Commission’s decision on aid to digital terrestrial television operators upheld
The General Court (GC) has issued its judgments on two cases Spain v Commission (T-489/21) and Cellnex Telecom and Retevisión I v Commission (T-715/21), concerning the measures adopted by the Spanish authorities to ensure the rollout of digital television in remote and less urbanised areas of Spanish territory, except in Castilla-La Mancha.
The GC focused first on selectivity and found that the Commission outlined the context, legal framework, and compared terrestrial and satellite operators sufficiently. It found that the Commission correctly defined the reference system as the entire digital broadcasting sector in Spain and the objective as digital TV transmission. The court held differences in legal frameworks between the technologies to be irrelevant as they did not affect their ability to provide digital signals.
For more information, see the GC’s judgment.