1. When the Commission opens an in-depth investigation pursuant to Article 10(3) of Regulation (EU) 2022/2560, the time limit within which the undertaking under investigation, any other natural or legal person, Member States and the third country that granted the foreign subsidy may submit their comments in writing shall be fixed by the Commission and shall normally not exceed one month from the date on which the undertaking under investigation has been informed about the decision, or from the date of publication of the summary notice of the decision in the Official Journal of the European Union in all other cases. Comments shall be submitted in accordance with Articles 25 and 26.
2. In duly justified cases, the Commission may extend the limit set out in paragraph 1.
3. Where the submission includes confidential information, the submitting person shall provide a non-confidential version of the submission at the same time as the confidential version.
1. Where the Commission interviews a person in accordance with Article 13(7) of Regulation (EU) 2022/2560, the Commission shall, at the beginning of the interview, state the legal basis and the purpose of the interview, and inform the person interviewed that it will document the interview.
2. An interview conducted pursuant to Article 13(7) of Regulation (EU) 2022/2560 may be documented in any form.
3. A copy of the documented form of the interview shall be made available to the person interviewed for comments within a time limit set by the Commission.
1. Where officials or other accompanying persons authorised by the Commission ask authorised external representatives or members of staff of an undertaking or association of undertakings for explanations pursuant to Article 14(2), point (c) or Article 15 of Regulation (EU) 2022/2560, those explanations may be documented in any form.
2. A copy of any documentation made pursuant to paragraph 1 shall be made available to the undertaking or association of undertakings concerned after the inspection.
3. Where a member of staff of an undertaking or association of undertakings who is not or was not authorised by the undertaking or by the association of undertakings to provide explanations on behalf of the undertaking or association of undertakings has provided explanations to the Commission, the Commission shall set a time limit within which the undertaking or the association of undertakings may communicate to the Commission any change to the explanations provided by such member of staff. The changes shall be added to the explanations as documented pursuant to paragraph 1.
Information from the contracting authorities and contracting entities in charge of public procurement procedures
1. The obligation of the Member States pursuant to Article 13(5) of Regulation (EU) 2022/2560 to provide the Commission, upon its request with all necessary information to carry out investigations under Regulation (EU) 2022/2560 extends, in particular, to the contracting authorities and contracting entities in charge of the relevant public procurement procedures that have information relevant to the investigation.
2. The relevant contracting authority or contracting entity shall transfer to the Commission with the notification the copies of the documents used in the preparation of the procurement documents, including, if available, any research and the internal budget for the procurement, as well as the copies of any other documents the relevant contracting authority or contracting entity may consider crucial for the investigation. Where the notifying parties submit information under Section 4 of Annex II, the relevant contracting authority or contracting entity shall also forward the copies of all of the submitted tenders relating to the public procurement procedure in question. Where the tenders have not yet been submitted or are not available at the time of the notification, the copies shall be transferred to the Commission as soon as they become available. Where the relevant contracting authority or contracting entity does not or is not able to transfer to the Commission the copies of all the documents relevant for the investigation, the Commission shall request it to transfer the copies of the specific documents relevant to the Commission’s investigation.
Submission of information on unduly advantageous tender
1. To the extent not already provided by the notifying parties in their notification submitted pursuant to Article 29 of Regulation (EU) 2022/2560, justifications and related supporting documents listed in the form set out in Annex II, related to the assessment of the unduly advantageous nature of a tender, shall be submitted to the Commission according to the time limits and format specified in Article 8 and may be submitted during the preliminary review.
2. Where the notifying parties decide to make use of the possibility to submit justifications, they shall accompany this submission with all the related supporting documents listed in the form set out in Annex II in order to substantiate their claim.
3. When providing supporting documents, the undertaking under investigation shall identify any information that it considers to be confidential, shall duly justify such confidentiality claim, and shall provide a separate non-confidential version.
