The impressive acceleration in mergers and acquisitions, combined with the promotion of disruptive business strategies, has put the ‘regulatory gap’[1] paradox at the heart of the current European merger control policy debate. While the current EU merger control regime risks fragmentation with the advent of the new Guidance on Referral Mechanism and the Digital Markets…

Advocate General Juliane Kokott has proposed that the EU Court of Justice should find that competition authorities have the power to apply Article 102 TFEU to corporate transactions that are not reportable and test under that provision whether the transaction as such constitutes an abuse of a dominant position. However, a competition authority cannot in…

Introduction The substantial rules of the Turkish merger control are taken from the corresponding EU provisions. The amendments to the Turkish Competition Law in 2020 introduced the SIEC test to improve the concentration control regime and harmonize it with the EU rules even further. The amended Merger Communique in 2022 revised the thresholds as a…

In its first in-person event in more than two years, Canada’s Competition Bureau (the “Bureau”) hosted a summit on September 20, 2022, exploring the intersection between competition law and environmental/sustainability initiatives (details on the Competition and Green Growth Summit are available here). In doing so, the Bureau joins other agencies that have examined the impact…

Background Amazon.com Inc. recently approached the Supreme Court against the decision of the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT), where the Tribunal affirmed the ruling of the Competition Commission of India (CCI). The impugned decision of the Tribunal upheld the penalty order against Amazon.com, on the basis of non-disclosure and suppression of material information in…

On August 5, 2022, the Italian Parliament adopted the 2021 Annual Law for Market and Competition (the “2021 Competition Law”), [1] the aim of which is to adapt the Italian system to EU competition rules and policies and to improve and liberalize markets affected by regulatory or economic barriers. The law reflects most of the…

As in most jurisdictions, the Portuguese Competition Act (‘PCAct’) provides for an ex-ante merger control regime, according to which concentrations above certain thresholds are subject to mandatory pre-notification. Three alternative thresholds apply i) a turnover threshold, ii) a standard market share threshold and iii) a de minimis market share threshold (see Article 37 of the PCAct)….

Background The recent proliferation of foreign direct investment regimes (“FDI”) in Europe baffles practitioners and deal makers alike.  Why is my acquisition of, say, a developer of grapes in Spain potentially subject to CFIUS-like rules?  Can my carefully crafted leveraged buyout of a niche Polish producer of NFTs derail out of national security concerns because…

We are continuing with our competition law issues of the International Law Talk Podcast. Two weeks ago, I talked to Oliver Bretz, founding partner at Euclid Law and a merger expert, about the fragmentation of EU merger control. We focused particularly on the changes in the EU one-stop-systems through Brexit, the increasing use of EU…

Introduction On 20 May 2020 the Dutch competition authority (“ACM”) conditionally cleared a new joint venture between transport company Pon Netherlands B.V. (“Pon”) and Dutch rail operator NS Groep N.V. (“NS”) creating a Mobility as a Service (“MaaS”) platform. The case was referred to the ACM by the European Commission (“Commission”) under Article 9 of…