Action brought on 27 February 2009 - Mojo Concerts and Amsterdam Music Dome Explotatie v Commission of the European Communities

(Case T-90/09)

Language of the case: Dutch

Parties

Applicants: Mojo Concerts BV (Delft, Netherlands) and Amsterdam Music Dome Explotatie BV (Delft, Netherlands) (represented by S. Beeston, Lawyer)

Defendant: Commission of the European Communities

Form of order sought

Annul the contested decision;

order the Commission to pay the costs.

Pleas in law and main arguments

The applicants seek the annulment of the Commission Decision of 21 October 2008 on the investment of the municipality of Rotterdam in the Ahoy complex (State aid C 4/2008 (ex N 97/2007, ex CP 91/2007).

They submit that the Commission's reasoning in the contested decision discloses a manifestly incorrect assessment and that the steps in the reasoning are incorrect and/or inadequately substantiated.

First, the applicants argue that the value of the rent and of the shares in Ahoy which have been established are not in accordance with market value. Furthermore, an investment which only leads to value retention can indeed produce an advantage. Moreover, when determining the value of the rent and of the shares, no account was taken of the investment. According to the applicants, the contractual restrictions between the municipality and the operator would not prevent the investment from producing added value. Finally, the benefit-sharing arrangement does not provide an additional guarantee of the market conformity of the transactions.

The applicants also allege breach of procedure and defective reasoning: the arguments submitted by them were not, or only inadequately, taken into consideration by the Commission in the contested decision; parts of the file were wrongly classified as confidential; and the applicants were not informed of all the elements in the file, which constitutes an infringement of the right to be heard.

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