THEIA

THEIA provides technical solutions for the construction industry, specializing in materials for thermal insulation. It is positioned in the middle of the distribution channel, between manufacturers and construction companies, and the profound changes that occurred in the sector had repercussions on the company's activity, forcing it to rethink its business strategy. THEIA repositioning was studied according to a specific methodology, combining analysis techniques to assess organizations' internal capacity and the exploration of external conditioning factors. The strategic plan used financial and commercial information from THEIA and from the sector where it operates, according to the following steps: analysis of THEIA's internal situation, external positioning of THEIA in the national market, definition of strategic objectives, elaboration of scenarios and recommendations.

Market Definition in the Platform Economy

The article addresses the role market definition can play for EU competition practice in the platform economy. The focus is on intermediaries that bring together groups of users whose decisions are interdependent, which therefore are commonly referred to as ‘two-sided platforms’. We address challenges to market definition that accompany these cross-group network effects, assess current practice in a number of competition cases, and provide guidance for adapting practice to properly account for the economic forces shaping markets with two-sided platforms. We ask whether and when a single market can be defined that encompasses both sides. We advocate a multi-markets approach that takes account of cross-market linkages, acknowledges the existence of zero-price markets, and properly accounts for the homing behaviour of market participants.

On the Risks of Using the Sequential Product-Level SSNIP Approach to Identify Relevant Antitrust Markets‡

In a recent influential paper Coate et al. (2021) have criticized the sequential product-level approach to market definition in merger review. They argue that a simultaneous market-level approach to critical loss is more appropriate than a product-level critical loss analysis, because under certain plausible demand scenarios (nonlinear demand functions) the latter could yield the wrong answer on market definition—i.e., excessively broad or narrow markets. We extend their analysis by showing that a sequential product-level approach actually leads to an excessively narrow market definition when the typical nonlinear demand functions used in merger analysis are employed.

1. Competition policy and economics

This chapter provides an overview of competition law and its economic context. Section 2 describes the practices that competition laws attempt to control in order to protect the competition process. Section 3 examines the theory of competition and gives an introductory account of why the effective enforcement of competition law is thought to be beneficial. Section 4 considers the goals of competition law. Section 5 introduces two key economic concepts, market definition and market power, that are important to a better understanding of competition policy. The chapter concludes with a table of market share figures that are significant in the application of EU and UK competition law, while reminding the reader that market shares are only ever a proxy for market power and can never be determinative of market power in themselves.

Excessive Pharmaceutical Pricing as an Abuse of Dominant Position – The Case of CD Pharma (Denmark)

On 31 January 2018, the Danish Competition and Consumer Authority adopted a decision1 finding the Swedish company generic distributor CD Pharma in breach of Art. 102(a) Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) by abusing its dominant position and having imposed excessive and unfair prices for the drug Syntocinon. The company increased the price of the drug by 2000% in the period April-October 2014 in the Danish pharmaceutical market. CD Pharma appealed to the Danish Competition Appeals Board,2 which on 29 November 2018 upheld the decision by the Authority. On subsequent appeal to the Danish Maritime and Commercial Court,3 the judgment by the previous court was upheld in a 3-2 decision on 2 March 2020, thus finding CD Pharma liable for infringement of Danish competition law as well as Art. 102(a) TFEU. The decision is final and not subject to further appeal. The case raises outstanding legal-economic issues regarding excessive pricing such as relevant market definition in pharmaceutical cases, the length of abuse, competitive price benchmarks, definition of economic value and the matter of dominance in public procurement and tenders. The case is rather unusual in that the alleged abusive period amounted to a six-month period, CD Pharma was the ‘losing’ party in the bidding process for the supply of the medicine in question, and CD Pharma subsequently had reduced prices through negotiations with the Danish central medicine procurer, Amgros. Similar to the Aspen Pharma decision4 by the Italian Competition Authority, where the Italian Medicine Agency (AIFA) reported the case to the Competition Authority, it was the Danish medicine procurer Amgros who had notified the Danish Competition and Consumer Authority about allegedly abusive practices. This subsequently led to an investigation and the adoption of the Decision. Following an introduction describing the Danish pharmaceutical market and specifics of the case, section two of this contribution details the proceedings at Danish Competition Authority. Section three depicts the proceedings at Competition Appeals Tribunal, and section four deals with the proceedings at the Maritime and Commercial Court. Section five concludes.

