Comments on European Commission Proposals for reform relating to horizontal cooperation

The European Commission is undertaking a wide-ranging reform of its competition policy which will have an important impact on all businesses operating in the European Union as well as ramifications for competition policy worldwide.

Within the context of this reform, it has issued a proposal to modify the regulatory framework governing horizontal agreements in the European Union, which consists of:

1. a category exemption regulation for specialization agreements;
2. a category exemption regulation for research and development agreements; and
3. guidelines for assessing the applicability of Article 81 to horizontal cooperation agreements (the Guidelines)

The regulations relating to specialization and to research and development agreements replace Regulation No. 417/85 and and Regulation No. 418/85 respectively, both of which cease to be valid on 31 December 2000.