Case T-20/07 P: Appeal brought on 26 January 2007 by the European Commission against the judgment of the Civil Service Tribunal delivered on 14 November 2006 in Case F-100/05 Chatziioannidou v Commission
Date: 2007-03-24
Institutions: Court of First Instance
Subjects: European Commission, Greece, action by staff, appeal, equal treatment, euro, exchange rate, transfer of pension rights

C 69/22

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

24.3.2007

— order the confiscation of all support material held by the
Commission and by the company GOSSELIES on which are
reproduced
developments
carried out by GOSSELIES from the EC-SYSTRAN Unix and
SYSTRAN Unix versions in fraud of SYSTRAN's rights and
its delivery up to SYSTRAN, or, at the very least, its destruc-
tion under the control of an officer of the Court;

information technology

the

— order

the European Community,

acting through the
Commission, to pay damages to compensate for the damage
suffered by the applicants as a result of the infringement
committed by the Commission and, particularly, by the DGT
in the performance of its duties;

— such damages are:

— for SYSTRAN Luxembourg, EUR 1 531 000;

their know-how to the party awarded the contract. They claim
that since the carrying-out of the tasks required by the call for
tenders consists, among other things, of effecting alterations and
adaptations to the system originally conceived by SYSTRAN, it
at least requires its prior agreement. They maintain, therefore,
that by not having required such agreement, the Commission is
guilty of infringement of the intellectual property rights relating
to the SYSTRAN system and, consequently, of disclosure of the
applicants' know-how in breach of Article 4 of Directive
91/250/EEC (2) as transposed into the national legal systems.

that

then submit

the infringement of

The applicants
the
SYSTRAN software program and the disclosure of their know-
how are wrongful acts which incur the Community's liability
under Article 235 EC and the second paragraph of Article 288
EC. They claim also that those wrongful acts caused damage
which should be made good by the Commission.

— for SYSTRAN SA, EUR 47 014 000 subject to addition,

and EUR 2 000 000 for non-material damage;

(1) Call for tenders No 2003/S 191-171556 (OJ 2003 S 191).
(2) Council Directive 91/250/EEC of 14 May 1991 on the legal protec-

tion of computer programs (OJ L 122, 1991, p. 42).

— order the Court's decision to be published, at the Commis-
in specialist journals, reviews and internet

sion's expense,
sites of SYSTRAN's choice;

— in any event, order the Commission to pay all the costs.

Pleas in law and main arguments

By user licence agreements relating to the SYSTRAN machine
translation software program concluded between the applicants'
predecessors in title and the Commission, the latter obtained the
right to use the software program for its own needs and for
those of the European authorities. The applicants submit that
the agreements did not assign any of the intellectual property
rights in the SYSTRAN software program to the Commission.
From 1999 to 2002, SYSTRAN,
subsidiary
SYSTRAN Luxembourg, brought about, for the Commission, the
migration to the new system of exploitation. The contract
signed for that purpose with the Commission provided that the
Commission's entire translation system would remain its prop-
erty, ‘without prejudice, however, to any pre-existing intellectual
and industrial property rights’.

through its

In October 2003, the Commission published a call for tenders
for the award of a contract relating to the ‘maintenance and
linguistic enhancement of the European Commission's machine
translation service and associated services’ (1). The applicants did
not participate
in that procedure. SYSTRAN nevertheless
submitted its reservations on the subject-matter of the call for
tenders and the ensuing contract since, in its submission, it was
liable to infringe its intellectual property rights in the software
program.

In this action,
the
contract to a company other than SYSTRAN infringes, in itself,
their intellectual property rights and necessitates disclosure of

the applicants claim that

the award of

Appeal brought on 26 January 2007 by the European
Commission against the judgment of
the Civil Service
Tribunal delivered on 14 November 2006 in Case F-100/05
Chatziioannidou v Commission

(Case T-20/07 P)

(2007/C 69/50)

Language of the case: French

Parties

Appellant: Commission of the European Communities (Brussels,
Belgium), (represented by K. Hermann and D. Martin, Agents)

Other party to the proceedings: Eleni Chatziioannidou (Auderghem,
Belgium)

Form of order sought by the appellant

The appellant claims that the Court should:

— set aside the judgment of the Civil Service Tribunal of 14

November 2006 in Case F-100/05;

— dismiss the action brought by Mrs Chatziioannidou;

24.3.2007

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 69/23

— order that the parties shall bear their own costs of these
proceedings and of those before the European Union Civil
Service Tribunal.

