Annotation on the Judgment of the Court of Justice (Seventh Chamber) of 18 November 2021 in Case C-306/20 Visma Enterprise SIA v Konkurences padome
The Court of Justice of the European Union’s preliminary ruling in Case C-306/20 Visma Enterprise SIA v Konkurences padome addressed the competition law implications of an agreement between a software vendor and its distributors under which the latter registered sales leads in a database operated by the vendor. The first distributor to register a transaction was given priority, for six months, to complete the sale process with the prospective customer – provided the customer did not object. The Court’s preliminary ruling re-affirmed that “by object” restrictions of competition should be interpreted narrowly, and that “vertical” agreements are generally less harmful than “horizontal” agreements. It also confirmed that relevant circumstances and the context of the agreement must be analysed on a case-by-case basis to assess whether the exemption conditions in Article 101(3) TFEU are met. Thus, the Court confirmed relevant precedents and existing legal principles in its preliminary ruling and provided general guidance to the referring Latvian court that will ultimately decide on the legality of this deal registration agreement.