When EU competition law meets private international law: jurisdiction and forum shopping in antitrust damages litigation

Introduction

Private enforcement of European Union ('EU') competition law has developed significantly over the past decade. Directive 2014/104/EU ('Damages Directive'), together with a series of landmark rulings of the Court of Justice of the European Union ('CJEU'), has given rise to a sharp increase in both follow-on and stand-alone damages actions across the EU.

In this context, claimants have increasingly used procedural strategies to select the forum most likely to maximise recovery and consolidate claims against multiple defendants. This approach has exposed a doctrinal tension that arises when a substantive concept of EU competition law – the 'economic unit' or 'single economic entity' doctrine, under which a parent company exercising decisive influence over a subsidiary forms part of the same undertaking for the purposes of Articles 101 and 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union ('TFEU') – is transposed into the procedural domain of international jurisdiction governed by Regulation (EU) No. 1215/2012 ('Brussels I bis Regulation'). Although the two operate on fundamentally different planes – one defining the scope of liability, the other allocating adjudicatory authority among Member State courts – claimants have sought to leverage the former to expand the reach of the latter.

More specifically, claimants have argued that, where a parent company is domiciled in a Member State, the courts of that State may exercise jurisdiction over its foreign subsidiaries – and vice versa – because they form part of the same economic unit. Recent CJEU case law, including the landmark rulings in MOL^[1], Athenian Brewery^[2], and the joined Power Cables and Cardboard Packaging^[3] cases, has addressed this tension between effective antitrust enforcement and the principles of predictability and legal certainty that underpin EU private international law.

The Brussels I bis Regulation and jurisdiction in multi-party disputes

The Brussels I bis Regulation establishes the general rule that defendants must be sued in the courts of their domicile (Article 4), while Article 7(2) of the special jurisdiction of the courts of the place where the harmful event occurred. Article 8(1), however, creates a significant exception: where one of several defendants is domiciled in a Member State, the claimant may sue the remaining defendants – regardless of their own domicile – before the same court, provided that the claims are 'so closely connected that it is expedient to hear and determine them together to avoid the risk of irreconcilable judgments'.^[4]

This anchor defendant mechanism was designed to promote procedural efficiency and judicial consistency in multi-party litigation. In competition damages claims, however, claimants have used it primarily to forum shop. By suing a single defendant domiciled in a jurisdiction with favourable procedural rules, a claimant can use that defendant as an anchor to draw all remaining defendants before the same court. The strategy could be particularly effective where the economic unit doctrine applies, because it could entail joint and several liability among group entities for the same infringement: the anchor defendant would not merely be a procedural vehicle for consolidation but a substantively liable co-defendant, which in turn reinforces the close connection between the claims required under Article 8(1).

The CJEU first addressed the application of Article 8(1) in competition damages cases in CDC Hydrogen Peroxide,^[5] confirming that claimants may rely on the provision in follow-on actions while introducing an important caveat: a claimant cannot use a defendant as an anchor through an artificial or contrived arrangement.^[6] In Wikingerhof v. Booking.com,^[7] the Court further refined its analysis, holding that courts must interpret Article 8(1) in light of the need to avoid irreconcilable judgments, rather than as a general tool of procedural convenience.

The economic unit doctrine

The economic unit doctrine reflects the principle that legal form should not obscure economic reality. Where a parent company exercises decisive influence over a subsidiary's commercial conduct, EU competition law treats both entities as a single undertaking for the purposes of Articles 101 and 102 TFEU. In Akzo Nobel,^[8] the CJEU established that a parent company holding 100% of a subsidiary's share capital is presumed to exercise decisive influence over that subsidiary and may therefore be held jointly and severally liable for the subsidiary's infringement.^[9] Although this presumption is rebuttable in principle, courts have set an exceptionally high threshold for rebutting it in practice.

In Sumal,^[10] the CJEU extended the doctrine in the opposite direction, holding that a subsidiary may be liable for an infringement committed by its parent where the subsidiary's market conduct is connected to the anticompetitive conduct. This two-way extension of liability attribution within corporate groups raised an important question: if a parent and its subsidiary form a single undertaking for substantive liability purposes, do they also form a sufficiently connected entity for jurisdictional purposes under Article 8(1) of the Brussels I bis Regulation? If so, claimants could anchor proceedings where a group entity is domiciled, with significant implications for forum selection.

