Article 22 — Summary applications

1. Member States shall ensure that national competition authorities accept summary applications from applicants that have applied to the Commission for leniency, either by applying for a marker or by submitting a full application in relation to the same alleged secret cartel, provided that those applications cover more than three Member States as affected territories. 2. Summary applications shall consist of a short description of each of the following: (a) the name and address of the applicant; (b) the names of other parties to the alleged secret cartel; (c) the affected products and territories; (d) the duration and the nature of the alleged secret cartel conduct; (e) the Member State(s) where the evidence of the alleged secret cartel is likely to be located; and (f) information on any past or possible future leniency applications made to any other competition authorities or competition authorities of third countries in relation to the alleged secret cartel. 3. Where the Commission receives a full application and national competition authorities receive summary applications in relation to the same alleged cartel, the Commission shall be the main interlocutor of the applicant, in the period before clarity has been gained as to whether the Commission intends to pursue the case in whole or in part, in particular in providing instructions to the applicant on the conduct of any further internal investigations. In this period, the Commission shall inform the national competition authorities concerned about the state of play at their request. Member States shall ensure that national competition authorities may request the applicant to provide specific clarifications only regarding the items set out in paragraph 2 before they require the submission of a full application pursuant to paragraph 5. 4. Member States shall ensure that national competition authorities which receive summary applications verify whether they have already received a summary or full application from another applicant in relation to the same alleged secret cartel at the time of receipt of such applications. If a national competition authority has not received such an application from another applicant and considers the summary application to fulfil the requirements of paragraph 2, it shall inform the applicant accordingly. 5. Member States shall ensure that, once the Commission has informed the national competition authorities concerned that it does not intend to pursue the case in whole or in part, applicants are given the opportunity to submit full applications to the national competition authorities concerned. Only in exceptional circumstances, when strictly necessary for case delineation or case allocation, may a national competition authority request the applicant to submit the full application before the Commission has informed the national competition authorities concerned that it does not intend to pursue the case in whole or in part. The national competition authorities shall have the power to specify a reasonable period within which the applicant is to submit the full application together with the corresponding evidence and information. This is without prejudice to the right of the applicant to voluntarily submit a full application at an earlier stage. 6. Member States shall ensure that if the applicant submits the full application in accordance with paragraph 5, within the period specified by the national competition authority, the full application is deemed to have been submitted at the time of the summary application, provided that the summary application covers the same affected product(s) and territory(ies), as well as the same duration of the alleged secret cartel, as the leniency application filed with the Commission, which may have been updated.

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Source: EUR-Lex CELLAR · retrieved 2026-08-27