On Friday 6 May the European Commission launched a public consultation for interested parties on a draft revision of the Merger Implementing Regulation and the Notice on Simplified Procedure.
In August 2016, the Commission launched a comprehensive review of the procedural and jurisdictional rules on mergers. The objective was to simplify the Commission’s merger review procedure for cases unlikely to have competition concerns that are treated under the simplified procedure, in order to concentrate resources on the most complex and relevant cases.
For Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice-President responsible for competition policy, the initiative aims to further “ease administrative burden on both businesses and the Commission and will allow us to focus resources on the mergers that merit an in-depth investigation. We invite all parties to provide us with their comments on our draft revised rules, which will feed into the preparation of the new rules planned to enter into force in 2023”.
As set out in a background note accompanying the Implementing Regulation and the Notice on Simplified Procedure, the proposed amendments aim to:
- expand and clarify the categories of cases that can be treated under the simplified procedure;
- introduce refined safeguards so that the simplified procedure does not apply to cases that merit a more detailed review;
- ensure effective and proportionate information gathering, by introducing a new notification form for simplified cases, in a “tick-the-box” format;
- streamline the review of non-simplified cases by reducing and clarifying the information requirements;
- introduce electronic notifications and the possibility for parties to submit certain documents electronically.
Interested parties are invited to comment on the draft rules by 3 June 2022.
Link to the consultation and background note: https://aeur.eu/f/1jb (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)