Federal Minister Altmaier and Executive Vice-President Vestager present ambitious agenda at European Competition Day in Berlin

The Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy is holding the European Competition Day in Berlin on 7 and 8 September 2020. The European Competition Day is the central conference on competition policy during the German EU Council Presidency. High-level representatives from government, academia, ministries and competition authorities, the business and legal communities are set to discuss issues on the current EU competition policy agenda.

Economic Affairs Minister Peter Altmaier said: “The Covid-19 pandemic is increasing the challenges already posed by digitisation and globalisation. We need a level playing field in the platform economy and in the competition between different systems due to companies which are backed by third countries and, to this extent, are not subject to EU State aid rules. I am glad that the European Commission has responded to this with an ambitious competition agenda. We have a shared goal: to maintain fair conditions for competition on the EU Single Market going forward. We will make use of Germany’s EU Council Presidency to constructively progress the various initiatives.”

The event, which will also be attended by Margrethe Vestager, Executive Vice-President of the European Commission, focuses not least on how to counter the distortive effects of foreign subsidies on the internal market. Discussions will also cover the best way to handle digital companies with significant market power.