From today, the Competition Authority is giving outside users access to its Merger Database, a store of over 400 decisions delivered since the CA was set up. The Merger Database includes information on all the corporate merger cases that were notified to and decided by the Competition Authority between January 2003 and the present. It will be updated on a permanent basis.

The link www.concorrencia.pt/bdoc allows access to non-confidential versions of the Competition Authority’s decisions and to the data relating to a case, including, for example, the important dates, a description of the undertakings involved, and the economic activities in question in the operation.

The Merger Database also contains a research area that allows users to identify merger operations by number, year of the notification or year of the decision, or, again, by the undertaking involved, the type of decision (in accordance with the phase of the case), the code in the CAE (Portuguese Classification of Economic Activities) or the economic activities in question in the merger operation.

All the confidential information supplied by undertakings in connection with a merger operation will still be restricted to the Competition Authority’s authorised services.This new functionality has been wholly created and developed by the CA’s Computer and Communication Centre, in cooperation with the Merger Control Department. It addresses the needs of many professionals who deal with the CA’s decisions on mergers between undertakings, in particular, lawyers, academics and journalists.

The database may also be accessed at the CA’s website, www.concorrencia.pt, using the side menu ‘Cases and Decisions’ or the ‘Mergers’ window on the home page.

(Nº: 23/2009)