The Comparison Between Different Hospital Market Definition Approaches: An Empirical Analysis of 11 Representative Diseases in Sichuan Province, China

Objective: This study aims to provide empirical evidence for the controversy about whether the inference is consistent if alternative hospital market definition methods are employed, and for which definition method is the best alternative to the predicted patient flow approach.Data sources: Collecting data from the discharge data of inpatients and hospital administrative data of Sichuan province in China in the fourth quarter of 2018.Study Design: We employed Herfindahl–Hirschman Index (HHI) as the proxy of market competition used as an example to measure the hospital market structure. Correlation coefficients of HHIs based on different definition methods were assessed. The corresponding coefficient of each HHI estimated in identical regression models was then compared. In addition, since the predicted patient flow method has been argued by the literature of its advantages compared with the previous approaches, we took the predicted patient flow as a reference to compare with the other approaches.Data Extraction Methods: We selected the common diseases with a significant burden, and 11 diseases were included (902,767 hospitalizations).Principal Findings: The correlation coefficients of HHIs based on different market definition methods are all significantly greater than 0, and the coefficients of HHIs are different in identical regression models. Taking the predicted patient flow approach as a reference, we found that the correlation coefficients between HHIs based on fixed radius and predicted patient flow approach is larger than others, and their parameter estimates are all consistent.Conclusion: Although the HHIs based on different definition methods are significantly and positively correlated, the inferences about the effectiveness of market structure would be inconsistent when alternative market definition methods are employed. The fixed radius would be the best alternative when researchers want to use the predicted patient flow method to define the hospital market but are hindered by the data limitations and computational complexity.

Tracking immigrant professionals' experience in Manitoba's labour market

Our project aims to improve immigrant integration programs by exploring the immigration and settlement process from the perspective of professionals and trades people who are clients of Winnipeg’s Success Skills Centre, an agency that offers employment assistance services to immigrant professionals and skilled workers. We make three observations on the integration experience of immigrant professionals and trades people in the Manitoba labour market. First, recent immigrants to Manitoba through the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) have been educated and skilled, yet their labour market participation has often been restricted to general labour and entry-level employment. Second, immigration policy sets a minimum amount of money that an adult immigrant has to bring with him or her, resulting in a demand/supply mismatch in the labour market. Finally, employment has not been a fair or effective stepping-stone to integration in the case of visible minority immigrants. Our research indicates that a strict labour market definition of success fails to capture the expectations and real life goals of new immigrants. Key Words: immigration, professional immigrants, workforce, integration, Manitoba

Tracking immigrant professionals' experience in Manitoba's labour market

Our project aims to improve immigrant integration programs by exploring the immigration and settlement process from the perspective of professionals and trades people who are clients of Winnipeg’s Success Skills Centre, an agency that offers employment assistance services to immigrant professionals and skilled workers. We make three observations on the integration experience of immigrant professionals and trades people in the Manitoba labour market. First, recent immigrants to Manitoba through the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) have been educated and skilled, yet their labour market participation has often been restricted to general labour and entry-level employment. Second, immigration policy sets a minimum amount of money that an adult immigrant has to bring with him or her, resulting in a demand/supply mismatch in the labour market. Finally, employment has not been a fair or effective stepping-stone to integration in the case of visible minority immigrants. Our research indicates that a strict labour market definition of success fails to capture the expectations and real life goals of new immigrants. Key Words: immigration, professional immigrants, workforce, integration, Manitoba