The European Commission’s recent decision prohibiting Booking’s acquisition of Etraveli signals an important change in the assessment of conglomerate mergers in the EU. The decision sets aside the well-established economic framework of the non-horizontal merger guidelines and focuses instead on a theory of harm based on “ecosystem” concerns.
Pending the outcome of the ongoing General Court appeal, the Booking/Etraveli decision will have important ramifications for non-horizontal merger control in the EU.
In this latest Brief, we examine the economic logic underpinning the Commission’s ecosystem concerns and question if rejecting these guidelines signals a lower benchmark assessment of non-horizontal competition concerns, as well as risking the re-introduction of a “efficiency offence” concept.
