Video here.
Monday, November 28, 2022
Friday, November 25, 2022
Thursday, November 24, 2022
Wednesday, November 23, 2022
Tuesday, November 22, 2022
Monday, November 21, 2022
Fundamentals and Novelty
Adlc, here.
"I expect the new frontier of antitrust enforcement to be about data collection, hoarding and usage in traditional industries such as the healthcare or automobile sectors and in the internet of things (IoT). To address this new challenge, we will have to cooperate closely with industry regulators and data protection authorities"
Friday, November 18, 2022
Thursday, November 17, 2022
Wednesday, November 16, 2022
How Should the EU Approach the Metaverse?
Will we find out more about the still mysterious " concrete proposals on the metaverse due in 2023"? No guarantee but I registered:
Tuesday, November 15, 2022
Provision of technical expertise in the context of investigations and compliance enforcement related to digital services markets
EC, here (interesting read, trust me).
Monday, November 14, 2022
Friday, November 11, 2022
Thursday, November 10, 2022
Wednesday, November 09, 2022
Form Europe Data Economy Conference: This is not a Debriefing
I don't know this organization personally, and they did have sponsors who paid for a microphone on the panels, but I enjoyed the discussion (in parallel to doing not-so engaging things and also as an excuse to postpone the real serious stuff, perhaps). No main takeaways from my side on this one (differently from what more renowned Blogs in the area are offering) but watch/listen to it if recorded. My live posts are on Mastodon
The 4th Annual European Data Economy Conference | 9 November 2022 (dataeconomy-conference.com)
Monday, November 07, 2022
Wednesday, April 06, 2022
Teaching Art. 102 TFEU: Judges
Looking forward to this new experience. I hope we will all have fun working on the self-preferencing case study (here the pdf of the presentation).
Thursday, March 31, 2022
Tuesday, March 29, 2022
Google enjoys paramount significance for competition across markets
The 173-page decision by the Bundeskartellamt determining Google's status of addressee of Section 19 (a) GWB has been published and even translated into English. The company's "paramount significance for competition across markets" has been confirmed (and accepted by Google itself). Much to read and ponder on (already not clear - at least to me - how much Google in the end had to pay for the proceedings).
Antitrust Olympus
Cristina Caffarra of CRA has single-handedly (as far as I "know" her) organized an impressive Conference with the Gods of our field You can also join it virtually (as I'll be doing, thanks).
Sunday, March 27, 2022
Thursday, March 24, 2022
Habemus the Digital Markets Act
On 24 March 2004 the European Commission fined Microsoft for abuse of dominant position (H/T Lewis Crofts). 18 years (age of maturity) later on the same day, the Digital Markets Act was conclusively negotiated within the Trialogue. Papers and books will be written.
Wednesday, March 23, 2022
« Wouldn’t it be nice to solve all such problems in one go? »
…famously said the former Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes in the long aftermath of the EU Microsoft case referring to interoperability issues caused by Big Tech. More than a decade after Kroes expressed that wish, the DMA moves exactly in this direction, with mandated interoperability for ancillary services *and* for so called horizontal interoperability of instant messaging (albeit limited to one-to-one communications with late openings with regard to group chats and calls), as it has been reported by the FT and Politico today. More could be done, and the devil will likely be in the technical details of the obligations, of course, but it’d be a promising beginning.
Monday, March 21, 2022
Competition law in war times
Perhaps due to miopia, this is something we wouldn’t have expected to see in our so far rather peaceful European Union. The European Competition Network has just published a “ Joint statement by the European Competition Network (ECN) on the application of competition law in the context of the war in Ukraine”.
Friday, March 18, 2022
A patron of digital competition
At the end of January, Google launched a "new dedicated Digital Assets Team". Today, Politico reported that "a group of progressive advocates are pushing Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), the head of the House Financial Services Committee, to hold a hearing on Google’s" new blockchain plans. As reported by Politico, differently from Facebook's grand plan with Libra/Diem, Google "is...looking to create a broader blockchain infrastructure that could be used by a wide variety of cryptocurrencies and other digital assets, and stressed that Google doesn’t “want to take sides in backing any specific currency.” Should we worry? Will the DMA protect us? Antitrust and financial minds in particular will likely need to come together to discuss this. If St. Isidore of Seville (painting: as imagined by Murillo) is the unofficial patron saint of the Internet, we could use a patron of digital competition too. Any candidate?
One step ahead? The Italian Competition Authority sends detailed requests for information to major oil companies
After Germany and other countries, the Italian Autorità aims "to investigate the reasons for these increases and, if so, to assess whether there is scope for possible intervention limited only to the hypothesis of a possible infringement of the rules on abuse of a dominant position or agreements restricting competition"
Thursday, March 17, 2022
Quo vadis, DMA?
Are we fiddling while competition processes in the digital economy are "burning"? Not quite, according to the excellent Speakers at a conference which took place today (also online and for free, many thanks), organized by Concurrences. (BTW, this is not a conference debriefing à la D'Kart, so don't expect to be informed while being entertained). The urgency we are in, however, was clearly expressed by Andreas Mundt by saying that "we don't have the time to wait for Court decisions". He also expanded on the many ways in which "his" 19a GWB was way better than the DMA. My conference-tweeting as stream of consciousness starts here.
Wednesday, March 16, 2022
Teuer, expensive, chère, cara...
