Competition

The Future of Loyalty Rebates after Intel

By Abigail Hopper, J.D. Candidate 2018, Columbia Law School The European Court of Justice (ECJ) took a step toward clarifying the antitrust implications of loyalty rebates offered by dominant firms in its Intel decision released on September 6. The decision rejected the interpretation of the General Court (GC), which ruled that Intel’s loyalty rebates were illegal per se because they were conditioned on exclusivity. The ECJ clarified that although rebates conditioned on exclusivity were presumed to violate Article 102 TFEU, the presumption is just that – a presumption. A firm offering exclusivity rebates can rebut the presumption by showing evidence […]

Would a closed European soccer league violate TFEU Article 101?

Aaron Rogoff | J.D. Candidate 2017, Columbia Law School | Editor-in-Chief Is European soccer headed for a competition law standoff? The monumental growth in revenue from the sale of TV broadcasting rights for Europe’s major soccer leagues has made membership in a top league a valuable economic right. European leagues differ from the “Big Four” U.S. sports leagues (the NFL, NBA, MLB, and NHL) in that league membership is not fixed. In the U.S., any change in team membership requires collective action by the ownership of all existing teams, whereas in Europe the makeup of each domestic league changes on an […]

Shopping for a Case: Initial Reactions to the Commission’s Google Announcement

Alex Weaver J.D. Candidate, Columbia Law School, 2016 Editor-in-Chief, Columbia Journal of European Law After five years of formal investigation, the European Commission announced today that it has sent a Statement of Objections to Google concerning its means of promoting Google Shopping results. The allegation derives from Google’s giant footprint in general online search, boasting a more than 90% market share.[1] By using this position to systemically favor its own comparison shopping service, Google, says the Commission, may be in violation of Article 102 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. This Article prohibits the abuse of […]

Taking Takeover Struggles to the Courts

Julian Beach J.D. Candidate, Columbia Law School, 2016 Traditionally, hostile takeovers between publicly traded companies weren’t viewed as the European way of doing business.[1] Recognized as a common form of corporate practice in the United States since the enactment of broad Federal legislation in the 1960’s, European regulators and business leaders did not turn their full attention to hostile takeovers until the late 1980s.[2] Since the 1990s, mergers and public tender offers specifically have become increasingly frequent, leading the European Commission in 2004 to enact both updated merger regulation and a Takeover Directive to tackle hostile activity.[3] However, substantive differences […]