Press Release: Mergers: Commission clears proposed takeover of Austrian Airlines by Lufthansa, subject to conditions

On 28 August, 2009, the European Commission approved, under the EU Merger Regulation, the proposed acquisition of Austrian Airlines by Deutsche Lufthansa AG of Germany. The decision was conditional upon the implementation of a set of remedies offered by Lufthansa to remove the Commission's competition concerns. The Commission's in-depth investigation, opened on 1 July 2009, indicated that the transaction, as originally notified, would have led to competition concerns on a number of routes. The in-depth investigation enabled the Commission to reduce the number of routes where it was concerned that the transaction would result in consumers being faced with reduced choice and likely higher prices to the routes Vienna-Frankfurt, Vienna-Munich, Vienna-Stuttgart, Vienna-Cologne and Vienna-Brussels. Lufthansa submitted commitments which have removed these competition concerns on all these routes.