Competing at Scale: EU Competition Policy fit for the Global Stage

Competing at Scale: EU Competition Policy fit for the Global Stage

Source / author: 
European Rountable of Industrialists (ERT)
Country: 
EU
Publication date: 
7 October 2019
Publication type: 
Reports and studies

Leaders of some of Europe’s largest employers have today called for an EU competition policy which would allow European businesses to compete successfully at scale in today’s globalised and fast-moving economy. Measures would include adopting a more dynamic approach to competition enforcement and taking a more holistic view to safeguard global competitiveness. These reforms would enable competition policy to operate under the demands of the modern, digital and often borderless economy. The paper sets out four key policy recommendations to ensure that EU competition policy remains fit for purpose in the modern digitised and global markets:

 

  1. Align competition enforcement with the demands of the modern digitised economy: a more dynamic and pragmatic approach, which in particular takes into account non-price factors such as the role of data, innovation, quality, and choice, and the potential consumer benefits of inter-company relationships.
  2. Implement a smarter, leaner merger control regime: a broader and forward-looking substantive assessment, simplifying and shortening the merger control procedure, including by reducing the burden of information requests, improving checks and balances within the Directorate-General for Competition and implementing effective judicial review.
  3. Increase legal certainty for competitive collaboration: providing a more welcoming environment for pro-competitive business activities, ensuring a harmonised approach between the Commission and National Competition Authorities, and better guidance for firms, for example in the form of ‘comfort letters’.
  4. Adopt a holistic viewpoint to safeguard global competitiveness: the Commission must adopt a more comprehensive view of market practices and market power held by foreign state-owned or state-supported companies operating in Europe, and introduce more flexibility in state aid rules to enable research, especially in key strategic areas.