• If a group of entities constitutes a “single economic entity”, it thus constitutes a single “undertaking”; • Competent jurisdiction(s) as a rule are based on a “threshold of significance” concerning its enforcement - the Commission and/or national competition authorities in the EU 16; • Depending on the area of competition, enforcement may be applied “ex ante” or “ex post”; • The importance of the relevant product/service market definition17 and the market power18; • Interplay with enforcers includes requesting leniency and presenting remedies so as to eliminate competition concerns; • Very heavy (financial and non-financial) sanctions for unlawful practices are applicable to legal persons at EU level and also to physical persons under the CA. • De minimis (negligible) arrangements or practices may not be caught unless there are hard core anticompetitive conducts19; • Complementary nature of the public and the private enforcements; • Public enforcement follows priorities, given the limitation of human resources to investigate allegedly unlawful conducts – These priorities are most important to follow constantly, as well as the degree of cooperation between enforcers20; • Private enforcement of competition is a fast-growing trend before national courts, especially after the implementation of the corresponding EU Directive into the national legal frameworks21. 16 See article 3 of Council Regulation (EU) No 1/2003 of 16 December 2002 on the implementation of the rules on competition laid down in Articles 101 and 102 TFEU, published in the OJ L 1, 4.1.2003, p. 1–25. 17 Commission Notice on the definition of relevant market for the purposes of EU competition law, OJ C 372, 9.12.1997, p. 5–13. 18 Communication from the Commission Amendments to the Communication from the Commission – Guidance on the Commission’s enforcement priorities in applying Article 102 of the TFEU to abusive exclusionary conduct by dominant undertakings (“Guidance on priorities concerning 102 TFEU”), OJ C 116, 31.3.2023, p. 1–5. 19 Communication from the Commission — Notice on agreements of minor importance which do not appreciably restrict competition under Article 101(1) of the TFEU (De Minimis Notice) published in the OJ C 291, Volume 57 30.01.2014. 20 A relevant example for the present purposes concerns the external market study on the distribution practices of hotels in the EU, published by the Commission on August 26, 2022 - available at https://competitionpolicy. ec.europa.eu/system/files/2023-01/kd0722783enn_hotel_accomodation_market_study.pdf. It focused on a representative sample of six Member States (Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Poland, Spain and Sweden). Amongst other features, the same updates the conclusions for following up on a similar monitoring exercise carried out by the European Competition Network (“ECN”) in 2016. 21 Directive 2014/104/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 November 2014 on certain rules governing actions for damages under national law for infringements of the competition law provisions of the Member 131 THE SWEET&SOUR TASTE OF TOURISM AND COMPETITION LAW INTERACTION
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTE4NzM5Nw==