European Union

Digital, Digital competition, Digital economy, Digital markets, Digital Markets Act, European Commission, European Union

(University Villanueva, Spain)/ /Leave a comment

The Digital Markets Act (DMA) entails a change in the narrative of the punitive framework applied to digital dominant undertakings under EU competition law. At least, that’s what the European’s digital strategy proposed it to be. The failure of antitrust followed a new paradigm in applying per se rules to gatekeepers, based on cooperative-like mechanisms…

European Commission, European Union, Labour market, No-poach-agreement, Restriction by object

(ZESA Attorney Partnership)/ /Leave a comment

On 3 May, the EC published a policy brief on labor markets. The existing legal framework allows the EC and EU national competition authorities to take decisive action against anticompetitive agreements in labor markets. Wage-fixing and no-poach agreements are detrimental to competition in labor markets and should generally be qualified as restrictions by object. Wage-fixing…

European Union, Foreign subsidies, Foreign Subsidy Regulation, Mergers

(College of Europe, Bruges)/ /Leave a comment

It is often said that one of the greatest things about watching an important character is people wondering when he is going to make his comeback. In 2019, thirteen days after the prohibition of Siemens’ proposed acquisition of Alstom was published by the European Commission, Germany and France issued a public Manifesto ‘for a European industrial…

European Commission, European Union, Foreign direct investment, Legislation

(Norton Rose Fulbright, Belgium)/ /Leave a comment

What a difference five years make. In 2019, the European Union (EU) created a modest common framework for foreign direct investment (FDI) screening, Regulation 2019/452 (the FDI Regulation), stressing that decisions on proposed investments, and even the decision whether to engage in FDI screening at all, remained with EU Member States. A pandemic and two…

Antitrust, European Court of Justice, European Union, Professional body, Sport

(University of Oxford, Somerville College)/ /Leave a comment

Introduction On 21 December 2023 the Court changed its interpretation of EU competition law. The three judgments handed down that day asked as many questions as they answered, and it was obvious that further clarification would be required. Already in January 2024 two further rulings – Case C‑128/21 Lietuvos notarų rūmai, and others and Case…

Competition Law 2023, European Union

(University of Vienna, Austria) and (University Villanueva, Spain)/ /Leave a comment

2023 brought us a lot of developments in competition law and policy on the EU level. After 2020, 2021, and 2022, we continue to keep you up to date with the latest developments.   Article 101 TFEU Have we figured out by object and by effect yet? For their master or PhD thesis, students tend…

Agriculture, Anticompetitive agreements, European Union, Guidelines, Horizontal

(Norton Rose Fulbright, Belgium)/ /Leave a comment

Antitrust authorities around the globe are debating how best to assess sustainability agreements, i.e., agreements to achieve environmental objectives.  In the space of a few months in 2023, three leading regulators – the EU Commission, the Dutch Authority for Consumers and Markets, and the UK Competition and Markets Authority adopted guidance on the antitrust assessment…

Data Act, Data protection, Digital, Digital competition, Digital economy, Digital markets, Digitisation, European Union, Regulation

(Sciences Po Law School)/ /Leave a comment

Overshadowed by the outsize attention surrounding the AI Act Trilogue, the EU passed in late November another regulatory instrument with transformative potential for the digital economy: the Regulation on harmonised rules on fair access to and use of data (Data Act). Admittedly, the Data Act is not as groundbreaking as the AI Act. Far from…

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, Advantage, Advertising, App stores, Apple, Digital economy, Digital markets, Digital Markets Act, Digital Services Act, European Commission, European Union, Ex ante regulation, Facebook

(University Villanueva, Spain)/ /Leave a comment

The wheels of the DMA have started turning and so have the International Law Talk episodes. I had the pleasure to interview Assimakis Komninos following the Commission’s press release establishing the economic operators that it had designated as gatekeepers under the DMA. This triggering event gave us the excuse to talk about a range of…