#WorkforceWednesday: NLRB Wants Shuttered Starbucks Stores Reopened, Big Tech Retreats from DEI Programs, and Employers Scrap College Requirements - Employment Law This Week®
Nota Bene Podcast Episode 134: U.S. Q3 Check In: Infrastructure Bill Updates and Big Tech Antitrust with Elizabeth Frazee and Chani Wiggins
Nota Bene Episode 116: Challenging the U.S. Big Tech Antitrust Debate Assumptions: A Deep Dive with Thomas Dillickrath and Bill Margeson
What to Expect from the Biden Administration
Nota Bene Episode 104: European Q4 Check In: Brexit, Digital Platform Regulation, and National Security Regulation with Oliver Heinisch
Nota Bene Episode 68: The Current Antitrust Enforcement Climate in the United States with Capitol Forum Senior Editor Nate Soderstrom
Nota Bene Episode 46: America’s Existential Antitrust Crisis with Thomas Dillickrath
JANUARY – MARCH 2025: KEY THEMES AND TAKEAWAYS - UNITED STATES - FTC Loses Vertical Challenge to Tempur Sealy/Mattress Firm On July 2, 2024, the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed suit in federal court seeking to...more
Does anybody remember Napster? Launched in June 1999, the revolutionary peer-to-peer music sharing platform peaked at 80 million music lovers worldwide. It famously fell from greatness into bankruptcy three years later after...more
COMPETITION - Prior notification of a concentration (Case M.11889 - Amcor / Berry)... Prior notification of a concentration (Case M.11933 - PAI Partners / Motel One)...more
Gail Slater was confirmed last week as Assistant Attorney General (AAG) for the Antitrust Division; companies should expect a continuation of many Biden-era approaches, with new cases and priorities to advance the Trump...more
As we look back on 2024, one thing is clear: Antitrust enforcement in the technology sector continued at a steady pace, with global agencies showing no signs of relenting in their scrutiny of Big Tech companies....more
On March 11, 2025, the U.S. Senate confirmed Gail Slater to lead the U.S. Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division. Slater received bipartisan support in her confirmation....more
With the new Trump Administration, antitrust enforcers at the US Department of Justice's (DOJ) Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) are transferring leadership to the incoming appointees. FTC leadership...more
Key Points - Strong antitrust enforcement is expected to continue, but without the use of the novel and untested legal theories that defined the Biden administration approach. - Regulators are likely to continue to focus...more
The heightened focus on antitrust and competition issues that has defined dealmaking globally over the past few years looks set for readjustment since President Trump re-entered the White House. Under the Biden...more
The Trump Administration’s antitrust enforcement priorities are beginning to take shape. On January 20, 2025, President Trump designated former Federal Trade Commission (FTC) commissioner Andrew Ferguson as the agency’s next...more
With the nomination of Commissioner Andrew Ferguson as chair of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC or Commission) and Gail Slater to helm the U.S. Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Antitrust Division, the second Trump...more
Global M&A in 2024 faced geopolitical issues, elevated interest rates, and inflationary pressures, with expanding antitrust, foreign investment, national security, and export regimes adding complexity. But inflation receded...more
Many businesses and organizations are in the unique position of having already observed four years of antitrust enforcement under President-elect Donald J. Trump. That, plus the well-publicized records of his announced...more
Following a nine-week bench trial starting in September 2023 and closing arguments in May 2024, District of Columbia district court judge Amit Mehta ruled on August 5, 2024, that Google illegally maintained its monopoly in...more
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) announced last week that directors at several technology companies have resigned as a consequence of the agency’s renewed focus on overlapping board membership between...more
The DMA has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union and will enter into force on 1 November 2022. The DMA aims to address concerns regarding "contestability" and "fairness" in the digital economy and...more
FTC Suit Aspires to Chill M&A-Based Growth by Larger Tech Firms - Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan has consistently criticized past FTC leadership for being too lenient with Big Tech M&A activity, and for not...more
Antitrust activity increased significantly in 2021. This past year brought numerous changes in merger and non-merger enforcement policies and priorities that signal increased scrutiny in industry transactions. The “Biden...more
On 15 September 2021, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) published findings from its retrospective study of the non-reported acquisitions by five large technology companies from 2010-2019 (the Report). Focusing on 616...more
The U.K. government is consulting on far-reaching reforms to U.K. competition and consumer laws, which would substantially expand the powers of the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) and reduce procedural protections....more
As previewed earlier this week, four companies associated intimately with the opioid epidemic—three distributors and one drugmaker—have finalized a deal with state Attorneys General in which they will pay $26 billion to...more
The UK Government is consulting on proposed powers for the recently launched Digital Markets Unit. This is a significant juncture in the reconfiguration of the post-Brexit regulatory landscape, marked by a determination to...more
2021 has been a busy year for antitrust legislation. On February 4, 2021, Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and four other senators introduced the Competition and Antitrust Law Enforcement Act of 2021 (“Klobuchar Bill”)....more
Under the Clayton Act (15 U.S. Code § 18), certain business acquisitions are prohibited where “the effect of such acquisition may be substantially to lessen competition, or to tend to create a monopoly.” Long-standing...more
On 26 January, 2021, TransPerfect Legal Solutions (TLS) kicked off a virtual conference on EU and UK competition regulation. This article is the third of a three-part series highlighting the major takeaways from each session...more