This overview covers the main developments in competition law in Portugal in the course of 2020. This year is inevitably marked by the outburst of the Covid-19 pandemic, which seriously affected the world economy generating enormous costs for companies in most sectors. This situation was reflected in an unprecedented wave of State aid granted by…
5 Key Takeaways More Deals Take Longer More deals than ever before involved extended CCPC reviews. Of 42 deals notified, 10 involved merger review delays of at least 3 months. Two “Phase 2” reviews, both on going as of 15/01/2021, have each taken 11 months already. According to the CCPC, this trend reflects “the complex…
2020: Business as usual (more or less) While over the past year COVID has had a major impact on our lives in many areas, it left Swiss competition law practice refreshingly unimpressed. In late March 2020, in the middle of the first lockdown, the Swiss Competition Commission (“ComCo“) issued a clear message: Swiss competition law…
Despite the pandemic, 2020 has been a very busy year for the Federal Cartel Office (“FCO”) and courts in the field of competition law in Germany. The following is merely a selection of interesting developments. It does not include the recently adopted reform of the Competition Act, which merits its own blog. Generally, the FCO…
The Spanish competition law landscape has been busy in 2020. Below we review the main developments and takeaways from the last year in the following areas: (i) institutions and legislation; (ii) merger control; (iii) restrictive agreements and abuse of dominance; (iv) State aid; and (v) COVID-19. Institutions and Legislation Cani Fernández: New President of…
On 6 January 2020, the European Commission (EC) published an inception impact assessment that invites comments on the scope of application of EU competition law to collective bargaining agreements for the self-employed. The EC will launch in the first half of 2021 a more detailed public consultation, with a view to the possible adoption of…
Despite best efforts of the European legislator as well as the CJEU, from a claimant’s perspective, private enforcement litigation before German Courts in the trucks cartel [Link] must be an aggravating experience. Although the European Commission fined the members of the cartel extensively, an ‘all-out’-approach of the cartelists and apparently flustered lower courts result in…
The European Commission (the Commission) closed out its ambitious 2020 antitrust reform agenda with the long-awaited consultation (the Consultation) on reform of the Vertical Block Exemption Regulation (the VBER) and related Guidelines (the VGL), published on December 18, 2020. The Consultation’s proposals, which closely follow the Commission’s October 2020 Inception Impact Assessment (the Inception Impact…
The antitrust watchdog of India recently in Harshita Chawla v Whatsapp and Facebook[1] held that Whatsapp’s proposed model of integrating its payments app called ‘Whatsapp Pay’ (‘WPay’) within its messaging app is not anti-competitive since it does not constitute ‘tying in’ due to lack of coercion. In reaching such a conclusion the Competition Commission of…
2020 was a particularly busy year as regards competition law developments in Greece, despite the COVID-19 crisis. Pushing ahead The primary goal of the new leadership of the Greek Competition Commission (“HCC”) in late 2019/early 2020 was to clear a stockpile of pending cases, many of which had been initiated prior to 2011. This…
