In a tort law regime established on the basis of corrective justice considerations, causation requirements will tend to play a predominant role in regulating the damages claims brought forward. The requirement of the causal link between the harm suffered and the anticompetitive conduct in...

Nowadays, merger control predominantly relies upon a strict analysis of the effects from merger and acquisitions on effective competition. However, there is scope for so-called public interest considerations in several European merger control regimes and recently a number of European politicians...

The ministerial proposal for a 10th amendment of the German competition law particularly addresses abuse control and seeks to tighten this pillar of competition policy against the background of the challenges from the digital economy. Next to extending the classic policy instruments of abuse...

In 2008, the European Commission investigated E.ON, a large and vertically integrated electricity company, for the alleged abuse of a joint dominant position by strategically withholding generation capacity. The case was settled after E.ON agreed to divest 5,000 MW generation capacity as well as...

Data owners may be required to grant access to their data to third party businesses through the operation of various legal requirements. To date, these rules have not been noticeably applied in practice. There are likely two key reasons for this: the "data protection defence", i.e., the possible...

In 2008, the European Commission investigated E.ON, a large and vertically integrated electricity company, for the alleged abuse of a joint dominant position by strategically withholding generation capacity. The case was settled after E.ON agreed to divest 5,000 MW generation capacity as well as...

Both anti-corruption law and anti-trust law aim to create a level playing field and they are complementary to each other in support of this aim. Given the indispensable nature of both fields in terms of reaching social welfare, it is striking how differently society reacts to the breaching...

Within the debate on the role of competition law in standard essential patents (SEPs) litigation, German case law has gained centre stage because of the number of decisions handed down and its traditional patent owner-friendly approach. As the framework handed down by the European Court of...

For over a decade, the substantive rules of European competition law have been subject to a reinterpretation commonly referred to as the ‘more economic approach’. This article considers one of the procedural consequences resulting from this fundamental change: Since the EU courts...