Crown Holdings and Silgan Holdings have failed in their court challenge against the transfer of a cartel investigation to the European Commission, according to a report by MLex.

The two packaging manufacturers had contested the decision to move the antitrust probe from national competition authorities to the EU level. The General Court of the European Union rejected their arguments, clearing the way for the European Commission to continue handling the investigation.

The case stems from a competition inquiry into the metal packaging sector. Under EU referral rules, national competition authorities and the Commission may agree that a case with cross-border effect is better dealt with at Union level. Such transfers can raise the stakes for the companies involved: Commission investigations carry the possibility of significantly higher fines, calculated on the basis of group-wide worldwide turnover, than penalties available under many national regimes.

Crown and Silgan, two of the world's largest producers of metal food and beverage containers, objected to the reassignment of the probe. Their challenge failed, and the Commission's competence over the investigation now stands confirmed by the EU courts.

For practitioners, the outcome is a reminder that referral decisions are difficult to resist once authorities on both sides agree to consolidate a case in Brussels. Companies facing parallel national investigations should treat the possibility of an EU-level transfer as a live strategic risk from the earliest stage of a probe, with consequences for fine exposure, leniency strategy and the coordination of defence submissions across jurisdictions.

The decision confirms that the Commission will retain control of the cartel investigation into the sector, and that the companies will answer to the EU enforcement regime rather than to national authorities.

Note: The underlying report was published by MLex. Specific case references, the date of the judgment and the identity of the court division were not contained in the source material available to Global Law Wire.