Competition Law

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Whish ◽  
David Bailey
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property Rights ◽  
Competition Policy ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Private Enforcement ◽  
Periodical Literature ◽  
Collective Actions ◽  
Consumer Rights ◽  
Key Concepts ◽  
First Time

The book explains the purpose of competition policy, introduces the reader to key concepts and techniques in competition law and provides insights into the numerous different issues that arise when analysing market behaviour. Describing the law in its economics and market context, the chapters particularly consider the competition law implications of business phenomena, including distribution agreements, licences of intellectual property rights, cartels, joint ventures and mergers. The book assimilates a wide variety of resources, including judgments, decisions, guidelines and periodical literature. The text has been updated to include the changes to UK law introduced by the Consumer Rights Act 2015, including the reform of collective actions. It also considers the Directive on Antitrust Damages Actions and other measures designed to facilitate private enforcement of competition law. The book also discusses for the first time the application of competition law to price signalling, algorithmic collusion and other atypical cartel activities; it also incorporates extensive new case law and decisional practice at EU and UK level.

Competition Law

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Whish ◽  
David Bailey
Keyword(s):  
Competition Law ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Business Practices ◽  
Periodical Literature ◽  
Digital Platforms ◽  
Legal Principles ◽  
Law And Policy ◽  
Eu Competition Law ◽  
First Time ◽  
The Eu

Competition Law explains competition law and policy in the EU and UK. The intention is to provide the reader with an understanding of competition law and policy, to introduce the reader to key economic concepts, legal principles and tools in competition law, and to provide insights into the numerous different issues that arise when applying competition law to market behaviour. Describing the economic rationale for the law, the chapters consider the application of EU and UK competition law to various business practices, including cartels, cooperation agreements, distribution agreements, licences of intellectual property rights, joint ventures, and mergers. The text has been updated to include the changes to UK law as a consequence of Brexit. It discusses for the first time the rise of powerful digital platforms and the quest for a suitable competition law and regulatory response to this phenomenon. It also considers the implications of the European Green Deal and the sustainability agenda for EU competition law and practice. The text incorporates extensive new legislation, case-law, decisional practice, guidelines and periodical literature at EU and UK level.

scholarly journals Harmonising Private Enforcement of Competition Law in Central and Eastern Europe: The Effectiveness of Legal Transplants Through Consumer Collective Actions

2015 ◽  
Vol 8 (12) ◽  
pp. 33-59
Author(s):  
Katalin J. Cseres
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Central And Eastern Europe ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Private Enforcement ◽  
Collective Actions ◽  
Legal Rules ◽  
Eu Member States ◽  
Harmonization Process ◽  
Effective Remedy ◽  
Law Making

The aim of this paper is to critically analyze the manner of harmonizing private enforcement in the EU. The paper examines the legal rules and, more importantly, the actual enforcement practice of collective consumer actions in EU Member States situated in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). Collective actions are the key method of getting compensation for consumers who have suffered harm as a result of an anti-competitive practice. Consumer compensation has always been the core justification for the European Commission’s policy of encouraging private enforcement of competition law. In those cases where collective redress is not available to consumers, or consumers cannot apply existing rules or are unwilling to do so, then both their right to an effective remedy and the public policy goal of private enforcement remain futile. Analyzing collective compensatory actions in CEE countries (CEECs) places the harmonization process in a broader governance framework, created during their EU accession, characterized by top-down law-making and strong EU conditionality. Analyzing collective consumer actions through this ‘Europeanization’ process, and the phenomenon of vertical legal transplants, raises major questions about the effectiveness of legal transplants vis-à-vis homegrown domestic law-making processes. It also poses the question how such legal rules may depend and interact with market, constitutional and institutional reforms.

scholarly journals The Interaction Between Public and Private Enforcement of EU Competition Law: a Case Study of the Swedish Booking Cases

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (21) ◽  
pp. 55-70
Author(s):  
Katharina Voss ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Competition Policy ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Private Enforcement ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Standard Of Proof ◽  
Eu Competition Law ◽  
Public And Private Enforcement

