Europe

Amazon, App stores, Apple, Apps, Digital competition, Digital economy, Digital markets, Digital Markets Act, Europe, European Commission, Ex ante regulation, Facebook, Google

(University Villanueva, Spain)/ /Leave a comment

The Digital Markets Act (DMA) is now applicable. Following the 6-month interim period where gatekeepers had the opportunity to adapt their business models to the regulation, the DMA now requires them to prove their effective compliance with its provisions. To do that, on 7 March 2024, the six designated gatekeepers in September (see here) presented…

Artificial Intelligence, Europe, European Commission, European Union, Regulation

, (DLA Piper)/ /Leave a comment

The World’s first hard-law horizontal legislation on artificial intelligence is currently nearing political agreement between the European Union’s (EU) three legislative branches, the European Parliament (EP), the Council of the European Union (the Council) and the European Commission (EC). Inter-institutional negotiations (or with their technical name, trilogues) continue, and there is an incredible amount of…

Abuse of dominance, Amazon, Digital competition, Digital economy, Digital markets, Digital Markets Act, Economics, Europe, United States of America

(Intui Attorneys)/ /Leave a comment

Lawmakers and Amazon.com are involved in a constant cat-and-mouse game. Amazon.com is the big winner when consumers and businesses extensively use its digital ecosystem. As a reaction, lawmakers regulate big tech companies to protect end users and business users. This blog post argues that these regulations are not always effective and that their application is…

Digital economy, Digital markets, Digital Services Act, Europe, New Competition Tool, Platforms

(Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy)/ /Leave a comment

The current policy debate The European Commission will table two main legislative proposals on digital platforms: the Digital Markets Act (DMA) with new rules regarding the behaviour of gatekeeper platforms in competition, and the Digital Services Act with updated rules on the use of content by platforms, i.e. a reform of the e-commerce-Directive. As, amongst…

Europe, Poland, Regulation, Telecommunications, Trade between Member States

, (VVGB Advocaten/Avocats)/ /Leave a comment

Starting in 2016, the EU set out the shift to high-capacity 5G networks with the adoption of the “5G for Europe Action Plan”.[1]  These days, the buildout of the 5G network throughout Europe is starting.  Slovenia,[2] the Czech Republic,[3] Slovakia,[4] Portugal,[5] and Sweden[6] are among the first Member States to commence the 5G spectrum auctions…

Competition policy, Consultation, Europe, European Commission, Green Deal, Sustainability, Vestager

, , , (Latham & Watkins LLP)/ /Leave a comment

On 13 October 2020, the European Commission (EC) published a call for contributions to gather ideas on how EU competition rules (State aid, antitrust, and merger control) and sustainability policies can best work together. The aim is to gather the widest set of views possible to determine how the competition rules should be amended (if…

Competition proceedings, Dawn raids, Europe, Evidence, Fundamental rights, General Court of the European Union, Privacy

(White & Case, Belgium)/ /Leave a comment

On 5 October 2020, the General Court of the European Union (GC) partially annulled decisions of the European Commission (EC) to order on-the-spot inspections (dawn raids) of a number of French retailers[1]. The GC held that the EC did not have sufficiently strong evidence to launch dawn raids in respect of some of the suspected…

COVID-19, Europe, European Commission, State aid

, (Kirkland & Ellis) and (Kirkland & Ellis, Belgium)/ /Leave a comment

Our previous blog post covered the EU Commission’s (“EC”) Temporary Framework of 19 March 2020 (“Temporary Framework”), which aims at enabling national governments to use the full flexibility of State aid rules to support the economy in the context of the COVID-19 outbreak. Since the adoption of the Temporary Framework a number of Member States…

Competition, Competition law, Competition policy, Europe, European Commission, European Union, Merger control, Mergers, Minority shareholding, OECD, Regulation

(Kirkland & Ellis, Belgium)/ /Leave a comment

Common ownership currently is one of the focus topics in the antitrust community. Einer Elhauge, a Harvard Law professor, has called it the “greatest anticompetitive threat of our times”. Others believe that there is no issue at all. The below gives an overview on the status of the debate and analyses the recent EU Commission…