*This article is an automatic translation of the original article, provided here for your convenience. Read the original article. Introduction 1. The objective of this article is to examine the use of the principle of economic continuity in the field of State aid. It is a principle of European competition law, originating in case law, according to which the European Commission ("Commission") may be required to require the purchaser of an undertaking to repay the latter's "competition debts [1]". 2. This principle was originally developed in antitrust [2] law as an exception to the principle of personal liability, according to which liability for the commission of an infringement of the competition rules can only be attributed to the perpetrator [3]. On the contrary, under the
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LEGAL PRACTICE: STATE AID - ECONOMIC CONTINUITY - THE COMPETITORS EFFECTIVE PROTECTION
State aid and the principle of economic continuity: The consistency of the notion and the effective protection of the competitors and the buyers
This article examines the notion of economic continuity which, in the field of state aid, allows the Commission to determine that the obligation of recovery should be extended to the transferee of the initial beneficiary of the aid. To that end, the analysis of the question of procedure allows to note that the decisions on economic continuity are of two types : on the one hand, the decisions that are taken in the context of the examination of the compatibility of an aid and, on the other hand, those taken outside of this context. As far as this second type of decision is concerned, the Commission, following the Mory decision, can conclude that there is no economic continuity without having to open the formal investigation procedure, notwithstanding the fact that there were serious difficulties in making that determination. In this respect, it is argued that this case law deprives competitors of the possibility to submit observations and thus affects their interests. Finally, the author examines the applicability of this case law in the hypothetical scenario of a Commission decision concluding that there is economic continuity as well as its impact on the interests of transferees and competitors.
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