Horizontal cooperation as a limitation on the scope of applicability of the rules of public procurement and the conclusion of concession contracts

EU legislation includes two limitations to the application of rules of public procurement. Beside the limitation of in-house/vertical cooperation (the Teckal doctrine), the CJEU has also developed in its case law the so-called Hamburg doctrine, which concerns horizontal cooperation between contracting authorities. In 2014, this doctrine was incorporated into Paragraph 4 of Article 12 of Directive 2014/24/EU on public procurement, Paragraph 4 of Article 17 of Directive 2014/23/EU on the award of concession contracts, and in Paragraph 4 of Article 28 of Directive 2014/25/EU on procurement by entities operating in the water, energy, transport and postal services sectors. Since the text of the paragraphs is rather concise, it is necessary to interpret it in the light of relevant judgments of the CJEU, which is the aim of this paper.