This article studies the private enforcement conducted in Visita v Booking from the perspective of the interaction between public and private enforcement of competition law. This case concerned the question whether the narrow MFN clauses maintained by Booking were contrary to Article 101 TFEU and could therefore be prohibited by a Swedish court. The focus of this article is placed on the assessment carried out by the Swedish courts to determine whether the MFN clauses were restrictive of competition by effect and on the standard of proof attached to the claimant in this regard. With regard to the interaction between public and private enforcement, Visita v. Booking is viewed as an illustration of the increased complexity of competition policy, in particular were novel practices are at issue

scholarly journals Competition Policy during the Economic Crisis – legal issues

Equilibrium ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-89
Author(s):  
Mateusz Błachucki ◽  
Rafał Stankiewicz
Keyword(s):  
Economic Crisis ◽  
Competition Policy ◽  
Public Policies ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Case Law ◽  
State Aid ◽  
Legal Issues ◽  
Public Authorities ◽  
Made In

The paper addresses the issue of legal issues of competition policy during the economic crisis. During the economic crisis public authorities are forced to redefine the aims of public policies and harmonize them. The paper aims at identifying spheres, where competition policy is limited by other public policies. First, the problem of crisis cartels and their admissibility under competition law is discussed. It is followed by the presentation of the exemptions to the general prohibition of anticompetitive mergers. Last but not least, the temporary framework for state aid in the UE is presented. It has been argued that during the economic crisis public authorities use peculiar legal instruments of competition policy to address problems arising from the crisis. Whenever it is possible reference to the case law is made in order to present the application of presented problems in practice.

scholarly journals What Has Changed in European Concept of Undertaking? From „FENIN“ to „EASY PAY“

2021 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 81-88
Author(s):  
Katarína Kalesná
Keyword(s):  
Economic Activity ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Internal Market ◽  
Correct Interpretation ◽  
General Internal ◽  
Key Concepts ◽  
Regulatory Principle ◽  
Competition Rules ◽  
The Impact

Competition is the main self-regulatory principle of the market in general, internal market included. Competition law has the form of general clauses making its application dependant on the correct interpretation of general concepts. Core competition rules of the Functional Treaty („TFEU“) are addressed to undertakings; undertaking thus belongs to key concepts of competition law. Interpretation of this concept is decisive for the scope of competition rules application. So, the article explores different approaches of the case law to the interpretation of the concept of undertaking based on economic activity.  It compares the FENIN doctrine and the new functional test of separability developed in EASY PAY. It drives attention to the impact of this new test for the evaluation of procurement activities under competition scrutiny.

Exclusionary Abuses

2021 ◽  
pp. 79-112
Author(s):  
Renato Nazzini
Keyword(s):  
Competition Policy ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Private Enforcement ◽  
Pharmaceutical Sector ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
The Third ◽  
Public And Private Enforcement ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Abuse Of Dominance ◽  
The Eu

Chapter 4 deals with exclusionary abuses under the Competition Act 1998, covering both public and private enforcement cases. The analysis concerns the approach to dominance as well as tests for abuse, focusing on retroactive rebates and bundled discounts, exclusion in multi-market settings, exclusivity, most favoured nation and equivalent clauses, discrimination, and exclusionary abuses in the pharmaceutical sector. This chapter argues that, in its second decade, modern UK competition law continued a trend that was already clear in the first decade: the prohibition of abuse of dominance is applied in a more economically robust and commercially reasonable way than it is by the EU institutions - the Commission and the EU courts - and in certain other Member States. The chapter notes that the third decade of the Competition Act 1998 will see the UK develop its competition policy free from the constraints of EU law and may allow for some divergence in the approach to exclusionary abuses in the future.

