The Case

On an appeal from a decision of the Court of First Instance by which it had upheld a finding of the European Commission that the applicants had engaged in anti-competitive behaviour, the European Court of Justice held, inter alia, that the court could not have annulled the contested decision unless it had been found that the lack of proper access to the investigation file given to the undertakings concerned during the administrative procedure had prevented them from perusing documents which were likely to be of use in their defence and had thus infringed their rights of defence.