On 8 October 2015, the Finnish Government passed a bill that amends Section 1 of the Decree on the duty to notify of mergers and acquisitions (1012/2011). Following the amendment, as of 1 November 2015, notifications of mergers and acquisitions must be submitted to the Finnish Competition and Consumer Authority (FCCA) electronically, and paper copies will no longer be required.
This means abandoning the practice whereby notifications of mergers and acquisitions, as defined in the Competition Act, and their annexes, are submitted on paper and both the original and four copies need to be provided.
In the future, notifications of mergers and acquisitions, as well as their annexes, must be brought to the FCCA’s reception desk, during office hours, on a USB memory stick. As before, separate files must be created of the notification itself and each of its annexes.
The processing time specified in the Competition Act for mergers and acquisitions will be calculated from the date on which the FCCA receives the USB memory stick containing the notification. The amendment does not affect the information that needs to be provided in the notifications.
If necessary, the details of notifications can be agreed flexibly with individual notifiers, as before.