Collaboration and relations between economic operators in the competition for public contracts – Legal and economic analyses of grey zones between public procurement law and competition law (Grey zones)

Abstract:

EU and implementing national public procurement regulation and case law explicitly allows a great variety of collaboration forms and relations between tenderers who take part in the competition for public contracts. The legitimacy and desirability of such collaboration and relations is however regulated by EU and national competition law. In spite of the practical relevance, there is only very sparse case law at EU level, and the state of law concerning assessment of collaboration and relations between tenderers in competition for public contracts is highly unclear, which may jeopardize efficient spending of taxpayers’ money. The Ph.D. project will analyse the application of competition law in a public procurement context in order to determine how to strike the balance between collaboration and relations between tenderers and effective competition for public contracts.