The European Court of Justice ("ECJ") has ruled that, in certain circumstances, when a subsidiary company is wound up, its employees will transfer automatically to its holding company.

What happened?

In 1993, Air Atlantis SA ("AIA"), a Portuguese company operating charter flights, was wound up. Its main shareholder – TAP, the Portuguese flag carrier – took on AIA's unperformed charter flights using the same aircraft, assumed its charter routes and brought back employees it had seconded to AIA.