European Business Law, the fourth volume in our series, shows how the European authorities simultaneously abolish all restrictions on access to and exercise of economic activities and support the growth of domestic markets, through the harmonization the internal legislation or the enactment of genuinely unified regulations.

European Business Law

As for competition, but according to a different method as this is not a matter of analyzing a conduct on the market or structural changes in the supply of goods or services, the Commission carries out a multi-criteria analysis to define the product concerned or like product. Three series of criteria are generally used to identify a product: its nature, its conditions of use and how it is marketed …

Multi-criteria analysis

As for competition, but according to a different method as this is not a matter of analyzing a conduct on the market or structural changes in the supply of goods or services, the Commission carries out a multi-criteria analysis to define the product concerned or like product. Three series of criteria are generally used to identify a product: its nature, its conditions of use and how it is marketed . 

The adoption of anti-dumping measures at the end of the procedure depends, to a large extent, on the definition of the product concerned . The definition of “the product under consideration” at the time the investigation is initiated, does not prevent the EU institutions from subdividing the product into individual product types or models or from relying on model-by-model or type-by-type comparisons between the normal value and the export price, provided that an overall dumping margin for the product under consideration as a whole is established . 

Anti-dumping duties may be extended to types of products which are not dumped where they are perfectly interchangeable with the product in question . According to the Court of Justice, the concept of “product concerned” within the meaning of Article 1 of the Basic Regulation read in the light of the 1994 Anti-dumping Agreement, does not necessarily refer to a product envisaged as a homogeneous whole .

Case T-326/21 Guangdong Haomei New Materials Co. Ltd, Judgment of 21 June 2023, LawLex202400004574JBJ, to define the product concerned in order to draw up the list of products liable to have an anti-dumping duty imposed, the institutions may take into account several factors such as the physical, technical and chemical characteristics of the products, their use, their interchangeability, the consumer's perception of them, distribution channels, the manufacturing process, production costs and quality. 

Case C-232/14 Portmeirion Group UK Ltd, Judgment of 17 March 2016, LawLex201600000606JBJ, holding that the constituent elements of the concept of “product under consideration”, and especially the assessment of its homogeneous nature, necessarily determine those to be attributed to the “product concerned”.

Cases C-376/15 P and C-377/15 P Changshu City Standard Parts Factory, Judgment of 5 April 2017, LawLex201700000711JBJ: the EU institutions were entitled to exclude from the calculation of the dumping margin export transactions relating to certain types of the product under consideration because there were no “comparable prices” for those product types, price comparability not being taken into account in the context of the application of Article 2(10) of the basic regulation but only in that of the application of Article 2(11) thereof. 

See, for example, regarding persulphate having a content of persulphate of more than 99%: Commission Regulation No 1748/95 of 17 July 1995, LawLex200900002750JBJ.

Case C-232/14 Portmeirion Group UK Ltd, Judgment of 17 March 2016, LawLex201600000606JBJ.

European Business Law

391. Multi-criteria analysis

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391. Multi-criteria analysis

Demandez un accès gratuit au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise

Les décisions de justice citées dans ce paragraphe :

Les notions juridiques connexes

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au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise