Concurrence of wills – a necessary ingredient of an agreement restricting competition.Case comment to the judgment of Court of Competition and Consumer Protection of 8 February 2011 – ZST Gamrat S.A. v President of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection(Ref. No. XVII Ama 16/10)

• Main Author: Monika A. Górska
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: University of Warsaw 2012-08-01
• Series: Yearbook of Antitrust and Regulatory Studies
• Online Access: https://yars.wz.uw.edu.pl/images/yars2012_5_6/s289.pdf

The case in question represents just one of several legal actions that ZTS Gamrat and its distributors undertook against the decision of the Polish national competition agency, the President of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (hereafter, UOKiK President, after the Polish acronym). This legal battle commenced in 2005 and still has not been resolved, as the judgment of the Court of Competition and Consumer Protection (hereafter, the SOKiK) discussed in this comment has been appealed by the UOKiK President. The Court of Appeals, in its judgment of 20thOctober 2011 (ref. no. VI ACa 564/11), referred the case back to the SOKiK due to the invalidity of the trial before that Court. Hence, the pronounced judgment was set aside and the proceeding before the SOKiK will be repeated. Nonetheless, while keeping in mind that the judgment is under reconsideration, it is worth taking a closer look at the judgment originally issued as it tackles the interesting question of the legal prerequisites of an agreement restricting competition contrary to competition law.