Recent CJEU doctrine: a developing line of cases

RH v AB Volvo et al. and Stichting App Stores: the dual conferment of jurisdiction

A related question in antitrust litigation concerns the nature of the jurisdiction under Article 7(2) of the Brussels I bis Regulation: does the provision confer only international jurisdiction – leaving national procedural law to determine which court within that Member State has territorial jurisdiction – or does it also determine the locally competent court within that Member State? The CJEU addressed this question in its judgment of 15 July 2021 in RH v AB Volvo et al.^[11]

The preliminary reference came from a Spanish court hearing a damages claim brought by a company based in Córdoba in connection with the Trucks cartel case. The referring court asked whether Article 7(2) confers only international jurisdiction within Spain, or whether the provision itself determines both international and territorial competence.

The CJEU held that Article 7(2) is a combined jurisdiction rule that directly confers both international and territorial jurisdiction on the courts of the place where the damage occurred. Member States therefore cannot apply territorial jurisdiction rules that depart from the criteria established by Article 7(2).

The Court confirmed that this approach is consistent with the coherence requirement set out in recital 7 of the Rome II Regulation.^[12] Under Article 6(3)(a) of that regulation, the law applicable to damages actions arising from a restriction of competition is the law of the country whose market is, or is likely to be, affected.^[13]

The Court also confirmed that Article 7(2) does not prevent a Member State from granting exclusive jurisdiction over a specific category of dispute to a single specialised court, regardless of where the damage occurred within that Member State. The Court held that such centralisation may serve the sound administration of justice, particularly given the technical complexity of competition damages actions.

The CJEU further developed this approach in its judgment of 2 December 2025 in Stichting App Stores Claims,^[14] following a request for a preliminary reference from the Amsterdam District Court. The case concerned a representative action brought by Dutch associations on behalf of unidentified but identifiable consumers and companies located in different districts of the Netherlands. The claim sought compensation for harm allegedly caused by Apple's abuse of a dominant position – through excessive commissions charged on applications and digital products sold through the App Store – in breach of Article 102 TFEU.

The Court held that, in a Member State whose market is allegedly affected by anticompetitive practices, any court with subject-matter jurisdiction to hear a representative action brought on behalf of a plurality of unidentified but identifiable users has both international and territorial jurisdiction, by reason of the place of materialisation of the damage, to adjudicate the action in respect of all such users.

The ruling rested on three main grounds. First, requiring the claim to be divided among all potentially competent tribunals – determined by the domiciles of the individual victims – would undermine the effet utile of Article 7(2) and the proper administration of justice. Second, in a representative action brought on behalf of identifiable, although not yet individually identified, users, the court need not determine where the damage materialised for each victim in order to establish territorial jurisdiction. Third, the alleged anticompetitive conduct covered the entire national territory because the App Store NL was specifically designed for the Dutch market. The damage could therefore be regarded as having materialised throughout the Netherlands.

MOL v Mercedes-Benz: rejecting the reverse application of the economic unit doctrine

In its judgment of 4 July 2024 in MOL Magyar Olaj- és Gázipari Nyrt v Mercedes-Benz Group AG, the CJEU considered a claim brought by the Hungarian company MOL against Mercedes-Benz Group AG for overcharges paid by MOL's subsidiaries on 71 trucks acquired during the Trucks cartel period. MOL relied on the economic unit doctrine and argued that, as the parent company, it had suffered the same harm as its subsidiaries. On that basis, it sought to establish jurisdiction under Article 7(2) of the Brussels I bis Regulation, claiming that its registered office was the place where the harmful event occurred.

The CJEU rejected that interpretation. Citing settled case law, the Court held that the expression 'place where the harmful event occurred' cannot include every place where the adverse consequences of an event of damage first suffered elsewhere are felt. Damage that merely follows from harm initially suffered by other legal persons cannot establish jurisdiction under Article 7(2). Because only the subsidiaries had directly paid the overcharge, jurisdiction lay with the courts of the place where the trucks were acquired.

The Court also rejected MOL's argument that the economic unit doctrine should apply symmetrically to claimants. That interpretation, the Court reasoned, would undermine the principles of proximity and predictability that underpin the rules on international jurisdiction. The courts of the Member State where the affected market is located are best placed to satisfy those objectives.  This connecting factor also ensures consistency between jurisdiction and the applicable law under Article 6(3)(a) of the Rome II bis Regulation.

