ANTITRUST - BLOCK EXEMPTIONS

The draft Commission block exemption regulation on vertical agreements, which is intended to replace Regs. 1983/83, 1984/83 and 4087/88 (expiring at the end of 1999), was published in OJ C270/7. It embodies a new and more business-friendly approach in line with the Commission’s Green Paper of 1997. In addition to the text of the new regulation, the OJ includes the accompanying Commission Guidelines on Vertical Restraints, which outline the Commission’s enforcement policy in the application of Art. 81 EC to vertical agreements. While the regulation is crisp and short (13 articles on 4 pages) the guidelines are huge (225 paragraphs on 35 pages) and scattered with useful examples.