Specialisation Agreement

Specialisation agreement in the European Union Law

Concept of Specialisation agreement provided by the “Glossary of terms used in EU competition policy” (Antitrust and control of concentrations, published in 2002): An agreement between undertakings relating to the conditions under which they specialise in the production of a narrow or specific range of goods and/or services. Agreements on specialisation can contribute to improving the production or distribution of goods, because the undertakings concerned can concentrate on the manu-facture of certain products and thus operate more efficiently and supply the products more cheaply. Specialisation agreements are divided into agreements whereby one participant gives up the manu-facture of certain products, or provision of certain services in favour of another participant (unilateral specialisation); agreements whereby each participant gives up the manufacture of certain products, or provision of certain services in favour of another participant (recipro-cal specialisation); and agreements whereby the participants under-take jointly to manufacture certain products, or provide certain services (joint production). The issue is covered by a specific block exemption regulation.

(See: Council Regulation (EC) No 2658/2000 of 29 November 2000 on the appli-cation of Article 81(3) of the Treaty to categories of specialisation agreements (OJ L 304, 5.12.2000).)

Spillover effects

Spillover effects in the European Union Law

Concept of Spillover effects provided by the “Glossary of terms used in EU competition policy” (Antitrust and control of concentrations, published in 2002): Side effects of an agreement or a merger between two or several firms, which affect competition between them in another relevant market than the one covered by the agreement or the merger in question. Spillover effects are referred to in Article 2(4) of the merger regulation, which concerns the creation of a joint venture that has as its object or effect the coordination of the competitive behaviour of undertakings that remain independent. In that case, the Commission shall appraise this coordination also taking into account whether two or more parent companies retain, to a significant extent, activities in a market which is () downstream or () upstream from that of the joint venture or in a neighbouring market closely related to this market.