The Finnish Competition and Consumer Authority (FCCA) will initiate further proceedings regarding the acquisition of VTT Expert Services Oy and its subsidiary Labtium Oy by Eurofins Product Testing Lux Holding SARL.
Eurofins Product Testing Lux Holding SARL is part of the Eurofins Scientific Group, offering bioanalytical laboratory and expert services in Finland for the food, agriculture and environmental sectors. VTT Expert Services and its subsidiary Labtium offer commercial testing, inspection and certification services in sectors dealing with construction, environmental and industrial products.
On the basis of a preliminary investigation, the FCCA concludes that the acquisition could lead to harmful competition effects especially in testing, inspection and certification services related to environmental analytics and believes there are grounds for examining the matter in a further, detailed investigation.
In its further investigation, the FCCA will examine whether the planned acquisition significantly impedes effective competition on the Finnish market, or a key segment of the market. The FCCA may approve the acquisition as such, attach conditions to the approval or request that the Finnish Market Court prohibit the acquisition. According to the Competition Act, the further proceedings may not take longer than three months.
The FCCA’s decision includes business secrets of the parties involved. The decision cannot be published until the business secrets have been removed, i.e. in around two weeks’ time.
Further information:
- Research Officer Jenna Huttu, tel. +358 29 505 3576,
- Senior Research Officer Laura Kauppila, tel. +358 29 505 3335
firstname.lastname@kkv.fi
According to the Competition Act, the FCCA must be notified of the transaction if the combined turnover of the parties to the corporate transaction exceeds 350 million euros and the turnover from Finland of at least two of the parties exceeds a combined total of 20 million euros. The FCCA will approve a corporate transaction if it has none of the harmful impacts referred to in the Competition Act. The FCCA will intervene in corporate transactions if its investigations suggest that the acquisition substantially impedes effective competition on Finnish markets or a substantial part of the markets, particularly through the creation or reinforcement of a dominant market position. Where necessary, notifications of acquisitions are considered in two stages. The so-called first stage takes a month at most. If the acquisition is clearly not harmful to competition, or if the harmful effects can be prevented by means proposed by the parties to the acquisition, the acquisition is approved during the first stage. If not, the FCCA decides to conduct a further investigation of the matter, during which the acquisition and its competition effects are investigated in further detail.