The EU Commission has approved, subject to divestiture commitments, the acquisition of the French glass container manufacturer BSN Glasspack, SA, by its US-based competitor Owens-Illinois Inc. The transaction initially raised competition concerns because the two companies are direct competitors in a number of already highly-concentrated regional markets in the EU. However, OI's commitments to divest two glass bottle plants in Span and Italy, enabled the Commission to clear the deal. The merging firms' EU plant networks are largely complementary on a national basis, ie that they do not operate production plants in the same Member States. However, OI and BSN are direct competitors in 2 regional markets comprising north-eastern Spain/SW France and, south-eastern France/Northern Italy.
