Ref. Ares(2018)837260 - 13/02/2018
[Redactions made under art. 4(1)(b)]
Ref. Ares(2018)4840320 - 20/09/2018
EUROPEAN COMMISSION
Directorate-General for Trade
Directorate E - Neighbouring countries, USA and Canada
USA and Canada
Brussels, 31/01/2018
E.1/
/
NOTE TO THE FILE
Subject: EU-US: Significant changes in the Trans-Atlantic Business Council
(TABC)
On 30 January Ignacio Garcia Bercero (accompanied by
) met
with outgoing CEO of TABC Tim Bennett who is retiring at the end of February. Mr.
Bennet informed that it has finally been decided to end the current TABD structure with
two offices in DC and Brussels and with dedicated staff (about 8 in total).
Instead TABC is going to operate with a much lighter 'association' structure managed by
the international law firm K&L Gates1.
Practically speaking this change means that the organisation will no longer have
any dedicated staff and will lose in-house technical know-how to push certain issues. TABC
was for example instrumental in pushing sectoral initiatives when the TEC was set up in
2005, and provided solid inputs and private sector support before TTIP was launched in
2013.
TABC will henceforth operate more as a 'networking platform', where technical inputs
will be sought from experts on a case by case basis. In a nutshell it is therefore likely that
TABC – the last remaining fully dedicated EU-US business organisation2 - will further
evolve into a more reactive rather than initiating association.
Cc:
J.L. Demarty, J. Korte, I. Garcia Bercero,
,
, Trade E1 (TRADE)
(EU DEL. Washington)
1 Former Congressman Bart Gordon will lead from the DC office of K&L, while former MEP Ignaci
Guarndans will do the same from Brussels. Both were present at the meeting.
2 Amcham represents only the interests of US companies in Europe
Commission européenne/Europese Commissie, 1049 Bruxelles/Brussel, BELGIQUE/BELGIË - Tel. +32 22991111
Office:
- Tel. direct line