1. International jurisdiction and applicable law are paramount for the entrepreneur who is planning to trade in an international area. Companies should develop a marketing strategy and specify the spatial scope in which their clients can be "captured". Hence, an entrepreneur has the right to know where he can be sued.... in case of problems....
2. In this case, responsibily arises from a defective product, a bike, manufactured in Germany by Pantherwerke AG. The bike was sold in Austria by another company (Funbike GmbH). In 2007, Mr. Kainz, who has his habitual residence in Salzburg, Austria, bought the bike from Funbike GmbH, a company established in Austria. In 2009, while riding that bike in Germany, Mr. Kainz suffered a fall that caused multiple injuries.

3. According to Mr. Kainz, his fall was caused by the fact that the legs were detached from the fork from the bicycle. And from his point of view, the product manufacturer was responsible for the manufacturing defect mentioned before. Mr. Kainz decided to sue the manfacturer before the courts of Austria in ccordance with Article 5.3 of the Bruxelles Regulation I (BR-I). The plaintiff said that the Austrian courts should have international jurisdiction because Austrai was the place where the bke was purchased and put into service. On the contrary, the company Pantherwerke AG held that the place of the harmful event was in Germany, not Austria. According to the defendant, the defective bicicle was made in Germany and then it was sent to Austria.

4. The ECJ had to determine how Art. 5.3 BR-I should be interpreted in the present case, i.e. when the responsibility of a manufacturer is required for damage caused by a defective product.

5. The ECJ held that the place where the defective product was manufactured was the place of the harmul event as the "place of origin" of the harm. Bad luck: Mr. Kainz was having the accident in Germany, so the "place of the harm" was also Germany and not Austria.....