The story
The organisation was established in 1995, in preparation for the 1995–96 season, and was headquartered in Dublin. ERC's had nine major shareholders: the six tier 1 unions and three club associations, which were all represented on the board of directors:
Unions
Rugby Football Union
Fédération Française de Rugby
Irish Rugby Football Union
Scottish Rugby Union
Welsh Rugby Union
Federazione Italiana Rugby
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Club associations
Premiership Rugby
Ligue Nationale de Rugby
Regional Rugby Wales
In 2012, Premiership Rugby and LNR, on behalf of the English and French clubs respectively, notified ERC that they would be withdrawing from the accord governing the competition, being dissatisfied with the organisation of the competition and the distribution of funding. Premiership Rugby subsequently refused to join any new agreement in which ERC remained organisers of European rugby tournaments.
In April 2014 the nine shareholders with an interest in continuing major European club competition came to an agreement for new competitions. Under the new agreement, ERC was wound up, and a new body, European Professional Club Rugby (EPCR), was created to organise three new competitions, European Rugby Champions Cup, the European Rugby Challenge Cup, and the third tier Qualifying Competition, beginning with the 2014–15 season.
From Wikipedia’s article on European Rugby Cup, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.4