‘The UK competition practice has been transformed by Brexit’ observes Nick Levy, a partner in Cleary Gottlieb’s London antitrust team.
It’s well documented that since the UK’s exit from the EU, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has embraced a position of intensified scrutiny, leading to parallel investigations and outcomes with the European Commission (EC). Continue reading “Antitrust renaissance: navigating deals amid agency crackdowns”
In a boost to its Washington DC presence, Freshfields has hired former Federal Trade Commissioner, Christine Wilson, as a senior adviser in its antitrust practice.
The firm has made a concerted effort to build out its antitrust offering in both the US and Europe over the last year. In October 2023, it appointed former senior director of mergers at the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority, Colin Raftery, to the firm’s London office. While in June 2023, antitrust litigators Heather Lamberg and Justina Sessions joined the firm’s Washington DC and Silicon Valley antitrust practices. Antitrust and foreign investment practitioner Charlotte Colin-Dubuisson also joined the firm’s Paris office in January 2024. Continue reading “Freshfields snaps up former FTC commissioner to bolster US antitrust offering”
In a case that has put antitrust law on the front pages, the European Commission (EC) has fined Google a record €4.34bn for breaching competition rules after Clifford Chance (CC)’s client FairSearch triggered a long-running investigation.
Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and Allen & Overy (A&O) were on the losing side as the EC found Google had illegally required manufacturers of smartphones running its Android operating system to pre-install its internet browsing and search engine apps. Continue reading “CC wins out as Google’s record fine in landmark antitrust case heralds new era”
Business transactions regularly require a careful analysis from a competition law point of view. We at Prager Dreifuss have excellent expertise in advising and representing companies – small and large, local and global – as well as public entities in all aspects of competition law. With profound knowledge of Swiss and EU competition law, we regularly advise clients before the Swiss competition authorities, and frequently collaborate with foreign law firms in multi-jurisdictional cartel and merger proceedings, be it as team members or co-ordinators of international teams. Public procurement and state aid law also belong to our preferred areas of practice. Continue reading “Practice Area Spotlight: Competition and regulatory – leading experts and high-profile cases”
On 27 June, the European Commission (EC) fined Google a record €2.4bn for abuse of dominance in online shopping comparison search, paving the way for a raft of damages claims.
The European Commission’s (EC) probe of Google’s online shopping practices is reported to be closing in coming months with a potential €1bn (£875m) fine, in a case in which Clifford Chance (CC), Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and Covington & Burling all act.
Humphries Kerstetter has launched a series of new £300m competition damages claims against MasterCard and Visa, on behalf of a group of 27 UK high street companies including betting firms, online retailers and a major supermarket.
After a management shake-up at its IT consultancy arm, Bird & Bird has shelved its intellectual property and trademarks spin-off, just two years after launch and after almost 50% the partnership put capital into the business. Continue reading “Buy-back: Bird & Bird shelves trademark and IP consultancy spin-off”
As part of an ongoing restructure, the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has made three key appointments to its legal team with hires from Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer and Hogan Lovells.
Continue reading “CMA plucks from Freshfields and Hogan Lovells in ongoing restructure”
