Brussels, 15/02/2012 (Agence Europe) - The General Court of the EU has annulled the Commission decision of October 2008 to authorise the granting of restructuring aid of €31 million by France to electrical appliance manufacturer FagorBrandt subject to conditions (see EUROPE 9767). In a ruling given on 14 February (Joined Cases T-115/09 and T-116/09), the Court found the Commission had wrongly held that the accumulation of compensatory measures offered by the company (the sale of its subsidiary Brandt Components and the cessation of marketing of refrigeration, cooking and dishwashing appliances under the Vedette brand for five years) satisfactorily reduced the negative effects on competition. The Court thus found for Electrolux and Whirlpool Europe, which challenged the decision in 2009.
In its ruling, the Court states that measures put into effect by companies to compensate for competition distortion caused by the granting of restructuring aid must be “appropriate” in that they must not lead to a deterioration in the structure of the market and they must be “in proportion” to the distortive effects of the aid. In fact, the Commission itself had acknowledged that the sale of Brandt Components had no real effect on the washing machine market, the “main market” in which FagorBrandt was active. Furthermore, the company's Italian subsidiary had not fully repaid illegal aid which it had received, a factor which gave the company an advantage that ought to have been taken into account by the Commission in its investigation on the accumulation of compensatory measures offered. (FG/transl.rt)