Co-authored by Patrick Harrison and Audrey Silvain, Sidley Austin LLP. There are few distinctions more important in EU competition law than that between the notion of a restriction “by object” – where a regulator need not demonstrate that conduct had anti-competitive effects – and the notion of a restriction “by effect,” where a regulator…
Following over 20 years of deliberations and finally the entry into force of the first cross-sector competition law in the Philippines last summer, the newly established Philippine Competition Commission (“Commission”) has published an interim arrangement to accept simplified merger notifications. Notifications are mandatory for transactions which satisfy the transaction value threshold during the interim period….
The merger control regime in India has been in existence since 2011. The provisions of the Competition Act are to be read together with the notifications issued by the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, Government of India and the Combination Regulations. In line with the vision of India on promoting investments into India, the Ministry of…
79th Lunch Talk of the Global Competition Law Center Monday, March 14, 2016 from 12:00 PM to 2:00 PM Assessing unilateral effects in horizontal mergers: closeness of competition and the role of bidding data with Daniel Coublucq, DG COMP Sascha Schubert, Freshfields David Spector, MAPP Economics Moderator: Damien Gerard, GCLC Programme: 12:00 – 12:30: Sandwich…
A recent report from the National Audit Office has recommended that the Competition and Markets Authority (“CMA”) increase the number of cartel investigations it carries out. A number of recent statements made by senior officials in the CMA’s Cartels and Criminal Group (“CCG”) suggest that the CMA is listening very carefully. The case for more…
The summaries of the pleas of the actions for annulment lodged by Luxembourg and the Netherlands in the Fiat and Starbucks cases respectively were recently published (see here and here). Moreover, the pleas of Fiat in its own action for annulment against the Commission’s decision were also published (see here). These pleas are important because…
DG COMP has published a study by the University of East Anglia analysing the European Commission’s approach to geographic market definition in recent cases. It has reviewed ten cases from 2008-2014 where geographic market definition was a key issue. The study looked at the Commission’s geographic market analysis in terms of the methodology used and…
On 29 January 2016, the Court of First Instance of Hong Kong ruled in favour of TVB and against the Communications Authority (the “CA”), in the ‘no Cantonese’ policy abuse of dominance case. The 2013 decision by the CA, in which the broadcaster was fined nearly HKD 1 million under the sector-specific competition rules of…
On January 20, 2016, the European Court of Justice (the Court) issued a seminal preliminary ruling on the relationship between EU and Member State leniency programmes in Case C‑428/14, DHL Express (Italy) Srl and DHL Global Forwarding (Italy) SpA v. Autorità Garante della Concorrenza e del Mercato (AGCM). The Court held that EU and Member…
The COMPAT’s recent judgment in Hiranandani contains several important lessons for the Indian antitrust community. The case reflects the CCI’s desire for strong enforcement and effective deterrence of exclusive contracts in strategically important sectors (hospital services). And it reflects effective judicial control by the COMPAT of the CCI’s process, institutional design, and analysis. COMPAT’s lessons…