The Role of Private Enforcement within EU Competition Law

2014 ◽  
Vol 16 ◽  
pp. 143-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
Niamh Dunne
Keyword(s):  
Hard Core ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Private Enforcement ◽  
Public Enforcement ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
Eu Competition Law ◽  
Competition Rules ◽  
The Right

AbstractPrivate enforcement is an increasingly prominent element of EU competition law. The forthcoming Directive on damages actions aims to strengthen and, to a degree, harmonise procedures for private competition litigation, while recent case law of the Court of Justice reaffirms the centrality of the right to claim compensation for losses stemming from breach of the competition rules. Moreover, this right has been presented as an essentially unitary one, whereby any victim of any type of competition infringement has, in principle, the right to claim damages. This chapter reviews the evolving framework, and considers, specifically, the role for private enforcement within the overall system of EU competition law. Taking into account the Commission’s efforts to facilitate and increase private enforcement, the emerging EU public enforcement framework, as well as the substantive EU competition rules more generally, this chapter argues that, contrary to the rhetoric, private enforcement is a mechanism best adapted, and arguably most appropriate, for use only in the context of hard-core cartels. It is further suggested that the gap between rhetoric and reality is not problematic as such, yet difficulties may arise insofar as these divergences conflict with the principle of effectiveness.

scholarly journals RELEVANCE THE REGULATION OF INNOVATION WITH THE CHALLENGES OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND COMPETITION

2018 ◽  
pp. 333
Author(s):  
Dragana Radenković Jocić
Keyword(s):  
Intellectual Property ◽  
Property Rights ◽  
Intellectual Property Rights ◽  
Competition Policy ◽  
Value Added ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Private Investment ◽  
Economic Relationships ◽  
Important Sign ◽  
Development Area

Intellectual property is directly connected with competition law. On the other side, it should be noted that innovation as a part of intellectual property rights make significant element of companies’ activities if they want to be competitive at the market. This is the reason why it is possible to say that competition law belongs to rules of economic relationships. Law is important for companies in sense to promote economic efficiency. The competitiveness is the ability of a region to export more in value added terms than it im­ports. That definition is very important for companies and for investors at the same time. Due to that, governments have to pay attention on all possible so-called discounts, includ­ing an artificially low currency, suppressed wages in export sectors, artificially low taxes on traded sector firms and direct subsidies to exports. Governments, but the legislators also should control barriers and obstacles, in order to improve measurements to eliminate them. It could be very important sign for investor. Finally, intellectual property rights will show their significance through the companies’ competition policy. The whole Europe develops research and development area, focusing on major competitors. Due to that task participants are interested especially in the share of private investment in a field of research.

The role of ‘freedom’ in EU competition law

Legal Studies ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 183-213 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pınar Akman
Keyword(s):  
Quantitative Analysis ◽  
Competition Policy ◽  
Economic Freedom ◽  
Competition Law ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Eu Competition Law ◽  
Initial Reading ◽  
The Eu ◽  
Comprehensive Study

An initial reading of EU competition law jurisprudence and literature may suggest that there might be a competition-related freedom in the EU, expressed along the lines of ‘freedom of competition’ or ‘freedom to compete’. If competition is to be protected as a ‘freedom’ rather than merely as a ‘policy’, what this freedom involves should be established. It is important to establish the role of ‘freedom’, since it has been argued that EU competition law is a product of or has been significantly influenced by ‘ordoliberalism’. Under ordoliberalism, protecting the ‘economic freedom’ of market actors is the aim of competition policy. This paper examines the entire jurisprudence of the EU Courts to establish the role of ‘freedom’ in EU competition law as perceived by the EU Courts. This inquiry establishes whether ordoliberalism has so fundamentally influenced the jurisprudence that welfare-based objectives cannot be adopted as an/the objective of EU competition law. This is the first such comprehensive study regarding ‘freedom’ in EU competition law. The paper demonstrates that there is little quantitative or qualitative support for the ordoliberal argument when one considers the relevant jurisprudence. A quantitative analysis of the case-law and in particular the historical trend raises serious doubts concerning the validity of the conventional ordoliberal-influence thesis.

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