Robert Habeck, the German Minister for Economic Affairs and Climate, asked the German Competition Authority (per Tweet?) to assess weather mineral oil companies were behaving abusively ("Could be"). The Bundeskartellamt replied by press release (only in German at the time of writing). The Authority is not concerned with oil price swings per se, but "[I]f crude oil prices now fall again and petrol station prices do not follow suit or even rise further, we have to take a close look. This includes several market levels: from the crude oil market to the refineries and wholesalers to the petrol station operators." How national are these markets (still) today, actually?
MGM's Bauchschmerzen
The European Commission approved Amazon's acquisition of MGM Holdings Inc. Personally, I felt some Bauchschmerzen.
Tuesday, March 15, 2022
Meta's exclusionary conduct in South Africa referred to the Competition Tribunal
We have a press release and a very nice interview with Competition Commissioner Bonakele (with a shut out to Sec. 19a GWB).
Monday, March 14, 2022
Net Zero-relevant markets
The CMA has launched a Sustainability Taskforce, namely "a cross-organisational taskforce dedicated to sustainability issues". Among other things, it commits to "launching at least 1 new market study in a Net Zero-relevant market in the next financial year".
Saturday, March 12, 2022
Libra's Post-Mortem - Novi Resuscitati?
The CFPB's Director, Rohit Chopra, gave a TV interview yesterday. While Libra might be no more, he made clear that "cryptocurrencies + Big Tech" might still pose issues and that the Biden administration is getting ready to anticipate them.
Friday, March 11, 2022
One of Biden Executive Order's Many Sprouts
President Biden's Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy never stops giving. The US Department of Agriculture has just announced that "[a]s part of its efforts to enhance fair and competitive markets, USDA is requesting comments and information from the public about the impacts of concentration and market power in fertilizer, seeds and other agricultural inputs, and retail"
Byzantine splits
One of the strangest things about US antitrust policy to my European eyeballs has always been the byzantine split between the FTC and the DOJ on merger enforcement. Interagency collaboration as well as the very hot discussions on modernizing merger guidelines are on the agenda of an upcoming Spring Enforcers Summit (4 April).
I need that source.
At a panel organized during the Industrial Organization Meeting, Spring 2022, Carl Shapiro famously called himself a Modernist and others New Brandeisians (see here, fn. 7). While the recordings of the other panels are still available (one click away on the meeting's website), this is not (while it has been for a while: I caught up a few hours after the panel took place). This is a real pity for us interested in following the recent developments in antitrust policy thinking. Please NBER, put it up again.
Stellar Wars in the Antitrust Sky?
The antitrust news of the day so far (10. 52 AM CET) is the parallel opening of investigations in the UK and the EU into the Jedi Blue allegation. Interestingly, the CMA is signalling again that the DMU politicians' time is up, this time by starting "scrutinising Google’s conduct in relation to header bidding services more widely to see if the firm abused a dominant position and gained an unfair advantage over competitors trying to provide a similar service".
Thursday, March 10, 2022
Message to my Students & Others
Dear all,
This blog/feed has always been for us to be well informed. Sadly, I'm no longer able to update it - simply too much going on. I might be transitioning it to a real blog.
Friday, February 04, 2022
Thursday, February 03, 2022
Wednesday, February 02, 2022
Thursday, January 27, 2022
Wednesday, January 26, 2022
Establishing a European Declaration on Digital rights and principles for the Digital Decade
Thursday, January 20, 2022
Wednesday, January 19, 2022
Big Tech, big deals and a new era of antitrust
Interview with Lina Khan, here (an enforcer - and still very much an academic IMHO, not a politician or an activist - she might want to learn a couple of tricks from Margrethe though, if she has the time...).
Tuesday, January 18, 2022
Monday, January 17, 2022
Saturday, January 15, 2022
Apple complies with Dutch watchdog ruling on payment options in Netherlands
Friday, January 14, 2022
Tuesday, January 11, 2022
Wednesday, December 22, 2021
Thursday, December 16, 2021
15 Visionen für eine gerechte, soziale und nachhaltige Digitalisierung
Digitalezivilgesellschaft.org, hier.
Ökonomie als Wissenschaft der Präferenzentstehung und Charakterbildung
Hayek-Vorlesung mit Ernst Fehr, hier.
The Impact of Consolidation and Monopoly Power on American Innovation
Subcommittee on Competition Policy, Antitrust, and Consumer Rights, here.
Friday, December 10, 2021
Monday, December 06, 2021
Friday, December 03, 2021
Tuesday, November 30, 2021
Monday, November 29, 2021
Tackling Digital Gatekeeper Power: A More Effective, Participatory Way
@wavesblog, Study commissioned by MEP Martin Schirdewan, here.
Ahead of his time: the ideas and legacy of Giovanni Buttarelli
Guest Lecture (online) by Christian D'Cunha
3 December, 9 AM CETFriday, November 26, 2021
Thursday, November 25, 2021
Wednesday, November 24, 2021
Tuesday, November 23, 2021
DISINFORMATION RISKS, REGULATORY GAPS AND ADEQUATE COUNTERMEASURES
Expert Opinion Commissioned by the Landesanstalt für Medien NRW, here.
Monday, November 22, 2021
Thursday, November 18, 2021
Wednesday, November 17, 2021
Tuesday, November 16, 2021
Thursday, November 11, 2021
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Centre for a Digital Society , Video here . These are my very rough talking points on pay or okay in full length (more than I actually had...
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Arstechnica.co.uk, here .
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TechCrunch, here .
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Lesechos.fr, ici .
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Searle Center on Law, Regulation, and Economic Growth, June 4-5 2015, Agenda here .
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On with Kara Swisher, here .
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E. Schmidt, here . { " Everything needs to change , so everything can stay the same" }
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CERRE, Panel here . CERRE Report, here .