Correspondence with EU gatekeepers from September 5
Dear Competition,
Under the right of access to documents in the EU treaties, as developed in Regulation 1049/2001, I am requesting documents which contain the following information:
Meetings between Margrethe Vestager and Apple, Alphabet, Meta, Bytedance, Microsoft and Amazon since September 5 2023 to today.
Any meetings scheduled between Vestager and Apple, Alphabet, Meta, Bytedance, Microsoft and Amazon from today until March 7 2024.
On those meetings, I am requesting the following documents:
- All minutes, agendas, summary, memos and any other reports of these meetings, issued both in preparation and after the meetings took place.
- All correspondence including attachments (including, but not limited to any emails, correspondence or telephone call notes) and follow-ups, between any Directorates General/the cabinet, Commissioner Vestager and the companies/organizations or any intermediaries representing their interests.
- All correspondence including attachments (i.e. any emails, correspondence or telephone call notes) and followups, between any Directorate Generals, the cabinet and Commissioner Breton about those meetings, issued both prior and after.
- All documents prepared for the meetings and exchanged in the course of the meetings between both parties.
Yours faithfully,
Edith Hancock
POLITICO Srl
Rue de la Roi, 62
Dear Sir or Madam,
We hereby acknowledge the receipt of your request for access to documents
sent on 02/02/2024 and registered on 02/02/2024 under the case number
2024/0674.
We will handle your request within 15 working days as of the date of
registration. The time-limit expires on 23/02/2024. We will let you know
if we need to extend this time limit for additional 15 working days.
To find more information on how we process your personal data, please see
[1]the privacy statement.
Yours faithfully,
Directorate-General for Competition - Access to Documents
European Commission
References
Visible links
1. https://ec.europa.eu/info/principles-and...
Hello,
We are writing concerning your request for access to Commission documents
registered on 02/02/2024 under case number 2024/0674.
We are currently working on your request. However, we have not yet been
able to gather all the elements necessary to carry out a full analysis of
your request. We will not be able to send you the reply within the
prescribed time limit expiring on 23/02/2024 for the following reason :
• the application concerns documents held by different Services, which
must be consulted.
Therefore, in line with Article 7(3) of [1]Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001,
we need to extend this time limit by 15 additional working days. The new
time limit expires on 14/03/2024.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.
Kind regards,
References
Visible links
1. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/...
Dear Madam,
We refer to your application dated 2 February 2024 in which you make a
request for access to documents, registered on the same day under the
above mentioned reference number.
Please find attached a scan of the reply to your request for access to
documents, signed by the Director General.
Kind regards,
Vicky VAN DELSEN
Case Secretary
European Commission
DG Competition
Unit J.3 – Markets and cases VI: Digital Platforms III
MADO 15/32
B-1049 Brussels/Belgium
+32 2 298 81 23
[1][email address]
References
Visible links
1. mailto:[email address]
Dear Competition
Thank you for your response.
While I understand that there are cases ongoing and contain market sensitive information , I believe this response is disproportionate to the concern at hand and that it should be possible to recieve some (if not all) of the documentation requested. There is also a clear public interest in knowing how the Commission is interacting with companies subject to new provisions under the Digital Markets Act at the highest level, and rejecting the request in its entirety goes against the spirit of the right of access to documents in the EU treaties, as developed in Regulation 1049/2001.
I also note that a previous access to documents request that did concern Google's (Alphabet's) meeting with Margrethe Vestager in May concerning the Digital Markets Act resulted in a successful disclosure.
Would it be possible to receive a smaller pool or redacted version of the documents requested (such as meeting memos for both Alphabet and Apple or mission reports)?
Thank you for any help you can provide.
Best regards,
Edith Hancock
Dear Ms Hancock,
thank you for your email of 14 March 2024, following receipt of the letter signed by the Director-General of DG Competition, Olivier Guersent of 11 March 2024 (Ares(2024)1900022).
In this letter of 11 March 2024, the Director-General of DG Competition provided you with a detailed assessment of your request for access to documents pursuant to Regulation 1049/2001 and why access to the documents you had requested access to has to be refused as the requested documents form part of the case files in pending investigations under Regulation (EU) 2022/19252 (the Digital Markets Act, hereinafter the ‘DMA’) and therefore fall under the exceptions of Article 4 of Regulation 1049/2001.
You were also informed of the possibility to make a confirmatory application requesting the Commission to review this position.
Kind regards,
The COMP DMA team