Case T‑146/09

Parker ITR Srl
and
Parker-Hannifin Corp.

v

European Commission

(Competition — Agreements, decisions and concerted practices — European market for marine hoses — Decision finding an infringement of Article 81 EC and Article 53 of the EEA Agreement — Price-fixing, market-sharing and the exchange of commercially sensitive information — Attributability of unlawful conduct — Fines — 2006 Guidelines on the method of setting fines — Legitimate expectations — Ceiling of 10% — Mitigating circumstances — Cooperation)

Summary — Judgment of the General Court (First Chamber), 17 May 2013

1.      Competition — Union rules — Infringements — Attribution — ‘Economic continuity’ criterion between undertakings — Conditions

(Arts 81 EC and 82 EC)

2.      Competition — Union rules — Infringements — Attribution — Parent company and subsidiaries — Economic unit — Criteria for assessment — Presumption that a parent company exerts a decisive influence over its wholly-owned subsidiaries — Evidential obligations of the company seeking to rebut that presumption

(Arts 81 EC and 82 EC)

3.      Competition — Fines — Amount — Determination — Method of calculation laid down by the guidelines drawn up by the Commission — Calculation of the basic amount of the fine — Determination of the value of sales — Criteria

(Art. 81(1) EC; Council Regulation No 1/2003, Art. 23(2) and (3); Commission Notice 2006/C 210/02, Sections 13 and 18)

4.      EU law — Principles — Protection of legitimate expectations — Conditions — Specific assurances given by the authorities

5.      Competition — Fines — Amount — Determination — Maximum amount — Calculation — Turnover to be taken into consideration — Cumulative turnover of all the companies constituting the economic entity operating as an undertaking — Limits

(Art. 81(1) EC; Council Regulation No 1/2003, Art. 23(2))

6.      Competition — Fines — Amount — Determination — Criteria — Gravity and duration of the infringement — Discretion of the Commission — Judicial review — Unlimited jurisdiction — Effect

(Arts 81(1) EC and 229 EC; Council Regulation No 1/2003, Arts 23(2) and (3), and 31)

1.      Under the principles of personal responsibility and the personal nature of penalties, which apply to EU competition law, it is for the natural or legal person managing the undertaking in question when the infringement was committed to answer for that infringement, even if, at the date of the decision finding the infringement, the operation of the undertaking was no longer his responsibility. Thus responsibility for the undertaking’s infringement — or that of the entities of which it consists — follows the legal or natural person managing the undertaking in question when the infringement was committed, even though the assets and personnel which contributed to the commission of the infringement have been transferred to a third person after the period of the infringement.

A natural or legal person who has not committed the infringement may however be penalised for that infringement where the natural or legal person who has committed the infringement has ceased to exist, either in law or economically, in order to prevent an undertaking from being able to escape penalties by simply changing its identity through restructurings, sales or other legal or organisational changes. The relevant criterion is economic continuity, so that a change in the legal form and name of an undertaking does not have the effect of creating a new undertaking free of liability for the anti-competitive behaviour of its predecessor when, from an economic point of view, the two undertakings are identical.

Furthermore, the fact that a legal person continues to exist as a legal entity does not exclude the possibility that, with reference to EU competition law, there may be a transfer of part of the activities of that legal person to another which becomes responsible for the acts of the former. Applying penalties in this way is permissible where those legal persons have been under the control of the same person and have therefore, given the close economic and organisational links between them, carried out, in all material respects, the same commercial instructions.

By contrast, in the case of two existing and functioning undertakings one of which had transferred part of its activities to the other and where there was no structural link between them, there can be economic continuity only where the legal person responsible for running the undertaking has ceased to exist in law after the infringement has been committed.

Accordingly, the criterion of economic continuity makes it possible, in exceptional circumstances which are strictly defined, to ensure that the principle of personal responsibility of the author of the infringement is effective and to penalise a legal person which is not the legal person which committed that infringement but with which it shares structural links. In accordance with the criterion of economic continuity, the Commission is therefore allowed to penalise a legal person other than the person who committed the infringement, notwithstanding any legal structure intended, within one and the same undertaking, artificially to prevent the penalising of infringements of competition law which have been committed by one or more of the legal persons of which it consists.

However, where rules of law, such as those governing limitation, prevent an undertaking from being penalised for having committed an infringement of competition law, or where the undertaking which has transferred the legal person which committed the infringement to a third party has ceased to exist, the criterion of economic continuity is not intended to enable another undertaking to be found and rendered responsible retroactively for the acts committed by the first undertaking, unless the undertakings have structural links which link them economically and organisationally or the transfer of the legal person which committed the infringement was an abuse.

(see paras 85-95, 98)

2.      See the text of the decision.

(see paras 173-178, 181, 184, 193)

3.      See the text of the decision.

(see paras 205-212)

4.      See the text of the decision.

(see para. 217)

5.      See the text of the decision.

(see para. 227)

6.      See the text of the decision.

(see paras 246-250)