EU Antitrust Briefing: A Standard Year For The European Commission

Introduction

At the end of 2009, the European Commission closed two long-running investigations into misuse of market power afforded to companies whose patented technology had been incorporated into industry standards: the Rambus case and the Qualcomm case. Although the cases are further illustrations of the on-going tension between IP rights, which seek to reward investment in innovation by protecting holders from competition, and EU antitrust rules, which seek to ensure that "dominant companies" do not abuse their privileged position, they are perhaps less controversial than the last major case to consider the inherent tension between these two strands of law - the Microsoft case. Although neither the Rambus case nor the Qualcomm case resulted in fully-reasoned decisions from the Commission, the principles applicable to standard-setting now appear to be clear.