8.
To be more specific, Competition law covers most of the aspects of economics such as goods, services and intellectual property rights. Its provisions are framed in broad terms so are subject to the interpretation of the European Court of Justice and they can also be used against firms regardless of existence of registered office in the EU. These rules are pragmatic, so are subject to exceptions to preserve market efficiency and penalties apply where trade in the EU is affected, so can apply to small firms and inter-state disputes. Following from this, it is worth mentioning that it is possible for EU Competition law and national law to co-exist.9'10 In other words, under the regime introduced by Regulation 1/200311 the Commission shared the competence to apply Articles 101 and 102 with national competition authorities and national courts.12 'EU Competition law has received a wide variety of critiques of not being flexible enough by treating all practices alike or 'the admission that the market alone cannot effect competition'13 but the EU has succeeded in framing cohesive and consistent objectives, identified in the Commission's Ninth Report on Competition Policy. Some of these objectives are achieving fairness in the market, protecting the consumer and penalising unlawful state subsidies.14 The proof that Competition law is connected with economics and economic behaviour is in articles 101 and 102 of TFEU and the measures provided in them help protect economy, influence it and endorse healthy competition. The detailed answers that Competition law is about economics are in these two articles and that's why a closer discussion regarding them is needed. .
'Article 101 is the principle vehicle for the control of anti-competitive agreements and is aimed at private bodies or 'undertakings'. Both Articles 101 and 102 are concerned with the behaviour of undertakings but they don't provide its definition which can be extracted from case law.