Covington Competition, published by Covington & Burling LLP, focuses on competition law and regulatory developments within the European Union and globally. The blog covers topics such as foreign direct investment (FDI) screening regimes, antitrust enforcement including no-poach agreements and minority shareholdings, state aid frameworks supporting industrial and clean energy initiatives, and sector-specific regulatory issues like defense and technology. It analyzes trends in merger control, investment screening, and competition policy enforcement, providing insights into legal and policy intersections affecting corporate transactions, compliance, and market competition.
On 10 September 2019, Margrethe Vestager was proposed as the European Commissioner for Competition, a post which she has held since November 2014. The appointment is still subject to the confirmation of the European Parliament.
Vestager has also been given…
Fines are integral to EU cartel enforcement and subject to careful methodology and review. The European Commission (“EC”) determines cartel fines in accordance with the Guidelines on the method of setting fines imposed pursuant to Article 23(2)(a) of Regulation No…
On 13 December 2018, the European Court of Justice (“ECJ”) rejected an appeal by Electricité de France (“EDF”) against a General Court (“GC”) judgment confirming a Commission decision ordering France to recover EUR 1.37 billion in State aid from EDF…
With a musical ABBA twist, Johan Ysewyn presented the evolution of the cartel concept in the EU at the Chillin’ Competition Conference on 20 November 2018 in Brussels.
Click here to watch the full presentation by Johan.…
In October, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) imposed a fine of 1.6 million GBP for a land agreement which it found to infringe competition law. This is the first time that the CMA has taken enforcement action and…
On the 10th October 2018, BEREC (the Body of European Regulators for Electronic Communications) launched its public consultation on the ‘Data Economy’. This comes at a time when different regulators are increasingly discussing the importance of big data, including the…
The European Commission (“Commission”) recently fined Denon & Marantz, Asus, Pioneer and Philips (the “Individual Parties”) a total of EUR 111 million for restricting the ability of online retailers to set retail prices for their products – a…
On 25 September 2018, Covington’s Johan Ysewyn and Jim O’Connell will speak on cartels and merger enforcement, respectively, at the 12th Annual Georgetown Global Antitrust Enforcement Symposium in Washington DC.
This Symposium serves as a leading forum for in-house and…
The German Monopolies Commission (Monopolkommission), an independent body advising the German federal government and legislature on competition law and policy, recently published its Twenty-second Biennial Report (“Report”) in which it outlined recommendations to adapt the German legal framework to account…
On 5 September 2018, the District Court for the Southern District of California ruled that private equity firm Lion Capital must face trial in class action litigation alongside its portfolio company Bumble Bee Seafoods, in a case alleging price-fixing in…
