Background In 2004, the European Union modernised the rules and procedures that govern the enforcement of its competition law. The entry into force of Council Regulation (EC) No 1/2003 on 1 May 2004 brought about the most comprehensive reform of the enforcement rules since they were first laid down in 1962. The EU moved from…
Last week, the European Commission adopted an updated version of its Informal Guidance Notice (“the IGN”), the mechanism that allows businesses to seek clarity regarding the compliance of specific activities with EU competition law. The substance of the IGN is animated by “guidance letters”, informal documents intended to provide legal certainty to undertakings facing novel…
On September 29th 2022, the Commission published Guidelines on the application of Union competition law to collective agreements regarding the working conditions of solo self-employed persons (hereinafter: the Guidelines). The first draft of this document was released almost a year ago as part of a package including a proposed Directive on platform work. The Guidelines,…
The long-awaited Google Android decision is out (see the press release here or the full text here). The General Court has dismissed Google’s action almost in its entirety, slightly reducing the record fine from 4.343 billion euros to (still a record) 4.125 billion euros. This post gives a very first overview of the judgment and…
Sustainability as a policy priority It is no news that sustainability is an important topic of competition policy across the EU. There is clear consensus that competition law enforcement should be careful not to hinder cooperation between companies, even competitors, that facilitates the realisation of or progress towards reaching sustainability goals of climate policy (or…
At the beginning of May 2022, the Supreme Court of Israel decided, having confirmed the position of the lower instance, that a boycott of tender construction companies should be regarded as a violation of competition law. According to the highest judicial instance of Israel, the joint decision of the competitors not to bid constitutes a…
The European Commission’s horizontal guidelines are an invaluable tool for practitioners in antitrust compliance work. The team at Unit A1 in DG COMP have done a great job at further developing the guidelines in the new draft that was published for stakeholder comments on 1 March 2022. Today, the EU & Competition team at Szecskay…
Chinese antitrust is going through what are likely the most important changes since its inception: an amendment of the Anti-Monopoly Law and the establishment of a new enforcement body. Anti-Monopoly Law amendment On 23 October 2021, the Standing Committee of the National People’s Congress – China’s legislature – published a draft revision of the…
In a speech on 22 October 2021, EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager revealed that the European Commission was planning a series of dawn raids for the months to come. She highlighted that the European Commission is not just looking to investigate traditional cartels, like price-fixing agreements, but also other types of anti-competitive conduct – such…
On 9th November 2021, the Commercial Court of Moscow will decide an antitrust case between Russian insurance companies (PJSC Rosgosstrakh and LLC Capital Insurance of Life) and the Federal Antimonopoly Services (FAS). The FAS had previously declared an agreement between the two insurance companies invalid. The case concerns the blurring lines between cartels and other agreements in Russian antitrust law. Particularly the standard of proof concerning “other agreements restricting competition” needs to be…
