34The General Court examined first the legal nature of the corrective decision. After finding, in paragraph 69 of the judgment under appeal that the legislation governing procedure in State aid matters does not provide expressly for a corrective decision and extension of a pending procedure, the General Court held as follows in paragraphs 71 to 73 of the judgment under appeal:71. [I]t is logical and, moreover, in the interest of potential recipients of an aid scheme that, should the Commission discover, after the adoption of a decision to open the formal investigation procedure, that that procedure is based either on an incomplete set of facts or on an incorrect legal characterisation of those facts, it has the possibility of adapting its position by adopting a corrective decision. A corrective decision, comprising a fresh call on interested parties to submit their comments, affords them the opportunity to react to the changed position as set out in the Commission’s preliminary assessment of the measure in question and to put forward their viewpoint on the matter.72. It should also be observed that the Commission could equally have chosen to adopt first of all a decision closing the procedure definitively and then a fresh decision to open the formal investigation procedure, on the basis of its revised legal assessment, which would have had the same substantive content as the corrective decision. In those circumstances, considerations of procedural economy and the principle of sound administration highlight the preferability of the adoption of a corrective decision over the closure of the procedure and opening of a fresh procedure. It should be noted in that context that the correction of the subject-matter of the procedure enabled the Commission to take account, for the purposes of the contested decision, of the observations submitted by Grand Hotel Abi d’Oru following the opening decision, which would not have been the case had it closed the formal investigation procedure in order to open a new one.73. As regards the legal characterisation of such a corrective decision, given that it is in addition to the opening decision and together with it forms the revised opening decision, it accordingly shares the same legal status. It should be remembered in that regard that the sole aim of the notification of the opening of the formal investigation procedure is to obtain from persons concerned all information required for the guidance of the Commission with regard to its future action (Case 70/72 Commission v Germany [1973] ECR 813, paragraph 19, and Case T-266/94 Skibsværftsforeningen and Others v Commission [1996] ECR II-1399, paragraph 256).’
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