Competition

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EU Antitrust Agency Must Rethink Mergers After Court Loss

Mergers in tightly packed European markets got a shot in the arm last month when the bloc's General Court assailed European Commission antitrust reviews in a drubbing experts say will make the enforcer much more cautious and companies more bold.
July 02, 2020
Law360 Names Top Attorneys Under 40

We're pleased to announce Law360's Rising Stars for 2020, our list of 176 attorneys under 40 whose legal accomplishments transcend their age.
July 03, 2020
UK Litigation Roundup: Here's What You Missed In London

The last week has seen a competition suit against Royal Mail, a Saint-Gobain unit lodge a patent claim against 3M and a Russian bank file another suit against Mozambique and one of the state-owned entities embroiled in a $2 billion bribery scandal. Here, Law360 looks at those and other new claims in the U.K.
July 02, 2020
Sutter Health Indirect Purchasers Vie For Cert. In $489M Suit

Health insurance plan purchasers seeking $489 million from Sutter Health on claims they overpaid because the hospital chain violated antitrust laws told a California federal judge during a hearing Thursday that their renewed class certification bid isn't doomed by a dispute over calculating damages.
July 02, 2020
Tech Behemoths Say Yes To Testifying For Antitrust Probe

Four of the biggest giants in tech — Google, Amazon, Apple and Facebook — have agreed to sit in the House Judiciary Committee's hot seat later this summer amid the Democratic-led probe into their virtually unmatched market power.
July 02, 2020
Ryanair Testing EU's Discretion In Lufthansa Aid Challenge

Ryanair's challenge of the German government's €9 billion bailout of Lufthansa may hinge on whether European regulators missed something in their rush to combat COVID-19's economic fallout on the major carrier.
July 02, 2020
Jimmy John's Slams Class Certification Bid In No-Poach Suit

A Jimmy John's employee can't certify a class in his suit challenging the company's no-poach agreements because the class would include conflicting class members and their claims can't be proven with common evidence, the sandwich chain argued in Illinois federal court.
July 02, 2020
EU To Extend State Aid Rules As COVID-19 Marches On

The European Commission is pushing back the expiration date on a slew of state aid rules and tweaking others to account for the economic fallout caused by the coronavirus pandemic, the watchdog said on Thursday.
July 02, 2020
DOJ Antitrust Chief Denies Staffer Claims Of Political Bias

The head of the U.S. Department of Justice's Antitrust Division has hit back against allegations made by a division staffer that investigations into recent cannabis mergers and a car emissions deal were politically motivated.
July 02, 2020
Singapore Watchdog To Probe LSE's $27B Refinitiv Deal

Singapore's competition authority on Thursday raised concerns about the London Stock Exchange's planned $27 billion takeover of Refinitiv, saying the blockbuster deal could affect the market for foreign exchange rates.
July 01, 2020
Sports Antitrust Protection Questioned As NCAA Seeks Bill

U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal said Wednesday it may be high time to scrutinize sports labor antitrust exemptions, with the NCAA urging Congress to give it a pass from antitrust scrutiny as it works to reform its rules restricting college athletes from profiting from the use of their names, images and likenesses.
July 01, 2020
T-Mobile Closes $1.4B Sprint Divestment Deal With Dish

T-Mobile has made good on its promise to shed all of Sprint's prepaid mobile business in the wake of the telecom giants' $56 billion merger, revealing Wednesday that it has officially closed the divestiture deal with Dish Network for $1.4 billion.
July 01, 2020
Telescope Co. Says Rival Pulling Strings On Antitrust Suit

Celestron wants out of a $350 million suit accusing the telescope maker of teaming up with rivals to hike the price of the stargazing devices, slamming the suit as a "transparent and frivolous" effort by a non-party competitor to run it out of business.
July 01, 2020
Sandoz Dodges Sanctions Bid In Antitrust Dispute

A New Jersey federal judge has rebuffed biopharmaceutical company United Therapeutics and infusion pump maker Smiths Medical's bid to impose sanctions on Sandoz and its marketing firm in an antitrust dispute, ruling that they attempted to correct their accidental filing of an unredacted document that revealed trade secrets.
July 01, 2020
UK Watchdog Calls For New Tech Platform Regulatory Regime

The U.K.'s competition authority called on the government Wednesday to set up a new regulatory system to help rein in the power of Facebook, Google and other major technology platforms that generate money through digital advertising.
July 01, 2020
Brazil Watchdog Eases Up On Facebook, Cielo Payment Deal

Brazil's competition authority has dropped a recent decision to block a partnership between Facebook and credit card issuer Cielo, but says it will continue probing the deal for possible anti-competitive effects.
July 01, 2020
Indivior Wants 3rd Circ. To Undo Suboxone Class Cert.

