The Commission released last Wednesday €750m of funding for key European energy infrastructure projects with major cross-border benefits. Supporting the construction of necessary infrastructure, contributes to the Commission's energy policy priorities of improving energy security, whilst giving consumers more choice, and spurring economic growth and jobs.

The Commission fined Google €1.49bn for breaching EU antitrust rules as the tech giant has abused its market dominance by imposing a number of restrictive clauses in contracts with third-party websites which prevented rivals from placing their search adverts on these websites, the EU press service reported

Whistleblowers will be able to report suspected price-fixing without showing up at the offices of the EU's antitrust regulators as last Tuesday the Commission launched new online tool aimed at make it easier for companies to tackle the issue, the EU press service reported. “Users of eLeniency can directly provide corporate statements and upload supporting documents on a dedicated secure server of the Commission,” the EU said.

The Commission adopted last Tuesday a work programmes to co-finance joint defence industrial projects in 2019-2020 worth up to €500m. A further €25m were earmarked to support collaborative defence research projects in 2019, with calls for proposals already launched. The programmes are precursors to the European Defence Fund, which will become fully functioning from 2021.

The European Commission scaled up its campaign to create a new way to fund innovation in Europe, promising a €300m budget boost to help a planned funding agency to start buying shares in small European technology companies as early as this year. The initiative to form a European Innovation Council (EIC) aims to create more world-scale tech companies in Europe with a budget that will eventually top €1.5bn a year. Global competition is intensifying and the EU needs to deepen its innovation and risk-taking capability to compete on a market increasingly defined by new technologies.

In its first ever report on the matter released last Wednesday, the Commission threw light on foreign direct investment across the EU, confirming a continuous rise in foreign company ownership in key sectors in the Union and an increase in investments from emerging economies, such as China. The report illustrates the need for effective implementation of the freshly adopted EU investment screening framework.

The first pilot call under the European Universities Initiative has resulted in applications from 54 alliances, involving more than 300 higher education institutions from 31 European countries including all EU Member States. The institutions include comprehensive and research-based universities, universities of applied sciences, technical universities, as well as art and medical schools.

Ahead of the March European Council, the Commission took stock of progress made over the past 4 years and set out the measures still required to address immediate and future migration challenges, the EU press service reported. Faced with the most severe refugee crisis the world has seen since the Second World War, the EU managed to bring about a step change in migration management and border protection.

The Commission has fined Autoliv and TRW a total of €368m for breaching EU antitrust rules, the EU press service reported. Takata was not fined as it revealed the cartels to the Commission. The companies took part in two cartels for the supply of car seatbelts, airbags and steering wheels to European car producers. All three suppliers acknowledged their involvement in the cartels and agreed to settle the case.

The European Union and the State of Qatar initialled today an aviation agreement, the first such agreement between the EU and a partner from the Gulf region. As stated, the agreement was negotiated by the EU Commission on behalf of the European Member States as part of its Aviation Strategy for Europe – a milestone initiative to give a new boost to European aviation and provide business opportunities.