The growth in the digital economy both powerfully drives competition, but also provides challenges to global antitrust enforcement. This E-commerce Competition Enforcement Guide, edited by Claire Jeffs, looks at whether established competition tools are sufficient to deal with the challenges of the online world. Drawing on the collective wisdom and expertise of 48 distinguished experts from 22 firms and competition authorities, the Guide provides insight on the differing approaches adopted by enforcement agencies and whether a balance is being struck between maintaining a vigilant approach to the digital economy and allowing competition to flourish.--From publisher's website.
The most important book on antitrust ever written. It shows how antitrust suits adversely affect the consumer by encouraging a costly form of protection for inefficient and uncompetitive small businesses.
Private Enforcement of European Competition and State Aid Law Current Challenges and the Way Forward Edited by: Ferdinand Wollenschläger, Wolfgang Wurmnest & Thomas M.J. Möllers The overlapping European Union (EU) regimes of competition law and State aid law both provide mechanisms allowing private plaintiffs to claim compensation for losses or damages. It is thus of significant practical value to provide, as this book does, analysis and guidance on achieving enforcement of such claims, written by renowned authorities in the two fields. The book examines the two areas of law both from an EU perspective and from the perspectives of private enforcement in France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and the United Kingdom. In country reports for these major jurisdictions, as well as in more general and comparative chapters, the authors focus on such issues as the following: impediments to private enforcement; which entity is liable for damages; binding effect of decisions of competition authorities; limitation of actions; collective actions and pooling of claims; enforcement of the standstill obligation (Article 108(3) TFEU); remedies and information deficits; cooperation and coordination between national courts and the European Commission; transposition of the so-called Damages Directive (Directive 2014/104/EU) by the EU Member States; extent to which the strengthening of private enforcement of competition law has a spillover effect on State aid law; and prospects for harmonisation of State aid law. A concluding section identifies enforcement deficits and proposes ways to improve the existing legal framework. As an in-depth assessment of key obstacles and best practices in private enforcement actions, this highly informative and practical volume facilitates choice of the best forum for competition and State aid law cases. Academics and practitioners engaged with this important area of European law will appreciate the authors’ awareness of the economic need and legal particularities which could generate an effective European system of private enforcement of legitimate claims under EU competition and State aid law.
This report analyzes e-commerce in Asia and the Pacific, assesses its environmental impact, and explains why providing adequate internet, online payments, and last-mile logistics is key to creating a sustainable and inclusive digital marketplace. Noting the region makes up the largest share of the world’s online retail market, it tracks the impact of the pandemic and emphasizes the need to level the playing field for small businesses. It outlines ways for companies to measure their carbon footprint, highlights the potential risk of anti-competitive behavior, and explains the need to improve digital taxation policies in line with e-commerce’s rapid growth.
Presenting new findings and perspectives from leading international scholars on three critical areas of developing government policies: Digital markets and their regulation, the divergence of expert and public views on European democracy, and the effects of firing notification procedures on wage growth.
This book offers an in-depth legal analysis concerning the notion of restrictions of competition, be it by object restrictions according to Article 101 TFEU or prima facie abusive practices treated according to the form-based approach under Article 102 TFEU. Although extensive research has been conducted on the notion of object infringements of competition, there is no systematic review of this topic covering both competition provisions, namely Articles 101 and 102 TFEU. This book fills that gap by providing an extensive analysis of the relevant case law, while also covering new phenomena stemming from the digital revolution and its impact on the functioning of traditional markets. In this regard, particular attention is paid to the concept of prima facie infringements and the analysis necessary for their successful establishment. Object restrictions and object abuses are not infringements per se in the sense that they can be established in the abstract and without consideration of the actual legal and economic context (context analysis) within which a measure is implemented. Hence, the indispensable context analysis is informed by the potential economic effects of a given measure. Examining the changes regarding the economic reality and how markets work in the digital economy, this book makes a valuable contribution to the current debate about whether our competition law toolkit is fit and proper to deal with the challenges posed by digitalization. The author argues that while there is a coherent framework covering both Treaty competition provisions as regards object restrictions of competition, the increased use of an actual effect analysis and thus the concept of a restriction of competition by effect represents an underestimated (and underused) weapon for combating measures that are ambivalent from a competition law perspective as regards their (anticompetitive or non-detrimental) nature in a digital economy.
Recent studies on competition law and digital markets reveal that accumulating personal information through data collection and acquisition methods benefits consumers considerably. Free of charge, fast and personalised services and products are offered to consumers online. Collected data is now an indispensable part of online businesses to the point that a new economy, a data-driven sector, has emerged. Many markets such as the social network, search engine, online advertising and e-commerce are regarded as data-driven markets in which the utilisation of Big Data is a requisite for the success of operations. However, the accumulation and use of data brings competition law concerns as they contribute to market power in the online world, resulting in a few technology giants gaining unprecedented market power due to the Big Data accumulation, indirect network effects and the creation of online ecosystems. As technology giants have billions of consumers worldwide, data-driven markets are truly global. In these data-driven markets, technology giants abuse their dominant positions, but existing competition law tools seem ineffective in addressing market power and assessing abusive behaviour related to Big Data. This book argues that a novel approach to the data-driven sector must be developed through the application of competition law rules to address this. It argues that current and potential conflicts can be mitigated by extending the competition law assessment beyond the current competition law tools to offer a modernised and unified approach to the Big Data–related competition issues. Promoting new legal tests for addressing the market power of technology giants and assessing abusive behaviour in data-driven markets, this book advocates for cooperation between competition and data protection authorities. It will be of interest to students, academics and practitioners with an interest in competition law and data protection.
This book features research papers presented at the International Conference on Emerging Technologies in Data Mining and Information Security (IEMIS 2022) held at Institute of Engineering & Management, Kolkata, India, during February 23–25, 2022. The book is organized in three volumes and includes high-quality research work by academicians and industrial experts in the field of computing and communication, including full-length papers, research-in-progress papers and case studies related to all the areas of data mining, machine learning, Internet of Things (IoT) and information security.
Since the last edition ten years ago the pace of technological and legal change has stepped up even more than before with previous editions. New legislation is in force such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and UK Data Protection Act 1998 and from 1 January 2021 "UKGDPR". The UK Information Commissioner has been looking closely at "Ad Tech" and what has become known as "big data" and how data are gathered on-line. Intellectual Property law in the ecommerce area has also changed. There is a very recently agreed new EU copyright directive which is due to be implemented in the 27 EU member states (but not the UK) in 2021. The post-Brexit transition period expired on 31 December 2020 which has implications for the application of ecommerce law in a number of different areas which are all addressed in the new addition. The 2010 EU vertical regulation and guidelines have recently been built on with the EU "geo-blocking" regulation and the related EU Commission's initiatives in relation to ecommerce in the anti-trust area. In 2020 the UK implemented changes in relation to EU law in the revised 2018 Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMS) through the Audiovisual Media Services Regulations 2020 which are addressed in the new edition as post-Brexit the UK is retaining this legislation. Other updates include the distance selling legislation in the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013 and the Consumer Rights Act 2015 which came into force since the last edition.
What is algorithmic collusion? This evaluative book provides an insight into tackling this important question for competition law, with contrasting critical perspectives, including theoretical, empirical, and doctrinal – the latter frequently from a comparative perspective. Bringing together scholarly discussion on algorithmic collusion, the book questions whether competition law is adeptly equipped to deal with its various facets.
