The Background: The Australian Federal Treasurer recently announced sweeping reforms to Australia's merger review regime. These reforms will overhaul the current merger review regime in Australia to introduce mandatory filing...more
The Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division continues its aggressive pursuit of enforcement and recently succeeded in blocking a controversial acquisition in the book selling market. After a string of losses in the merger...more
On November 2, 2021, the United States Department of Justice (“DOJ”) filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to block the planned $2.175 billion merger between powerhouse publishing companies...more
The Justice Department filed a complaint in the US District Court for the District of Columbia to block Penguin Random House’s acquisition of Simon & Schuster. Penguin Random House is the largest book publisher in the world...more
Recent Merger Review and Litigation in Australia - Australia's antitrust merger laws have remained largely unchanged since 1993. The law prohibits the acquisition of assets or shares with the effect or likely effect of...more
Australia's competition authority settles allegations that port operator misused its market power. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission ("ACCC") secured a declaration in its first action under Section 46 of the...more
Fortnite game maker Epic Games brings dispute with Apple to Australia, alleging "misuse of market power." Epic Games, developer of the popular game Fortnite, filed proceedings in the Federal Court of Australia alleging...more
The terms of a settlement that resolved antitrust litigation between the State of California and Sutter Health, the largest health system in Northern California, have now become public, almost two months after the settlement...more
Germany is about to implement an ambitious new “digital antitrust law” (“GWB-Digitalisierungsgesetz”) to effectively regulate online markets. The draft Ministerial bill on the 10th amendment of the German Act Against...more
On 18 October 2017, Australia's Parliament passed into law long-awaited legislation to amend Australia's competition laws. The passing of the Competition and Consumer Amendment (Competition Policy Review) Bill 2017 and...more
The existing EU regulatory framework for electronic communications obliges the EU Member States to provide in their national laws for certain powers and responsibilities of national regulatory authorities (“NRA”), in...more
On September 22, 2016, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued a Notice of Inquiry (NOI) seeking comment on whether and, if so, how FERC might modify or enhance its methods for identifying and assessing market...more
In recent years, federal antitrust enforcers and businesses that accept payment cards have been waging a slow war against payment card fees and the card network rules that protect them. The payment card industry’s antitrust...more
Keystone Orthopaedic Specialists, LLC (“Keystone”), and Orthopaedic Associates of Reading, Ltd. (“OA”) reached a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission last week that they had violated the antitrust laws through the...more
As intellectual property licensing continues to grow more prevalent, legal practitioners and business personnel are being asked to craft and negotiate agreements that can significantly impact a business’s ability to compete...more
This is the concluding installment of a six-part series discussing the Federal Trade Commission's challenges to provider mergers. Following the initial Introduction and Background (Part 1), the series discusses The Need for...more