EU Commissioner Neelie Kroes visits Bundeskartellamt

Today the EU Commissioner for Competition, Neelie Kroes, paid a visit to the Bundeskartellamt. On this occasion the President of the Bundeskartellamt, Ulf Böge, underlined the close and trust-based cooperation between the Directorate-General for Competition in Brussels and the Bundeskartellamt in Bonn:
“With globalisation the competitive pressure on companies has increased. In direct contrast efforts to avoid this pressure have intensified in the form of merger and cooperation strategies, cartel agreements and the full exploitation of existing market power. In view of this the need for close interlinking between the competition authorities is more important than ever before. In the European Community we have formed a network of competition authorities over the last two years, the so-called European Competition Network (ECN), which is unique for its intra-institutional cooperation. This goes for the prosecution of cartels as well as that of abuse cases. The European Network allows for flexible case allocation, the extensive exchange of files as well as the joint organisation and conduct of searches in cases of the reasonable suspicion of cartel agreements or abuse, as witnessed recently in the gas and electricity sector.
Also in the area of merger control there is a clear allocation of responsibility for merger projects, which at the same time provides for an adequate amount of flexibility in favour of the basic principle that the authority best placed to deal with the case should be responsible for it. The system functions well since it is and remains our common aim to enforce the competition principle as effectively as possible. The challenges facing the competition authorities are immense if one takes a look at markets which, although liberalised on paper, in reality are not exposed to enough competition, such as electricity and gas, rail traffic, post and telecommunications. Cartel prosecution, the main focus of competition authorities’ activities, will also remain a special building site, where more work has to be done”.

According to Dr Böge the Bundeskartellamt is particularly keen to enforce competition rules in the EU in close cooperation with the EU Commission. He greatly appreciated the support which his authority had received from the Commission in its efforts to put an end to market foreclosure brought about by the long-term exclusive purchasing commitments of municipal utilities, and indicated that Commissioner Kroes had his full support in her actions against competition restraints caused by Microsoft. “Particularly those companies, which have been able to build their growth on the merits of a free market economy have a commitment to abide by the rules of fair competition. If they don’t, they have to be reminded, if necessary with substantial fines”.

Dr Böge continued by saying: “However, a great number of competition restraints are also imposed by the state. Examples of this are direct subsidies, tax advantages, special provisions for certain sectors or individual occupational groups and state promoted, so-called national champions. The competition authorities should not shy from pointing out these restraints and from triggering a discussion process because recent experiences in sectors formerly exempted from competition such as telephony, air traffic and gas and electricity show us: Consumers benefit from effective competition but suffer from encrusted markets and from markets on which positions are well-established”