Athenian Brewery and Heineken: confirming the Akzo Nobel presumption in private enforcement

In February 2025, the CJEU delivered its ruling in Athenian Brewery. Unlike the other cases discussed in this article, Athenian Brewery concerned a damages action arising from an alleged infringement of Article 102 TFEU – rather than Article 101 TFEU. The case involved an abuse of dominance on the Greek beer market by Athenian Brewery SA, a subsidiary of Heineken NV. The central issue was whether the rebuttable presumption of decisive influence established in Akzo Nobel also applied in private damages actions for the purpose of establishing jurisdiction under Article 8(1).

The Court answered that question in the affirmative. It held that a court hearing claims for joint and several liability against a parent company and its subsidiary may rely on the presumption that a parent holding all, or almost all, of a subsidiary's capital exercises decisive influence over it, provided that the defendants have a genuine opportunity to rebut that presumption. The Court also confirmed that claimants may rely on Article 8(1) even in the absence of a final Commission decision establishing the joint and several liability of the parent company and the subsidiary.

The April 2026 ruling: Power Cables and Cardboard Packaging

The CJEU's ruling of 16 April 2026 in the joined cases Power Cables (Case C-672/23) and Cardboard Packaging (Case C-673/23) is the most important recent development on anchor defendants. The ruling followed a request for a preliminary ruling from the Amsterdam Court of Appeal. The cases concerned the conditions under which claimants may rely on Article 8(1) of the Brussels I bis Regulation in competition damages actions where the anchor defendant is not an addressee of the relevant infringement decision. In Power Cables, several utility companies sought damages based on the Commission's 2014 decision on the high-voltage cables cartel. They sought to establish jurisdiction through Draka Holding BV, a Dutch intermediate holding company within the Prysmian group that the Commission had not named as an addressee of the decision. In Cardboard Packaging, Unilever brought a follow-on damages action based on a 2019 decision of the Italian Competition Authority. It relied on Smurfit Kappa entities established in Amsterdam as anchor defendants, although those entities were likewise not addressees of the infringement decision.

The Court's judgment produced six main findings:

(i) Non-addressee anchor defendants may satisfy the close connection test. The CJEU held that it is sufficient for there to be 'serious indications' that the anchor defendant forms part of the same 'undertaking' as the entities to which the infringement was attributed. At the jurisdictional stage, it suffices that it cannot be excluded that the anchor defendant and the co-defendants form part of the same single economic unit.

(ii) Intermediate holding companies may serve as anchor defendants. A holding company whose activities are limited to holding and managing shares may nonetheless form part of the same economic unit and incur joint and several liability, provided that it exercises decisive influence over a subsidiary whose activities are connected to the infringement.

(iii) Foreseeability is not an independent jurisdictional criterion. The Court clarified that foreseeability must be taken into account as a general principle. It is sufficient that a reasonably well-informed defendant is able to foresee the courts before which it may be sued.

(iv) The prospects of success on the merits are irrelevant to the jurisdictional assessment, save for the purpose of detecting abuse. Under Article 8(1), a claimant cannot sue several defendants solely to remove one of them from the jurisdiction of its domicile. However, abuse may only be established where there is convincing evidence that the claimant has artificially manufactured the conditions for the application of Article 8(1). This requires the action against the anchor defendant to be manifestly unfounded, artificial or devoid of any genuine interest.

(v) Claims for harm suffered outside the EEA are not automatically inadmissible. The Court held that just because the alleged damage occurred outside the EEA does not, in itself, render the action manifestly unfounded at the jurisdictional stage, provided that a causal link between the infringing conduct and the damage can be established. This finding may prove significant for multinational groups and claimants domiciled outside the EU seeking compensation for worldwide harm before EU courts.

(vi) Article 8(1) confers both international and internal territorial jurisdiction. The Court held that a court that considers itself to lack jurisdiction under national rules governing internal territorial allocation of cases may decline jurisdiction in favour of another court, provided this does not undermine the effective application of Article 8(1).

The ruling consolidates and refines the Sumal doctrine in its interaction with Article 8(1) of the Brussels I bis Regulation. Its practical implications are considerable: it lowers the threshold for establishing international jurisdiction, broadens potential liability exposure for intermediate holding companies, and opens the door to claims before EU courts for harm suffered outside the EEA.

