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United Kingdom

EU competition law: standardisation and standard terms—Article 101 TFEU analysis, safe harbours, FRAND and case examples under the pre-2023 Horizontal Cooperation Guidelines (Archived)

Published by a LexisNexis Competition expert

Practice notes

ARCHIVED:

Revised Horizontal Guidelines were published in the Official Journal on 21 July 2023. This Practice Note was produced with the previous Horizontal Guidelines in mind and is no longer maintained. For up to date content, please refer to the relevant section in Practice Note: Analysing horizontal co-operation agreements under EU competition law.

Standardisation (or standard-setting) is widely practised and has a pivotal role across many industries and in society more broadly, delivering clear advantages, such as:

stimulating innovation
assuring product quality and safety
enabling interoperability/compatibility
reducing transaction costs

Agreements on standards primarily seek to establish technical or quality requirements that current or future production processes, methods or products must meet, for instance to ensure compatibility between products designed to work together.

Standardisation agreements may cover a range of matters, including harmonising different grades or sizes of a particular product, or setting technical specifications in markets where compatibility with other products or systems is necessary or essential.

A clear example is the GSM standard for mobile phones, given the evident economic benefits when handsets adhere to the same standard so that users on different networks can connect with each other...

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Suzanne Rab

Serle Court

Suzanne Rab is a barrister specialising in UK and EU competition law and regulation. She has over 15 years of experience advising businesses, regulators and competition authorities on EU, UK and international competition law across the range of competition law, merger control and regulatory matters. She has particular experience advising on transactions and commercial agreements and practices, including in proceedings before the UK competition and regulatory authorities and the European Commission. She has worked on some of the most high profile merger, market and cartel investigations in Europe and the UK. Suzanne has advised on major cartel investigations, appeals and follow-on actions, including advising on the European Commission’s investigation under Article 101 TFEU in relation to air freight and appeal to the General Court and in relation to antitrust investigations into cartel activity in marine hoses.Suzanne has particular experience advising on the...

Web page updated on 21/05/2026

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