgment continues the form-based approach it has followed for four decades to abuse of dominance cases and is inconsistent with the Court’s emphasis on coherent economic reasoning in merger clearance reviews, thereby reinforcing a divide between these two critical parts of European competition policy. The CFI’s approach also continues its historical adherence to focusing on market structure and putting aside direct evidence of adverse effects on consumer welfare. In particular, the CFI did not embrace parts of the Commission’s Decision against Microsoft that advocated an effects-based approach. At the same time the CFI’s judgment expands the possibilities for finding an abuse of dominance by weakening key prongs of the Bronner/Magill/IMS exceptional circumstances test for refusal to supply and adopts a separate products test for tying that has illogical implications for many standard cases.

 William H. Page, Seldon J.Childers, Bargaining in the Shadow of the European Microsoft Decision: The Microsoft-Samba Protocol License(May 2008). Northwestern University Law Review Colloquy, Vol. 102, No. p. 332, 2008. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1117641

Abstract:
In 2004, the European Commission held that Microsoft had abused its dominant position under Article 82 of the European Treaty by, among other actions, refusing Sun Microsystems’ request for information Sun needed to interoperate with Windows workgroup server products. The EC ordered Microsoft to disclose complete and accurate specifications for the protocols used by Windows work group servers in order to provide file, print, and group and user administration services to Windows work group networks. In September 2007, the European Court of First Instance affirmed the EC’s liability ruling and its remedial order. Last December, with the active encouragement of the EC, Microsoft reached a licensing agreement for the covered protocols with Samba, an open-source development project that produces server software that emulates the behavior of Microsoft’s server operating systems. The Microsoft-Samba license agreement is by far the most important tangible outcome of the European Microsoft case. The EC’s other remedial order in the case, which required Microsoft to create a version of Windows without Windows Media Player, was an embarrassing failure. The Samba agreement, however, is both significant and perilous for global antitrust policy. It provides critical protocols and documentation to Microsoft’s most important rival in the server market, a rival, moreover, whose development methods are focused on the analysis of those very protocols. Samba is thus more likely to put the disclosures to effective competitive use than any other licensee. It is also possible that Microsoft will derive technical and competitive benefits from the interaction with the Samba team. The long-run peril is that the disclosures will go beyond the specifications that the CFI contemplated, and will allow Samba to clone Microsoft’s proprietary algorithms. That result, although reducing prices in the short run, would inhibit dynamic competition by undermining the incentives of leading firms to innovate.

Nicholas Economides, Ioannis Lianos, The Elusive Antitrust Standard on Bundling in Europe and in the United States at the Aftermath of the Microsoft Cases (*)

Abstract:
We analyze and contrast the US and EU antitrust standards on mixed bundling and tying. We apply our analysis to the US and EU cases against Microsoft on the issue of tying new products (Internet Explorer in the US, and Windows Media Player in the EU) with Windows as well as to cases brought in Europe and in the United States on bundling discounts. We conclude that there are differences between the EC and US antitrust law on the choice of the relevant analogy for bundled rebates (predatory price standard or foreclosure standard) and the implementation of the distinct product and coercion test for tying practices. The second important difference between the two jurisdictions concerns the interpretation of the requirement of anticompetitive foreclosure. It seems to us that in Europe, consumer detriment is found easily and it is not always a requirement for the application of Article 82, or at least that the standard of proof of a consumer detriment for tying cases is lower than in the US.