Delimitis v Henninger Bräu [1991] CaseC-234/89

German beer market. There are 4-5 main breweries and restaurants/pubs tied to one of those with EPA. Owner was tied to one of these breweries. Owner of public house tried to argue that that EPA was contrary to Article 101.

Question was whether EPA has an anti-competitive object to begin with.

• No, because mutual benefit.

Court also said there is no clear anti competitive object. Therefore, court went on to consider compatibility with 101.

• So now, look at if effects are anti.-competitive. Need to carry out extensive market analysis.

• Court pointed out that if you look at structure of beer market, it was a multitude of identical agreements all across the beer market, and were the sum of those agreements going to distort competition? Had to take this into account.

Court said to conditions – see (a) and (b) , above: where the object of an agreement is not expressly the prevention, restriction or distortion of competition, the determination of its effects requires market analysis.

Two cumulative conditions need to be satisfied:

1. The network of agreements should have the effect of denying competitors access to the market and

2. The agreement should contribute significantly to the sealing off effect of the market.