Page 31 - FAIR TRADE COMMISSION 2023 ANNUAL REPORT

The Commission adopts a tiered review system to evaluate mergers. Normal or simplified review procedures are decided in accordance with the level of concern about competition restraints being created. To increase review efficiency, the Commission’s merger working group solicited opinions from the industrial sector and presented a proposal regarding the revision of related measures to relax merger controls, including amending the Merger Types to Which Paragraph 1 of Article 11 of the Fair Trade Act Does Not Apply and the Fair Trade Commission Disposal Directions (Guidelines) on Handling Merger Filings, adding merger types that did not require filing, and extending the range of application of the simplified procedure. The effort greatly reduced the enterprises’ merger filing burden and shortened the reviewing time. At the same time, the Fair Trade Commission Disposal Directions (Guidelines) on Handling Extraterritorial Merger Cases were repealed. The application of different disposal directions in cases involving extraterritorial mergers or not was no longer a concern.
(2) Important mergers
● Uni-President and Presicarre
Uni-President Enterprises Corp. (hereinafter referred to as Uni-President) and President Chain Store Corp. (President Chain) together held 40% of the shares of Presicarre Corp. (Presicarre). Uni-President and President Chain intended to acquire the remaining 60% from Presicarre for 29 billion dollars. After the merger, Uni-President would hold 70% of the shares of Presicarre and President Chain would hold 30%. Presicarre would become a subsidiary of Uni-President. The condition complied with the merger patterns described in Subparagraphs 2 and 5, Paragraph 1, Article 10 of the Fair Trade Act. Meanwhile, the merging parties’ shares of the domestic instant noodles, dairy product, ready-to-drink tea and convenience store service markets and global and domestic sales respectively achieved the filing thresholds specified in Subparagraphs 2 and 3, Paragraph 1, Article 11 of the Fair Trade Act whereas the exemption regulation in Article 12 of the same act was inapplicable. Therefore, the two enterprises filed a merger notification with the Commission.
29
Important Achievements in 2023