Indivior Inc. implored the Third Circuit to undo certification of a class action accusing the company of delaying generic competition of its opioid addiction drug Suboxone, arguing Wednesday that certification was improperly based on an overarching antitrust theory, rather than on individually evaluated claims.
July 01, 2020
Peabody, Arch Coal Hit Back Against FTC's Bid To Halt JV

Peabody Energy Corp. and Arch Coal Inc. have urged a Missouri federal court not to halt their proposed joint venture, arguing in a Tuesday filing that the Federal Trade Commission took too narrow a view of their market and could not support its claims that the venture would have anti-competitive effects.
July 01, 2020
UK Watchdog Fines Eye Care Cos. £1.2M For Price-Fixing

The U.K.'s antitrust regulator on Wednesday said it has fined a private hospital group and several eye disorder specialists more than £1.2 million ($1.4 million) total for colluding for almost two years to raise prices for initial consultations.
June 30, 2020
DOJ Charges Glenmark With Generic Drug Price-Fixing

The U.S. Department of Justice announced new criminal charges late Tuesday in its investigation of price-fixing in the generic-drug industry, this time accusing Glenmark Pharmaceuticals Inc. USA in Pennsylvania federal court of overcharging by at least $200 million for a cholesterol treatment.
June 30, 2020
DOJ, FTC Finalize Vertical Merger Guidelines

The U.S. Department of Justice and a divided Federal Trade Commission issued the final version of their new vertical merger guidelines Tuesday, hewing closely to an earlier draft but leaving out perhaps the most controversial part: a market share threshold under which deals would be less likely to be scrutinized.
June 30, 2020
Top Mexico Court Lets Renewable Power Stay On Grid

Mexico's top court has refused to reinstate a plan by the country's energy ministry to prevent renewable power sources from connecting to the electric grid as an antitrust complaint against the idea moves forward.
June 30, 2020
Consumers Say Vaping Claims Aren't Barred In Juul MDL

Consumers in the federal multidistrict litigation over vaping told a California judge on Monday that federal law does not broadly bar their claims that Juul Labs Inc. and Altria Group Inc. hid the dangers of e-cigarettes in their marketing, saying that was not what Congress intended.
June 30, 2020
In Booking.com, Court Rejects Hard Rules And Dire Warnings

The U.S. Supreme Court's decision on Booking.com essentially amounted to a rejection of two big things: a bright-line rule on when generic terms can be registered as trademarks, and fears that such protection might be abused.
June 30, 2020
Visa, Mastercard Attack Cert. Bid In ATM Fee Antitrust Suit

Visa and Mastercard are coming out swinging against a bid to certify three different classes that all accuse the credit giants of running afoul of antitrust laws with ATM fee rules that hurt consumers and machine owners.
June 30, 2020
Monthly Merger Review Snapshot

Enforcers in the U.K. forged ahead with a slew of merger investigations last month, as Europe's watchdog launched in-depth probes into multibillion-dollar deals in the financial trading and automotive sectors and U.S. officials continued pushing several merger cases in court.

Editor's Picks

Major Antitrust Developments To Watch In 2020

Google, Facebook and other U.S. technology platforms are feeling the pressure from a groundswell of attention being paid to antitrust heading into 2020, and while some of the popular sentiment pushes the boundaries of conventional enforcement, more traditional concerns, like the pending merger of T-Mobile and Sprint, are also looming. Here, Law360 looks at key cases in antitrust for the new year.
The Most Closely Watched Merger Reviews Of 2020

U.S. antitrust enforcers have a lot on their plates in the new year, scrutinizing major technology platforms even as they weigh mergers involving massive companies not just in the online and privacy spaces but also in pharmaceuticals and investment brokerages.
CVS-Aetna Review Ends In Parting Shots & Punctuation!

Despite approving the U.S. Department of Justice deal clearing CVS Health’s purchase of Aetna, the presiding D.C. federal judge couldn’t resist a few parting shots at the agency after months of antagonism, and with a well-placed punctuation mark, the DOJ appears to have returned fire.

