The European Union's highest court has thrown out a lower court ruling that annulled the European Commission's approval of a merger between Sony and BMG. The European Court of Justice (ECJ) also ordered that the lower court, the Court of First Instance, reconsider its decision in order to review three of five pleas it had not dealt with previously.

 

A High Court statement read: "The Court of Justice sets aside the judgment of the Court of First Instance relating to the Sony BMG joint venture. Since the Court of First Instance examined only two of the five pleas relied on by Impala, the Court of Justice considers that it is not in a position to give a ruling itself on the dispute. It is accordingly referring the case back to the Court of First Instance."

The ruling comes as a blow to Impala, an organization of independent record labels that fought a long legal battle to break up the merger on the grounds that it hurt competition. With the latest decision, Sony BMG has now effectively passed all possible legal challenges and can continue with the status quo.

Impala said it was disappointed with today's decision, but that the lower court remained free to conclude that the commission had got it wrong, in which case the merger approval decision could be annulled all over again. "When the Court of First instance overturned the first approval, it was with good reason," Impala co-president Michel Lambot said in a statement. "This final judgment confuses the issue."