EUPillar Faurecia Interieur Industrie SNC v. NV Punch International and NV Overpelt Plascobel - C/06/00061

Summary

The plaintiff is a French company active in the car industry, it designs, develops and producs plastic car parts. The defendants are two Belgian subcontractors entrusted with part of a programme for new car parts. Because of delays in the production, the plaintiff decides to put an end to the programme, with a notice period of three months. The subcontractors immediately ceased all deliveries. This put the plaintiff in a difficult position. It sued the defendants in summary proceedings to make them continue the deliveries. The defendants challenge the jurisdiction of the court. They say the contract provided that the car parts had to be delivered "DDP" (Delivery Duty Paid) in France, and that the Belgian courts do not have jurisdiction to issue provisional measures that have to be performed abroad. The parties agree that the substance of the case has to be settled by a French court, according to French law. The only issue here is the power of the Belgian courts to grant cross-border provisional measures. The President of the Commercial Court applies Art. 31 Brussels I. The President withholds jurisdiction, because the requested measure originates in Belgium: the car parts have to be produced in Belgium. It suffices that the measure has to be partially enforced in Belgium to establish jurisdiction on the basis of Art. 31. The President also grants the measure sought and orders the defendants to continue the deliveries. The plaintiff, on its end, will have to resume payment of the defendants' outstanding invoices. It will have to pay the sum of 180,000 EUR immediately and a sum of about 400,000 EUR has to paid in an escrow account. The defendants have to obtain a bank guarantee to ensure that they can reimburse the plaintiff in case they lose the case on the merits (cf. ECJ cases Van Uden and Mietz). Short critique This decision was overturned on appeal because the measures were not provisional in nature, ie not reversible. The court in fact ordered the continued performance of the agreement and thereby exceeded the scope of its jurisdiction.