With our Update on Capital Market Law No. 037 of July 31, 2020 , we had already reported that the European legislator is planning on temporarily making it easier for companies to raise equity capital in order to overcome the effects of the Corona crisis ...
On November 12, 2020, just one day after the European Data Protection Board (“EDPB”) published its recommendations on additional measures for data transfers to third countries (Recommendation 01/2020), the European Commission published a draft of the long-awaited updated Standard Contractual Clauses (“SCCs”). Under Art. 46 GDPR, these can serve as the basis for data transfers to third countries without an adequacy decision ...
Following a decision of the Hamburg Regional Labour Court, the works council has an enforceable right of co-determination with the definition of staffing ratios – in accordance with § 87 exp. 1 No. 7 BetrVG. The co-determination right aims at avoiding an otherwise health-endangering overloading of the personnel ...
LAG Baden-Württemberg, judgement of 17.09.2020, 17 Sa 8/20 The unauthorized, deliberate deletion of operational data on the employer's IT systems represents a significant breach of duty and is generally suitable to justify a termination of the employment relationship without notice period. Facts The parties are in dispute about the validity of the extraordinary, alternatively ordinary, notice of termination pronounced by the employer ...
Regional Labor Court Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, ruling of July 30, 2019, 5 Sa 233/18 It is up to the employer to decide how to react to a conflict situation in the company, regardless of the causes and responsibilities of the disputants. FACTS The parties dispute over the validity of transferring the plaintiff to another workplace to resolve an interpersonal conflict ...
The German Federal Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information (BfDI) sees the decision as a success: On November 11, 2020, the District Court of Bonn reduced the fine imposed on 1&1 Telekom GmbH for a data protection breach from an original EUR 9.55 million to EUR 990,000.00, thereby fundamentally calling into question the fine practices of the German supervisory authorities ...
The Coronavirus pandemic has caused a shift in the paradigm of modern-day workplaces. Companies across the globe have seen a rapid and widespread shift to remote work, making compliance with the GDPR harder than ever. The Federal Office of Information Security (BSI), in its recent report on the ‘State of IT Security in Germany 2020’, expressed its concern and indicated a ‘tense situation’ for data protection in the country ...
Over-indebted companies still exempted from filing duty until 31 December 2020COVID-19-affected companies to benefit from easier access to protective shield proceedings and preventive restructuring schemes/ regimes as from 1 January 2021 Two German legislative initiatives taken in September 2020 will have an immediate impact on the options available to restructure a business under German law: DUTY TO FILE FOR INSOLVENCY RE-INSTATED FOR ILLIQUID COMPANIES AS OF 1 OCTOBER 2020; SUSPENSIO
BAG, ruling dated May 13, 2020, 4 AZR 528/19 The employee's remuneration, referred to in an employment contract as "collectively agreed salary" is to be understood as a "dynamic reference clause". If a reference "to the collective agreements applicable for the Company" has been agreed upon in the employment contract, this reference is limited to the binding collective agreements applicable for the employer at the time the contract is concluded ...
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the media has repeatedly reported about terminations by the employer, which are based on the fact that employees did not adhere to corona measures during their leisure time, for example because they took part in large anti-corona demonstrations and disregarded the distance rule or were associated with anti-constitutional ideas ...
BUSINESS STABILIZATION AND RESTRUCTURING ACT (STARUG) On 18 September 2020, the German Federal Department of Justice published a first draft bill for the implementation of the EU Directive 2019/1023 on preventive restructuring frameworks of 20 June 2019 (the „Draft Bill“) ...
In July 2020, the European Court of Justice (C-311/18, "Schrems II") declared the EU-US Privacy Shield as invalid as the legal basis for the transfer of personal data to the USA and increased the requirements on the EU standard contractual clauses ...
