DOJ’s Antitrust Division has been relatively quiet in prosecuting criminal cartel or bid-rigging cases. Since 2015, the Antitrust Division’s criminal enforcement has fallen from the billions in penalties each year to the...more
At the mid-year point, 2024 is shaping up to be an eventful year in cartel enforcement. In the United States, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ)’s Antitrust Division (Division) enjoyed two significant victories and finally...more
California Assistant Attorney General (AAG) Paula Blizzard recently announced that the California Attorney General’s Office (AGO) intends to “reinvigorat[e] criminal prosecutions” under California’s Cartwright Act, Cal. Bus....more
As anticipated, cartel enforcement is ramping up at the start of 2024 and investigations relating to artificial intelligence (AI) are taking center stage. Leadership of both the broader Department of Justice (DOJ) and the...more
The year 2023 ended with a bang in the cartel space, with a federal court of appeals upending what was long believed to be the scope of conduct that should be considered per se under the Sherman Act. The new year, 2024,...more
A three-judge panel from the US Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit overturned an executive’s bid-rigging antitrust conviction, holding that the district court erred in applying the per se standard to the executive’s...more
Since the Antitrust Division's March 2022 announcement that it would once again consider and bring criminal charges for violations of Section 2 of the Sherman Act, DOJ has resisted calls for guidance about what conduct would...more
Participants in the renewable energy industry should be aware of antitrust and competition rules because renewable energy is no longer a nascent field. Europe generated almost 40% of its electricity from renewable sources in...more
With the end of summer and fall right around the corner, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), Antitrust Division is gearing up for several crucial displays of its criminal enforcement priorities across multiple...more
The U.S. Department of Justice Antitrust Division ("DOJ") recently resolved a criminal case with Teva Pharmaceuticals and Glenmark Pharmaceuticals via deferred prosecution agreements ("DPAs"), which include a novel remedy for...more
At this mid-point of 2023, and now several months on from the ABA’s Spring Antitrust conference, there have been several notable developments concerning cartel enforcement, as new leadership settles in at the U.S. Department...more
The U.S. Department of Justice’s (“DOJ’s”) ongoing efforts against no-poach agreements suffered their latest setback on April 28, 2023, following the Connecticut federal court’s ruling in U.S.A. v. Mahesh Patel, acquitting...more
In December 2022, the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' Office of the Inspector General announced a memorandum of understanding memorializing their...more
The Justice Department’s Antitrust Division has had a rough year in the criminal arena. While the Antitrust Division has aggressively blocked several proposed mergers, it has lost several significant criminal cases. ...more
Since the last edition of the QCC, there has been a series of dramatic developments in the criminal antitrust enforcement space in the U.S. from the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division (Division)....more
Northern District of Illinois Grants Motion for Partial Reconsideration of Summary Judgment Decision Regarding Whether Former Walgreens CFO’s Statements Were Actionable; Securities Fraud Claims Against Chicken Producer for...more
On 17 February, the Department of Justice (DOJ) Antitrust Division (Antitrust Division) announced that it is launching a joint initiative with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to “deter and prosecute those who would...more
The end of 2021 continued to be a busy time for antitrust enforcers in the U.S. and around the world. Perhaps most notably, in November the Senate confirmed Jonathan Kanter to lead the U.S. Department of Justice’s Antitrust...more
As previously reported, a proposed class action proceeding against over 50 generic drug manufacturers was commenced in 2020. The proposed class action alleges that the defendants conspired to “allocate the market, fix prices...more
More than halfway through the year, 2021 has shaped up to be another busy time for antitrust enforcers. In July, the Biden administration confirmed that antitrust remains a top priority by issuing a sweeping Executive Order,...more
On June 25, 2021, the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division (the “Division”) announced the first criminal antitrust prosecution and “international resolution obtained by the Procurement Collusion Strike Force (PCSF).”...more
The Antitrust Division has pushed bid-rigging and price-fixing prosecutions of government contractors. It is long overdue – fraud enforcement has uncovered a number of bid-rigging and price-fixing schemes among government...more
The recent Criminal Antitrust Anti-Retaliation Act (CAARA), to be enforced by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”), offers protection from retaliation for antitrust whistleblowers who come forward to...more
At this point, most employers probably know that the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (“OSHA”) is charged with investigating far more than workplace safety. Indeed, OSHA has a robust Whistleblower Protection...more
A new year, a new administration in the United States, and new cartel enforcement leadership in the United Kingdom have begun. In the United States, first-of-their-kind criminal charges have been brought involving labor and...more