A blog about competition, regulation and privacy in the digital era
Everything had started well with the excellent Furman report, which emphasized the need to adopt an ex ante regulatory regime that would apply to Big Tech firms in the UK. That report had indeed found that competition rules would not be sufficient to control these firms’ market power. The UK had the lead and was … Continue reading When Brexit means falling behind: The probable death of the DMU regime
[This is the first of two blog posts on the principle of ne bis in idem and the DMA. This post sets the scene by discussing the CJEU’s case-law on ne bis in idem, with a focus on the Court’s recent rulings in bpost and Nordzucker. A second blog post will discuss the implications of … Continue reading Ne bis in idem and the DMA: the CJEU’s judgments in bpost and Nordzucker – Part I
In the past couple of years, several reports have concluded that a small number of large digital platforms act as gatekeepers in that they are necessary gateways between business users and their prospective customers. This allows these platforms to take advantage of the dependency of these business users on their services by imposing unfair trading … Continue reading What is a digital gatekeeper?
A lot of things have been written about the Digital Markets Act, which will be proposed by the Commission on 9 December. In most cases, I agree with some of the recommendations made, while disagreeing with others. For the first time, however, I fully agree with a set of recommendations made by others, which is … Continue reading Digital Markets Act: Why the CERRE Recommendations Paper gets it entirely right
2019 saw regulators across the EU rethinking the effectiveness of existing competition rules in digital markets. Within this context, the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate explored the possibility of adopting ex ante instruments to control “digital gatekeepers”, as part of its plan to modernize competition policy in relation to online platforms. For this reason, the … Continue reading “Digital Gatekeepers: assessing exclusionary conduct” – a report by e-Conomics and Radicand Economics