The two recent resale price maintenance (RPM) cases before the Bulgarian Commission for Protection of Competition (CPC or Commission) concern prohibited agreements between the only importers of baby products with brands Medela and Canpol (SMART SM) and Philips Avent (IVENTAS) on one side, and the retailers of baby and mothercare products acting on the Bulgarian…
In Joseph Heller’s seminal World War II novel, the protagonist Captain Yossarian finds himself in an inescapable situation. To continue flying into war is insane, but claiming insanity to avoid going to war immediately demonstrates your sanity. There is no way out. This is Catch-22. But the book also has other fascinating passages, touching on…
The recent adoption of the Collective Consumer Redress Directive has reignited the discussion on collective private antitrust litigation – any ‘bundling of claims’ – once again. Even though collective redress on an EU level was first seriously discussed in the context of the Damages Directive, competition law does not fall into the scope of the…
The market landscape has drastically been altered with the rise of platform-based business models setting in motion a new wave of capitalism transforming the erstwhile relationship between consumers and businesses. The erstwhile practice of building up physical assets to highlight economic prowess has been replaced by a more subtle mechanism of increasing access to the…
The law is blind. Competition law, however, has the potential to see through a gender lens. In World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index 2020, India ranked at 112th position in a list of 153 countries. According to a 2019 survey, the gender pay gap in the country was estimated to stand at 19%, where…
Early April, the Federal Supreme Court clarified controversial questions regarding the privilege against self-incrimination in Competition Law Proceedings in three much-noticed decisions (2C_383/2020, 2C_87/2020 and 2C_88/2020)[1]. The Decisions In 2018, the Swiss Competition Commission (“ComCo“) opened proceedings against various financial institutions regarding an alleged boycott in Switzerland. The Competition Commission suspected that the addressees of…
On April 21, 2021, the EU Commission adopted a proposal for a regulation (the AI Regulation) on “artificial intelligence systems” (AI systems), which it describes as “the first-ever legal framework on AI.” The AI Regulation will impose significant obligations impacting businesses across many, if not all, sectors of the economy. The AI Regulation will prove…
Even though public enforcement of competition law has traditionally played a significant role in deterring companies from committing antitrust infringements, private enforcement has proved to be an effective ally in this quest. Ever since the adoption of Directive 2014/104/EU (Damages Directive) and, in particular, the European Commission’s (EC) Decision in the Trucks cartel, litigation over…
On 10 April 2021, the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR), China’s competition authority responsible for the enforcement of the Anti-Monopoly Law (AML), announced the imposition of CNY 18 billion fine on Alibaba for abusing its dominant position on the e-commerce platform services market. The decision concludes the investigation launched at the end of 2020…
At a recent post, I discussed how the European Commission’s change of approach with the publication of its new Guidance on Article 22 of the Merger Regulation, in reality, should be seen as an accompanying measure to the Digital Markets Act (DMA). I called this a “DMA bis”. Let me share my thoughts in a slightly…
