156 COMPETITION LAW IN TOURISM of 110,000 € to the tour operator Sunair NV for the advertising of the regional airports at Ostend and Antwerp. The package included publicity features and advertisements in the catalogues produced by Sunair, which also illustrated the position occupied by the Ostend airport among Belgium's airports. According to the Commission, they constituted a simple advertising vehicle that benefited the Ostend airport and formed part of the normal activity of the Flemish Region, which owned and managed the Ostend airport, in order to publicise that airport. The remuneration corresponded to the cost of that advertising campaign, above and beyond the profits which the owner/manager of the airport was likely to expect in return. Therefore, the Commission concluded that the advertisement campaign did not constitute State aid. So why is there a different approach to the contract concluded by the CCIPB and many other airports such as Nîmes and Angoulême, with AMS/Ryanair and other low-cost airlines? In those cases, the Commission assessed whether the airports needed the marketing services in question and whether the marketing services contract was not concluded solely in order to subsidise the routes operated by the airlines at stake. The Commission also had doubts about whether the price of the services provided was not higher than the market price. Following its new approach under the Aviation Guidelines, the European Commission includes such remuneration for marketing services to promote a destination by an airline in the business plan at the level of the airport. In some cases, the inclusion of such remuneration in the business plan of the airport did impact its profitability for the airport, and the Commission excluded the existence of an aid for the airline at stake, for instance, Ryanair at Marseille Airport40. In other cases, such as Pau Airport41, Angoulême Airport42 and Nîmes Airport43, the Commission concluded the existence of an illegal and incompatible aid to Ryanair (and Transavia in the case of Pau Airport), and according to the Commission, the agreements could not have been reasonably expected to improve the financial situation of the airports concerned when they were concluded. No private airport would have accepted to grant similar terms to the airline in similar circumstances. The remunerations for the marketing services were thus requalified as illegal and incompatible operating aid. These decisions 40 Decision of 20 February 2014, Marseille Airport, SA.22932, OJ L 260, 27/09/2016. 41 Decision of 23 July 2014, Pau Airport, SA.22614, OJ L 201, 30 July 2015, p. 109. 42 Decision of 23 July 2014, Angoulême Airport, OJ L 201, 30 July 2015, SA.22614, p. 109. 43 Decision of 23 July 2014, Nîmes Airport, OJ, L 113, 27 April 2016, p. 32.
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