On 15 August 2014, the Competition and Markets Authority (“CMA”) approved Alliance Medical Group’s completed acquisition of IBA Molecular’s radioactive medical tracer business. Although IBA’s business was loss-making, would have exited the market and there was no other credible buyer for it, the CMA refused to apply the ‘failing firm’ (or ‘exiting firm’) defence, as…
On 9 July 2014, the European Commission published a White Paper setting out proposals to amend the EU merger control system. The proposed reform of the system is the most significant in the last 10 years and could have an impact on many corporate transactions. The proposals The proposals deal with the following: the expansion…
On 10 June 2014, the Polish Parliament adopted a significant set of amendments to the Polish Competition Law Act (the “Act”). Having received Presidential approval on 30 June 2014, the amended Act is now waiting for publication. The changes are expected to come into force relatively soon. The amendments will take effect 6 months after…
Co-authored by Nicola Boyle, Tom Bolster and Boris Bronfentrinker, Hausfeld On 5 June 2014, the Court of Justice of the European Union (ECJ) clarified the full extent of cartel damages that can be recovered in Europe. The ECJ ruled that the civil liability of cartelists also extends to so-called “umbrella pricing”. This term describes pricing…
On 6 May, the Dutch government issued a set of policy directions (“Directions”) to the Dutch competition authority (“ACM”) concerning the application of the Dutch equivalent of Article 101(3) TFEU in respect to sustainability initiatives. Around the same time, ACM published a Vision Document setting out how the authority intends to implement the Directions in…
Private damages litigation is an important complement to public enforcement of UK and EU competition law by the European Commission and national competition authorities (“NCAs”), such as the UK’s newly formed Competition and Markets Authority (“CMA”). Whilst there has been a noticeable increase in private litigation seen in the UK courts, whether ‘follow-on’ or ‘standalone…
Co-authored by: Alexandre Verheyden, Bernard Amory and Laurent de Muyter, Jones Day, Brussels The European Union has a new regime for assessing technology licensing agreements under EU competition law. The new rules include a new technology transfer block exemption regulation (“TTBER”), which exempts certain bilateral licensing agreements from antitrust rules, and revised Technology Transfer Guidelines…
About ten days ago, the Council of the EU failed to reach an agreement on the proposed increase in the number of judges sitting at the General Court of the European Union. The Council thus buried ‑ and for quite a while – a proposal which could have helped the General Court reduce its currently…
The proceedings brought by the European Commission against Google are nearing a – provisional – end with the prospect of a decision making binding on Google a revised set of commitments (see here for the Commission statement and here for the full text of the proposed commitments). Independently of their merits in addressing the Commission’s…
On December 23, 2103, the Federal Cartel Office (“FCO”) published an explanatory note on settlement proceedings in antitrust cases on its website. Since 2007, the FCO has increasingly terminated cases through settlements, so the note came rather late. Unlike the European Commission, the FCO has entered into settlement agreements without a specific regulatory basis and…