Expert Analysis

Opinion

Time To Consider Percentage Rental Agreements For Lawyers

It has long been the law that attorneys cannot use percentage rental agreements because doing so would constitute an impermissible sharing of fees with nonlawyers, but such arrangements can help lawyers match expenses with revenues in lean times like now, say Peter Jarvis and Trisha Thompson at Holland & Knight.
Indirect Purchaser Antitrust Standing Heads In New Direction

The applicability of the U.S. Supreme Court's 1983 Associated General Contractors indirect purchaser price-fixing decision to antitrust standing under state law continues to evolve, with some decisions that may portend diminished application, say Chris Micheletti and James Dugan at Zelle.
'Settle And Sue' Malpractice Cases Have New Clarity In Calif.

A California state appellate court's recent decision in Masellis v. Law Office of Leslie F. Jensen provides a road map for proving causation and damages in settle-and-sue legal malpractice cases — an important issue of long-standing confusion, says Steven Berenson at Klinedinst.
What You Say In Online Mediation May Be Discoverable

Mediation conducted online with participants in different states makes it harder to determine where communications were made, increasing the risk that courts will apply laws of a state that does not protect mediation confidentiality, say mediators Jeff Kichaven and Teresa Frisbie and law student Tyler Codina.
Trade Groups Face Antitrust Questions In Pandemic Response

Three recent business review letters from the U.S. Department of Justice's Antitrust Division provide some guidance to trade associations and professional societies in assisting members with coronavirus-related issues without violating antitrust laws, say Steven Fellman and Richard Bar at GKG Law.
Strategic Considerations For The Escalating SEP Battles

Recent developments in the standard-essential patent landscape affect licensing negotiations and litigation involving communications and networking technologies, and will lead to increased attention from regulators and potential inconsistencies among different agencies and forums, say Erik Puknys and Michelle Rice at Finnegan.
Prepare For Antitrust Scrutiny Of PIPEs, Partial Acquisitions

In light of the regulatory attention on private equity investment activity, as well as the recent decline in M&A activity and increase in private investments in public equity, the Federal Trade Commission or U.S. Department of Justice may decide to examine for the first time a PIPE transaction that raises competitive questions, say Peter McCormack and Laura Sullivan at Kirkland.
10 Tips For A Successful Remote Arbitration Hearing

As I learned after completing a recent international arbitration remotely, with advance planning a video hearing can replicate the in-person experience surprisingly well, and may actually be superior in certain respects, says Kate Shih at Quinn Emanuel.
Opinion

To Achieve Diversity, Law Firms Must Reinvent Hiring Process

If law firms are truly serious about making meaningful change in terms of diversity, they must adopt a demographically neutral, unbiased hiring equation that looks at personality traits with greater import than grades and class rank, says Thomas Latino at Florida State University College of Law.
A New Antitrust Approach After Humira 'Patent Thicket' Ruling

In light of an Illinois federal court's recent holding that AbbVie's Humira "patent thicket" did not violate antitrust laws, parties concerned with the potential anti-competitive conduct of a biologic reference product sponsor should focus on conduct and look beyond patent obtainment, says Kevin Nelson at Schiff Hardin.
Cybersecurity Steps For Law Firms Amid Heightened Risks

With large swaths of the population indoors and primarily online, cybercriminals will be able to exploit law firms more easily now than ever before, but some basic precautions can help, says Joel Wallenstrom at Wickr.
4 Tips For Defending Consolidated Cases

Consolidation of plaintiffs may be a trend we'll see more of in the aftermath of COVID-19 court closures, with added risks for those defending such cases before a jury, but running a targeted voir dire and incorporating a strong case theme could go a long way, says Christina Marinakis at Litigation Insights.
An Inside Look At DOJ Fight Against COVID-19 Price-Gouging

New Jersey U.S. Attorney Craig Carpenito and Assistant U.S. Attorney Nicholas Grippo share how the U.S. Department of Justice is combating hoarding and price-gouging of medical supplies and analyze some of the prosecutions a new task force has brought during the pandemic.
Opinion

It's Time For Law Firms To Support Work-From-Home Culture

Now that law firms are on board with fully remote work environments, they must develop policies that match in-office culture and align partner and associate expectations, says Summer Eberhard at Major Lindsey.
Opinion

Republicans Keep Confirming Unqualified Judicial Nominees

What emerges from the group of 200 federal judges confirmed by the Senate under President Donald Trump is a judiciary stacked with young conservative ideologues, many of whom lack basic judicial qualifications, says Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee.