EUROPEAN COMMISSION
PRESS RELEASE
Brussels, 1 October 2014
State aid: Commission orders recovery of incompatible
aid from certain terrestrial digital platform operators in
Castilla-La Mancha
The European Commission has concluded that subsidies worth €46 million granted in the
Spanish region of Castilla-La Mancha to finance the digitisation and extension of the
terrestrial television network in remote areas were incompatible with EU state aid rules.
The measure only benefits terrestrial digital technology, in breach of the principle of
technological neutrality, and also discriminates between different terrestrial operators.
As a result, some operators of terrestrial platforms received a selective advantage over
their competitors and have to pay it back to the region Castilla-La Mancha. In June 2013
the Commission had already concluded that similar measures covering other regions of
Spain were incompatible with EU state aid rules (see IP/13/566).
Commission Vice-President in charge of competition policy, Joaquín Almunia, said: "The
Commission supports the transition from analogue to digital technology because it
allows a better use of scarce frequencies. However, public financing must be available to
all transmission platforms without discrimination and not only to selected operators."
Following complaints from a satellite platform operator and a terrestrial DTT operator
the Commission in 2010 opened an in-depth investigation into the public financing of the
DTT infrastructure in Castilla-La Mancha (see IP/10/1195). The investigation found that
the measure exclusively funded the digitisation of terrestrial transmission technology.
Alternative transmission platforms like satellite, cable or the internet could not
effectively benefit from those subsidies despite the fact that the satellite platform, for
instance, would be available and suitable to cover the territory. Today, many commercial
TV channels are transmitted via the satellite platform. The measure also discriminated
between different terrestrial operators, as the regional government had handed out the
subsidy directly to only two companies.
In Member States that support the digital switch-over in a technologically neutral way
other platform operators have successfully participated in open tenders. The measure
applied to Castilla-La Mancha, on the contrary, unduly distorts competition both among
DTT operators and between DTT players and operators using other technologies. The
two pre-selected companies received an undue advantage over their competitors and
therefore need to return those subsidies to taxpayers.
Background
During the 2005-2008 period Spain adopted a series of regulatory measures to manage
the switch from analogue to digital television. In the terrestrial network, this change
IP/14/1066
required upgrading the existing transmission centres and building new ones. The
Spanish territory was divided in three distinct areas:
- in area I, covering the vast majority of the Spanish population, the cost of the switchover was borne by the broadcasters;
- in the less urbanised area II, broadcasters had no commercial interest in providing the
service;
- the topography of area III excluded terrestrial transmission and the satellite platform
was chosen.
This decision concerns exclusively the measures taken for area II in the region of
Castilla-La Mancha. Measures taken in other Spanish area II regions – worth €260
million – were addressed in the Commission's decision of June 2013 (see IP/13/566).
The case of Castilla-La Mancha was treated separately as it contains specific features, in
particular the fact that the beneficiaries were pre-selected.
In its decision on subsidies for DTT in Berlin-Brandenburg in Germany, the Commission
gave indications on how Member States could support the digital switch-over in
compliance with EU State aid rules (see IP/05/1394). The Commission's decision in this
case has been upheld by the EU General Court (cases T-8/06, T-21/06 and T-24/06).
The principle of technological neutrality has furthermore been confirmed in the General
Court ruling on the Commission's decision in the Mediaset case (see CJE/10/55, case T177/07).
The Commission is currently also investigating a distinct case on potential aid granted by
Spain to broadcasters for the change of bandwidth (see IP/12/401).
The non-confidential version of the decision will be made available under the case
number SA.27408 in the State Aid Register on the DG Competition website once any
confidentiality issues have been resolved. New publications of state aid decisions on the
internet and in the Official Journal are listed in the State Aid Weekly e-News.
Contacts:
Antoine Colombani (+32 22974513, Twitter: @ECspokesAntoine )
Yizhou Ren (+32 229 94889)
For the public: Europe Direct by phone 00 800 6 7 8 9 10 11 or by e-mail
2