Action brought on 29 January 2007 — L'Oréal v OHIM —
Spa Monopole (SPALINE)

(Case T-21/07)

(2007/C 69/51)

Pleas in law and main arguments

Language in which the application was lodged: English

By the judgment of 14 November 2006, the setting-aside of
which is claimed in the present appeal, the Civil Service Tribunal
(CST) annulled the Commission's decisions of 30 November
2004 and 20 February 2005 calculating the applicant's years of
pensionable service following the transfer to the Community
scheme of the actuarial equivalent of the pension rights she had
acquired in Greece.

In support of the application to set aside the judgment, the
Commission raises a single ground of appeal alleging infringe-
ment of Regulations No 1103/97 (1) and No 974/98 (2) and of
the GIP of Article 11 of Annex VIII (3). The Commission
submits that
the premiss on which the CST's reasoning is
entirely based, arises from an erroneous interpretation of the
scope of Regulation No 1103/97. The Commission maintains
that, contrary to the CST's finding, the purpose of the regulation
in question is the maintenance of contractual commitments
undertaken by private parties and not those undertaken by
public bodies. It argues also that, in any case, that statement is
irrelevant to these proceedings on the ground that the Commis-
sion had undertaken no commitment in respect of Mrs Chat-
ziioannidou at the date of the entry into effect of the euro and,
therefore,
the principle of continuity of contracts stated in
Article 3 of Regulation No 1103/97 was not, in law, applicable
to this case. On the contrary, Regulation No 974/98, above all
Article 14 thereof, should, in the Commission's submission, be
applied in this case and the GIP should be read in the light
thereof. Consequently, in the case of a transfer, after the intro-
duction of the euro, of pension rights acquired in Greece, a
country which had adopted the euro, the provision of Article 4
(4) of the GIP laying down the detailed rules for the conversion
into euros of amounts transferred in a currency other than the
euro,
is not applicable. The Commission also claims that,
contrary to the CST's decision, because of the sharing of the
powers under Article 11(2) of Annex VIII to the Staff Regula-
tions between the Commission and the national authorities, Mrs
Chatziioannidou could not complain of
the Commission's
method of calculating the amount of the actuarial equivalent
transferred to the Commission by the Greek authorities because
they alone had the power to select an appropriate method, the
Greek authorities having already transferred to the Communities'
account an amount already denominated in euros.

(1) Council Regulation (EC) No 1103/97 of 17 June 1997 on certain

provisions relating to the euro (OJ 1997 L 162, p. 1).

(2) Council Regulation (EC) No 974/98 of 3 May 1998 on the euro (OJ

1998 L 139, p. 1).

(3) General Implementing Provisions of Articles 11 and 12 of Annex
VIII to the Staff Regulations, as amended by Council Regulation (EC,
Euratom) No 723/2004 of 22 March 2004 (OJ 2004 L 124, p. 1).

Parties

Applicant: L'Oréal SA (Paris, France) (represented by: E. Baud,
lawyer)

Defendant: Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market
(Trade Marks and Designs)

Other party to the proceedings before the Board of Appeal: SA Spa
Monopole, Compagnie fermière de Spa, en abrégé SA Spa
Monopole NV (Spa, Belgium)

Form of order sought

— Annul the decision of the First Board of Appeal of the
Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market
(Trade
Marks and Designs) of 18 October 2006 in Case R
415/2005-1;

— order that the costs of the proceedings be borne by the

defendant and, if appropriate, the intervener.

Pleas in law and main arguments

Applicant for the Community trade mark: The applicant

Community trade mark concerned: The community word mark
‘SPALINE’ for the goods in class 3 (bath and shower soaps, skin
moisturizers, body lotions, skin toners, astringents, skin and
body cleansers, facial masks, scrubs and fragrance products) —
application No 989 236

Proprietor of the mark or sign cited in the opposition proceedings: SA
Spa Monopole NV

Mark or sign cited: The national and international word and
figurative marks ‘SPA’,
‘SPA SKIN CARE’ and ‘Les
Thermes de Spa’ for goods in classes 3, 32, 42

‘LIP SPA’,

Decision of the Opposition Division: Opposition upheld

Decision of the Board of Appeal: Appeal dismissed

Pleas in law: The applicant develops one single plea in law in
support of its application, on the basis of which it claims that
the contested decision infringes Article 8(5) of Council Regu-
lation (EC) No 40/94.