Competition policy 2022

Olivier Guersent, Director-General, DG Competition, European Commission
Chair: Joe Perkins, Senior Vice President, Head of Research, Compass Lexecon

• It is becoming increasingly difficult to predict which authorities will assert jurisdiction to review a merger, or require a filing, under both merger control and FDI screening regimes. How can businesses navigate these uncertainties, and should policy makers be doing more to mitigate them?

• Should competition authorities be looking more closely at certain issues in their merger reviews, e.g. mergers’ impacts on buyer power (including in labour markets), potential and nascent competition, competition on non-price factors?  Are more refined assumptions appropriate to prevent anticompetitive mergers slipping through the net?

• As authorities become more interested in impacts on potential competition, is the balance between quantitative and qualitative evidence changing in merger review? Are new approaches needed to analyse dynamic competitive effects rigorously?

• What are the implications of increased regulatory scrutiny in the form of clearance regimes such as the EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation?

• What are the early-stage reflections since the introduction of the UK’s National Security and Investment Act and to what extent will the UK be cooperating with other FDI systems and jurisdictions on the policy level or on specific cases?

Speakers:
Tembinkosi Bonakele, Commissioner, South African Competition Commission
Chandralekha Ghosh, Counsel, Clifford Chance
Niall Mackenzie, Director, Consumer & Competition Policy, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, UK Government
Alberto Martinazzi, Senior Counsel, Head of International Competition, The Coca-Cola Company

Chair: 
Rameet Sangha, Senior Vice President, Compass Lexecon

• Is Europe a global pace setter? To what extent will the newly introduced EU Digital Markets Act and Digital Services Act impact regulation across other jurisdictions such as the UK, USA, and Asia Pacific?

• What are the implications of the EU Digital Markets Act and Digital Services Act, what are their scope, and how will businesses need to adapt? How do these new regulatory regimes compare with the approach taken by the UK?

• How will new regulatory regimes impact technology investment incentives and innovation both as regards established and new market players?

• Are competition authorities and anti-trust regulators adequately prepared to enforce the new regulatory regimes alongside existing antitrust tools?

• How will the EU’s updated revised Vertical Block Exemption Regulation (VBER) and guidelines on vertical restraints (Vertical Guidelines) affect the growth of online sales and new market players such as digital platforms?

• How can new tools, such as machine learning and other data science techniques, help to improve competition interventions in the digital sector?

Speakers:
Amelia Fletcher CBE, Professor of Competition Policy, Centre for Competition Policy (CCP), Norwich Business School
Will Hayter, Senior Director, Digital Markets Unit, Competition Markets Authority
Joe Perkins, Senior Vice President, Head of Research, Compass Lexecon
Carla Wachendorfer, Senior Manager, Head of Commerical and Antitrust Law, Delivery Hero

Chair: 
Nelson Jung, Partner, Clifford Chance

• Should competition policy do more to facilitate competitor collaborations that mitigate supply chain disruptions and market shocks post-pandemic?

• Will the updated EU Horizontal Block Exemption Regulations and Guidelines facilitate more beneficial cooperation agreements and information exchange between competitors, in the areas of joint production, purchasing, and sustainability?

• Are specific exemptions required to address the emerging need for competitor collaboration within key sectors, and what might these look like in practice?

• What are the direct and indirect labour market impacts of agreements between competitors and how is anti-cartel regulation and enforcement adapting to account for them?

Speakers:
Natalie Harsdorf-Borsch, Acting Director General, Federal Austrian Competition Authority
Christoph Leibenath, Senior Antitrust Counsel, Nestlé 
Cristina Volpin, Competition Policy Expert, OECD
Chair: Simon Holmes, Member, Competition Appeal Tribunal

William E. Kovacic, Global Competition Professor of Law and Policy and Director, Competition Law Center, The George Washington University Law School
Chair: Timothy Cornell, Partner, Head of US Antitrust Practice, Clifford Chance