BAG dated February 13, 2020 - 6 AZR 146/19 ("Air Berlin") In the context of collective redundancies, the term "company" is a legal term under European Union (EU) law and, with regard to the responsible employment agency, it focus particularly on the local effects of the intended dismissals. In the EU legal system, the term "company" is to be interpreted autonomously, uniformly and detached from the national understanding of the term ...
Regional Court of Nuremberg, decision of June 18, 2020 - 1 TaBV 33/19 The Regional Labor Court (Landesarbeitsgericht - LAG) of Nuremberg had to rule on a motion by a works council, in which the latter demanded that the discussions held with it be conducted only in German. At the same time, it demanded that all communication between the branch management and the employees be conducted in German. The Regional Court rejected both motions of the works council ...
The summer holidays have already begun in most of the federal states or are about to begin. Due to the Corona pandemic, most holiday plans could not be realized during the Easter holidays. Although the travel warnings for most countries in the EU were lifted in time for the summer holidays, it is still not possible to enjoy "normal" holidays this year ...
Due to the Corona pandemic and the associated economic effects, numerous companies were forced to announce short-time work over the past few months. This raises the question for employers to what extent it is still possible to hire during short-time work and what effects this has on short-time working compensation. NEW HIRES DURING SHORT-TIME WORK First of all, a distinction must be made between new hires before and after the introduction of short-time work ...
In June, the European Commission has published the "White Paper on levelling the playing field as regards foreign subsidies". For the first time that the European Commission has brought together State aid and investment control as well as trade defence instruments. Companies coming from third countries can expect costly and lengthy examination procedures in M&A transactions, but also new hurdles for other activities in the internal market ...
The Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure (BMVI) is providing EUR 50 million annually until 2023 to promote computer games in order to strengthen Germany as a location for developers. In the first phase,de minimis funding will be provided with grants of up to EUR 200,000. In a second phase larger-scale funding will also be possible ...
When the corona pandemic broke out, many employers allowed their employees to work in home office or even forced them to do so. In the meantime, many uncertainties have been clarified and the desire for normality is increasing among both employers and employees. Therefore, in the following, we will describe what employers must take into account when employees return from home office. 1 ...
In order to tackle the effects of the Corona crisis, it is planned at EU level to temporarily facilitate the raising of equity capital for companies. This will enable certain issuers to publish a shortened prospectus with only 30 pages instead of a full prospectus to issue shares. Through this, issuers will have the option to issue shares at short notice, without bureaucracy and inexpensively, thereby improving the debt-to-equity ratio in their balance sheets ...
In July, the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi) compiled a draft law on data protection and the protection of privacy in the context of electronic communication and telemedia (the “Telecommunications and Telemedia Data Protection Act” [Telekommunikations-Telemedien-Datenschutz-Gesetz],“TTDSG”) – which has not yet been officially published ...
Summertime is holiday time. Although the worldwide travel warning issued by the Federal Foreign Office for some European countries was lifted on 15 June 2020, currently (as of 17 July 2020, 5:30 p.m.) 130 countries are still classified as risk areas. These include Turkey and the USA, which are popular destinations for German holidaymakers ...
The Corona Warning App, commissioned by the German Federal Government, has been available for download since June 16, 2020. The availability of the app raises numerous employment-law issues ...
In order to tackle the effects of the Corona crisis, it is planned at EU level to temporarily facilitate the raising of equity capital for companies. This will enable certain issuers to publish a shortened prospectus with only 30 pages instead of a full prospectus to issue shares. Through this, issuers will have the option to issue shares at short notice, without bureaucracy and inexpensively, thereby improving the debt-to-equity ratio in their balance sheets ...
The Baden-Württemberg Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information (LfDI) has imposed a fine of €1,240,000 on the AOK Baden-Württemberg health insurance provider. The reason? Data processing errors related to prize draws it ran: the health insurance provider had not obtained the valid consent for data processing of prize draw entrants in 500 cases. An internal whistleblower notified the LfDI about the breach ...
