18.3.2016   

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 103/5

1.

On 10 March 2016, the Commission received a notification of a proposed concentration pursuant to Article 4 of Council Regulation (EC) No 139/2004 (1) by which the undertakings Česká spořitelna, a.s. (‘CSAS’, the Czech Republic); Slovenská sporiteľňa, a.s. (‘SLSP’, Slovakia) and Banca Comercială Română S.A. (‘BCR’, Romania), belonging to the Erste Group Bank AG (‘EGB’, Austria) on one hand, and Global Payments Inc. (‘GP’, United States) on the other, acquire within the meaning of Article 3(1)(b) and Article 3(4) of the Merger Regulation joint control of Global Payments s.r.o. (‘the JV’) by way of transfer of assets and purchase of shares in a newly created company constituting a joint venture.

2.

The business activities of the undertakings concerned are:

—   EGB: provision of banking, financial services and payment services including merchant acquiring services in Central and Eastern Europe,

—   GP: provision of card payment processing services, including merchant acquiring services in the EEA, and also globally,

—   JV: provision of merchant acquiring services in the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Romania.

3.

On preliminary examination, the Commission finds that the notified transaction could fall within the scope of the Merger Regulation. However, the final decision on this point is reserved.

4.

The Commission invites interested third parties to submit their possible observations on the proposed operation to the Commission.

Observations must reach the Commission not later than 10 days following the date of this publication. Observations can be sent to the Commission by fax (+32 22964301), by email to COMP-MERGER-REGISTRY@ec.europa.eu or by post, under reference M.7950 — EGB/GP, to the following address: