James Killick, Author at Kluwer Competition Law Blog

Abuse of dominance, Excessive pricing, United Kingdom

Authorities have to consider different types of evidence. The UK Court of Appeal broadly upholds the CAT’s judgment in Phenytoin and clarifies “excessive pricing” test

James Killick, Assimakis Komninos (White & Case)/April 2, 2020April 2, 2020 /Leave a comment

Summary On 10 March 2020 the Court of Appeal upheld the Competition Appeal Tribunal’s (CAT) quashing of the Competition and Markets Authority’s (CMA) decision that Pfizer and Flynn Pharma (Flynn) had abused their dominant positions in the market by pricing their epilepsy drug unfairly. Among other aspects, the Court of Appeal broadly upheld the CAT’s…

Abuse of dominance, Effects-based, United Kingdom

The CMA Remicade decision: discount schemes and abuse of dominance – effects matter!

James Killick, Assimakis Komninos, Strati Sakellariou-Witt, Axel Schulz (White & Case)/March 28, 2019March 28, 2019 /Leave a comment

Summary On 14 March 2019, the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) decided to close its investigation into a discount scheme by Merck Sharp & Dohme Limited (MSD).[1] The CMA concluded that there were no grounds for it to take action, since MSD’s discount strategy was not likely to limit competition in anticipation of the…

Economics, European Court of Justice, European Union, Mergers

EU Court confirms the need for transparency and full disclosure of economic analyses in EU merger cases (UPS/TNT)

James Killick, Assimakis Komninos (White & Case)/January 22, 2019January 22, 2019 /Leave a comment

On 16 January 2019, the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU” or “Court”) dismissed the European Commission’s appeal against the annulment of its decision to prohibit the acquisition of TNT by UPS. The CJEU stressed the importance of respecting companies’ rights of defence as regards economic analysis and methodology used in merger control….

Excessive pricing, Pharmaceuticals, United Kingdom

Competition Appeal Tribunal quashes the CMA’s excessive pricing decision against Pfizer and Flynn Pharma

James Killick (White & Case)/June 13, 2018June 12, 2018 /Leave a comment

Summary On 7 June 2018, the UK Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) held that the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) misapplied the relevant legal test when finding that Pfizer and Flynn Pharma (Flynn) unfairly priced their epilepsy drug. The CAT quashed the record £84.2 million and £5.2 million fines that the CMA imposed on Pfizer…

European Court of Justice, Mergers

Economists Must Respect Due Process Too! EU General Court annuls Commission decision blocking UPS/TNT merger

James Killick (White & Case)/March 13, 2017March 13, 2017 /Leave a comment

The judgment reinforces due process and transparency in EU merger control proceedings. The Court made clear that due process standards will be strictly enforced in merger cases, despite the relatively tight deadlines. The Decision was, therefore, annulled for failure to respect rights of defence in relation to the handling of economic evidence by the Commission….

European Union

ECJ rips up Orange Book! New standards in Europe for SEP injunctions

James Killick (White & Case)/September 4, 2015 /1 Comment

Standards lie at the heart of the digital economy – without standards, we would not have smartphones, tablets and other key parts of modern life. Europe’s highest court recently delivered a judgment in Huawei v. ZTE[1]Judgment of the Court of Justice of 16 July 2015 in Case C‑170/13, Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd v. ZTE Corp….