A jurisdictional clause cannot be automatically sidelined simply due to the fact that the dispute concerns a claim for compensation due to an alleged violation of EU competition law, the Advocate General stated in conclusions returned on Thursday 5 July (case C-595/17).
It is also for the national court to which the case has been referred to determine, on a case-by-case basis, whether the dispute in question can be covered by such a clause if it is drawn up in general terms.
In 2002, the French company eBizcuss, now represented by the French company MJA, entered into a contract with the Irish company Apple Sales International licensing it to distribute products under the Apple brand virtually exclusively. This contract included a jurisdictional clause in favour of the Irish courts.
In 2012, eBizcuss brought proceedings in France, claiming €62.5 million in damages from Apple on the grounds that it considered that the latter had carried out anti-competitive practices by favouring its own distribution network from 2009 onwards, thereby abusing its dominant position.
The French Court of Cassation, the court of last resort in this case, asked the Court of Justice of the EU whether the jurisdictional clause in the contract assigning jurisdiction to Ireland should be discounted in the event of a dispute concerning a violation of EU competition law.
In his conclusions, Advocate General Nils Wahl considers that the requirement to prohibit abuses of dominant position does not in itself exclude the option for parties to agree by means of a jurisdictional clause on a derogation to the competition rules set out by EU law.
It must be determined whether proceedings of this kind over a breach of competition law are covered by the clause and, within that framework, whether the dispute arises from the legal relationship at the time the clause was concluded.
In the case at hand, the alleged conduct concerns tariff and supply conditions imposed in a discriminatory fashion, such that it cannot be ruled out that the dispute originates in the legal relationship between the supplier and the distributor. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)