Service of process: Transsaqui v Volvo

A closely related procedural issue was addressed by the CJEU in Transsaqui v Volvo.^[15] Transsaqui had effected service of the summons on Volvo's subsidiary in Spain rather than on Volvo's registered office in Sweden, arguing that both entities formed part of a single economic unit. The CJEU rejected that approach, holding that service on a subsidiary does not constitute service on the parent company, even where both entities form part of the same economic unit.

The Court's reasoning rested on three grounds. First, the 'undertaking' as an economic unit lacks legal personality and cannot be the addressee of procedural acts such as service of process. Second, the rights of defence – including the right to be duly notified of proceedings – attach to each individual legal entity, not to the 'undertaking' as a whole; service on one group entity does not constitute effective notification of another. Third, the mechanisms of judicial cooperation established under Regulation (EU) 2020/1784 on the service of documents provide adequate means for effecting cross-border service, rendering it unnecessary to extend the economic unit doctrine to the procedural sphere. The ruling thus underscored that the CJEU's case law on the economic unit doctrine in the context of private enforcement pertains exclusively to substantive liability and does not extend to procedural rules governing service of process.

Final remarks

The intersection of the economic unit doctrine with the jurisdictional framework of the Brussels I bis Regulation remains one of the most rapidly evolving areas of European antitrust litigation. Through a series of recent rulings, the CJEU has progressively delineated the boundaries of the doctrine's jurisdictional reach, while consistently reaffirming that the concept of the economic unit does not constitute a freestanding basis for jurisdiction. Resolving the remaining uncertainties will require the Court to ensure that the effectiveness rationale underpinning EU competition law does not undermine the predictability and systemic coherence on which the architecture of EU private international law depends. In this regard, the ongoing work on the reform of the Brussels I bis Regulation may prove decisive: any legislative revision of the connection criterion under Article 8(1) – whether by codifying the standards developed in the Court's case law or by introducing new safeguards against abusive forum selection – could reshape the procedural landscape of antitrust damages litigation across the EU.

As private enforcement continues to grow in both scale and sophistication, the procedural rules governing where claims can be brought carry consequences no less significant than the substantive rules determining liability. The forum is not merely a venue – it is a strategic asset, and the framework governing its selection requires careful and informed consideration.

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^[1].  CJEU, Case C-425/22, MOL Magyar Olaj- és Gázipari Nyrt v Mercedes-Benz Group AG, Judgment, 4 July 2024.

^[2].  CJEU, Case C-393/23, Athenian Brewery SA and Heineken NV v Macedonian Thrace Brewery SA, Judgment, 13 February 2025.

^[3].  CJEU, Joined Cases C-672/23 and C-673/23, Electricity & Water Authority of the Government of Bahrain and Others v Prysmian Netherlands BV and Others and Smurfit Kappa Europe BV and Others v Unilever Europe BV and Others, Judgment, 16 April 2026.

^[4].  Brussels I bis Regulation, Art 8(1).

^[5].  CJEU, Case C-352/13, Cartel Damage Claims (CDC) Hydrogen Peroxide SA v Akzo Nobel NV and others, Judgment, 21 May 2015, ¶¶ 19–24.

^[6].  CDC Hydrogen Peroxide, ¶ 27.

^[7].  CJEU, Case C-59/19, Wikingerhof GmbH & Co. KG v Booking.com BV, Judgment, 24 November 2020, ¶¶ 28–33.

^[8].  CJEU, Case C-97/08 P, Akzo Nobel NV and others v European Commission, Judgment, 10 September 2009, ¶ 60.

^[9].  Akzo Nobel, ¶¶60-63.

^[10].  CJEU, Case C-882/19, Sumal SL v Mercedes Benz Trucks España SL, Judgment, 6 October 2021, ¶¶ 46-51.

^[11].  CJEU, Case C-30/20, RH v AB Volvo, Volvo Group Trucks Central Europe GmbH, Volvo Lastvagnar AB and Volvo Group España SA, Judgment, 15 July 2021.

^[12].  Regulation (EC) No 864/2007 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 July 2007 on the law applicable to non-contractual obligations (Rome II), OJ L 199, 31.7.2007, p. 40, Art 6(3)(a).

^[13].  RH v AB Volvo, ¶¶ 33–34 (dual jurisdiction rule and coherence with Rome II).

^[14].  CJEU, Case C-34/24, Stichting App Stores Claims v Apple Distribution International, Judgment, 2 December 2025.

^[15].  CJEU, Case C-632/22, AB Volvo v Transsaqui SL, Judgment, 11 July 2024.