今年早些时候，我们报告了CJEU在C-307/18的判决中仿制(UK) Limited & Others v Competition and Markets Authority(“泛型“）并提到了CJEU的进一步指导可能遵循Lundbeckand服务器cases. On 4 June 2020, almost seven years after the European Commission (the “Commission”) first found Lundbeck and a number of generic manufacturers to have breached EU competition law, theLundbeckproceedings moved one step closer to a conclusion. The AG has applied the reasoning of the CJEU in泛型，赞同一般法院达成的结论，建议伦贝克的上诉整体被驳回。虽然意见对CJEU没有约束力，但似乎有可能达到相同的结论，因为倡导者普通Kokott的推理与CJEU的指导一致仿制.

背景到了Lundbeckproceedings

Set against a backdrop of process patents for the production of its Active Pharmaceutical Ingredient (“API”) citalopram, Lundbeck entered into six agreements with four generic manufacturers. Whilst the agreements vary in their scope, they each comprised:

• a value transfer from Lundbeck to the generic manufacturers; and

• restrictions on the generic manufacturers’ ability to enter the citalopram market (for example, by requiring the generic manufacturers to give undertakings not to sell or supply citalopram and/or requiring the delivery of any generic citalopram back to Lundbeck).

Having found that the agreements infringed EU competition law, the Commission imposed fines of more than £90 million on the parties. Following the General Court’s decision to uphold that finding, Lundbeck and the generic manufacturers appealed to the CJEU.

意见

本文侧重于三个关键问题而不是考虑意见的各个方面，而不是考虑意见的各个方面：

(1)是伦贝克和通用制造商的潜在竞争对手吗？

The AG agreed that, at the time the agreements were entered into, there was a potentially competitive relationship between Lundbeck and the generic manufacturers.

In line with the position adopted by the CJEU in仿制，AG重申，作为流程专利不能被视为进入的不可逾越的障碍，他们的存在并不意味着一位具有坚定的意图的通用制造商以及进入市场的固有能力，以及谁采取了足够的准备步骤走向市场进入，不能被描述为潜在的竞争对手。

AG还认为，委员会不需要证明通用制造商实际上能够在不侵犯Lundbecc的专利的情况下进入市场。事实上，AG认为随后被Lundbeck引起的证据表明，通用制造商侵犯了其专利，并且其专利的至少一项专利的有效性与伦贝克和通用的问题无关紧要制造商是潜在的竞争对手。什么问题是进入潜力和对专利局部的不确定性施加的竞争约束程度。

至于通用制造商采取的筹备步骤，AG认为缺乏MA没有阻止伦贝克与通用制造商之间存在潜在的竞争关系。MA的存在只是一系列通用制造商准备的因素之一。

(2)专利结算协议是否构成了“通过对象”的竞争限制？

In仿制CJEU认为，如果专利权人的价值转移到通用制造商的唯一审议是一项不进入市场并挑战专利的协议，这表明价值转移的任何其他合理解释的情况下诱导通用制造商留下市场并避免具有挑战性的专利。将此指导应用于案件的事实，AG发现伦贝克未能提供“even minimal concrete evidence that might provide an alternative explanation” for the value transfers and endorsed the General Court’s view that the agreements in issue constituted restrictions of competition ‘by object’.

Building on the guidance given by the CJEU in泛型，the AG agreed with the General Court that, when assessing the ‘by object’ nature of a restriction of competition, there is no need for an agreement to contain explicit no-challenge clauses in circumstances where the nature of the agreement ensures (as it did here) that the generic manufacturers had no incentive to challenge the patents.

(3)施加罚款时要申请的正确测试是什么？

The appellants had challenged the basis for the fines imposed by the Commission. The AG considered that the General Court had applied the correct test for establishing culpability. In order to meet the “standard for culpability”, there is no need to establish that the undertaking was in fact aware of the anticompetitive nature of its conduct. Instead, the Commission need only show that a “勤奋的经济运营商“可以合理地预计会意识到这一可能性。在事实上，AG认为Lundbeck无法不知道，它从通用制造商收到的唯一代价是不进入市场的企业。在此基础上，AG同意从Lundbeck的角度来看，这项协议可能无法侵犯第101条TFEU。

Pat Treacy是Bristows LLP竞争实践的合伙人，奥利维亚亨利是繁荣的专利诉讼实践中的助理。本文中表达的观点是作者的个人观点，而不是繁荣的LLP或其任何客户。