CELEX: C2002/084/120
Language: en
Date: 2002-04-06 00:00:00
Title: Removal from the register of Case T-315/00

6.4.2002                 EN                  Official Journal of the European Communities                                      C 84/65
The applicants claim that the Court should:                             one and the same Member State. Finally, this was not a partial
                                                                        transfer of an undertaking but a merger.
—     declare that, by failing to reach a decision on the
      complaint lodged by the applicants against a concen-
      tration with a Community dimension, which was notified
      and approved at national level by the Vienna Oberlandes-
      gericht (Higher Regional Court), in its capacity as Kar-          Action brought on 18 January 2002 by Michael Gerhard
      tellgericht (Restrictive Practices Court) by decision of          Franz Platte against Commission of the European Com-
      26 February 2001, or, in the alternative, by failing to                                       munities
      require the parties to the concentration to notify the
      defendant of the concentration, the defendant failed to                                     (Case T-6/02)
      fulfil its obligations under the EC Treaty;
                                                                                                (2002/C 84/119)
—     order the defendant to pay the costs.
                                                                                          (Language of the case: French)
Pleas in law and main arguments                                         An action against the Commission of the European Communi-
                                                                        ties was brought before the Court of First Instance of the
                                                                        European Communities on 18 January 2002 by Michael
By letter of 25 May 2001, the applicants, as owners of Austrian         Gerhard Franz Platte, residing in Tielt-Winge (Belgium), rep-
newspapers, lodged with the defendant a complaint regarding             resented by Xavier De Kesel, lawyer.
a media concentration which had been approved in Austria, to
which the companies Bertelsmann, Gruner+Jahr, Raffeisen,                The applicant claims that the Court should:
KURIER-Magazine and NEWS were parties, and which, accord-
ing to the applicants, had a Community dimension. The                   —     annul the decision of 6 September 2001 being appealed
complaint was accompanied by the request that the parties to                  against and make an order emending and implementing
the concentration be required to notify the concentration in                  what the appointing authority ought to have done,
accordance with Council Directive (EEC) No 4064/89.                           namely appoint the applicant to Grade C 4.
DG Competition took the view, in a number of letters, that              Pleas in law and main arguments
the abovementioned regulation was not applicable to the
concentration in question, as there had only been a partial             The applicant was classified, upon taking up his duties, in
transfer, which did not involve at least two undertakings with          Grade C 5. In his application, the applicant contests that
turnovers of more than EUR 250 million. DG Competition                  decision. According to the applicant, he should, in view of his
pointed out, however, that that view was not binding on the             previous experience and of the fact that the requirements of
defendant.                                                              the service call for the recruitment of a particularly well-
                                                                        qualified person, have been classified in Grade C 4.
Since the defendant failed to react within two months to the
applicants’ request for a formal decision on the complaint, the
applicants have brought an action under Article 232 EC for a
declaration of failure to act. They submit that in the absence
of a decision attributable to the defendant, it is not possible to             Removal from the register of Case T-315/00 (1)
bring an action for annulment before the Court of First
Instance, and that the applicants are directly and individually                                 (2002/C 84/120)
concerned by the defendant’s failure to adopt a decision.
                                                                                          (Language of the case: Italian)
The applicants claim that the national decision is invalid under
Article 81 EC in conjunction with Regulation 4064/89,                   By order of 29 November 2001 the President of the Fourth
because, contrary to Article 21(2) of that regulation, the              Chamber of the Court of First Instance of the European
Republic of Austria applied its national competition law to a           Communities Case T-315/00 Associazione delle Cantine Socia-
concentration with a Community dimension. In addition, they             li Venete e della Cantina dei Colli Berici against Commission
claim that there are two parties to the concentration with              of the European Communities, was removed from the register.
turnovers in excess of EUR 250 million, one of which does
not achieve more than two-thirds of its annual turnover within          (1) OJ C 335 of 25 November 2000.