Relevant legislation and statutory standards

The Notification Regulation was amended on 29 November 2006, with effect from 1 January 2007. Revised versions of the Competition Authority's forms and guidelines for standardised and complete notifications were published on 2 January 2007. The most important amendments are dealt with in section 3.1 below.

Decision-making bodies and enforcement authority(ies)

The Competition Authority

The relocation of the Competition Authority from Oslo to Bergen was completed in 2006.

The Ministry

As a result of reorganisations within the central administration, under the current government the Ministry of Modernisation (Moderniseringsdepartementet) has been replaced by the Ministry of Government Administration and Reform (Fornyings- og Administrasjonsdepartementet).

Notification requirements and procedures

Thresholds

The amendments to the Notification Regulation have increased the turnover thresholds provided for under Section 2 of the Regulation. As of 1 January 2007 concentrations are exempted from the general obligation to notify in the following situations:

1. if the combined annual turnover in Norway of the undertakings concerned is less than NOK 50 million (approximately €6.3 million); or

2. if only one of the undertakings concerned has an annual turnover in Norway of more than NOK 20 million (approximately €2.5 million).

While the Notification Regulation still uses the accounting and company law term “konsern” (i.e. corporate group) to define the group of companies that shall be included for the purpose of calculating turnover, the revised guidelines of the Competition Authority state that:

“Generally, turnover of all undertakings that are included in the new economic entity are taken into account when assessing whether the turnover threshold has been met.