2003/599/EC: Commission Decision of 13 November 2002 (concerning the cash advance granted by France to Bull) (notified under document number C(2002) 4366) (Text with EEA relevance.)

• Articles: 4

Article 1

The aid granted by France to Bull in the form of a cash advance of EUR 450 million is compatible with the common market, subject to the conditions set out in Article 2.

Article 2

France shall submit evidence of the reimbursement by Bull, no later than 17 June 2003, of the cash advance of EUR 450 million, including interest.

Article 3

France shall inform the Commission, within two months of notification of this Decision, of the measures taken to comply with it.

Article 4

This Decision is addressed to the French Republic.

Done at Brussels, 13 November 2002.

For the Commission

Mario Monti

Member of the Commission

(1) OJ C 128, 30.5.2002, p. 8.

(2) OJ L 83, 27.3.1999, p. 1.

(3) OJ C 128, 30.5.2002, p. 8.

(4) OJ C 288, 9.10.1999, p. 2.

(5) OJ C 244, 23.9.1992, p. 2.

(6) Commission Decision 94/1073/EC of 12 October 1994 (OJ L 386, 31.12.1994, p. 1).

(7) DNP is a Japanese group.

(8) Of these employees, 1026 work in Italy, 498 in the United Kingdom, 316 in Germany, 234 in the Netherlands, 441 in Spain and Portugal, and the others (nearly 6800) in France.

(9) It should be noted that Bull's Italian service activities are in deficit.

(10) See "Bull va racheter tout de suite sa division italienne à Steria", La Tribune, 28 December 2001.

(11) By the end of 2000 Bull was already discussing selling assets so as to reduce its debts.

(12) The total cost of the redundancy plan amounts to EUR 210 million, which corresponds to the total revenue from assets sold or asset sales decided on in September 2002.

(13) Compared with the target for March 2002 of EUR 700 million, turnover in the previous having been EUR 1,27 billion.

(14) The loss is due, among other things, to provisions for restructuring of EUR 225 million.

(15) C. Jay "Bull a assaini son bilan mais doit encore faire ses preuves". La Tribune, 29 July 2002.

(16) The cash advance is in two parts: a first advance of EUR 100 million at the end of 2001 and a further advance of EUR 350 million on 14 March 2002.

(17) The French authorities explained that, for example, the firm's self-financing capacity could deteriorate more rapidly than expected.

(18) See Section II.2.

(19) This was true of other European mainframe manufacturers such as ICL, Siemens, Nixdorf, Olivetti and Philips, which had to shut down or sell their businesses in this sector.

(20) Involving changes in the portfolio of activities and staff cutbacks or retraining.

(21) Law No 2001-1276 of 28 December 2001 (Journal Officiel de la République Française, No 302, 29.12.2001).

(22) France stated that, as regards top-of-the-range servers, Bull held less than 3 % of the European market and its share of the market for IT services was less than 2 %.

(23) [...]*.

(24) Square brackets with an asterisk denote confidential information which has been deleted from the text.

(25) Bull's budget was based on overheads reduced to some 17,5 %, excluding the cost of the redundancy plan.

(26) See Section V.