Most Recent News Archives - The Competition Law Hub

The Austrian Brau Union Case Unsettles Heineken

ComplawAdmin — Thu, 01 Oct 2026 12:55:48 +0000

In a recent interview with Orla McDonald from the Dutch Het Financieele Dagblad, Vicky Robertson discussed the developing case law of the Austrian Supreme Court on antitrust fines. She emphasised that the Court has issued ever stricter fining decisions over the past years against the background of the need for deterrence. This could also impact Heineken as the mother company of Brau Union, a company that is under scrutiny for abuse of dominance in an ongoing Austrian case.

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Merger Control at the European Parliament

ComplawAdmin — Thu, 01 Oct 2026 12:53:57 +0000

At an event that took place at the European Parliament, Vicky Robertson discussed ways in which the forthcoming Merger Guidelines by the European Commission could better take non-price parameters of competition into account, particularly as they relate to media plurality and digital platforms. Further speakers on the panel, which was moderated by Justine Haekens, were Filippo Lancieri and Ioannis Lianos. Their key takeaways:

Include all theories of harm based on which mergers may be blocked, and provide possible evidence in a separate section;
ensure that all sources of wisdom that can contribute to understanding a merger can be relied upon, don’t limit yourself to one strand of economics;
provide concrete examples of how to make non-price parameters of competition actionable in merger assessments; and
close gaps in assessing digital mergers with an impact on media pluralism, ensure coherence with the European Media Freedom Act.

A further panel asked what evidence there is for merger efficiencies, and what impact the more economic approach had (and continues to have) on EU merger control. Brought together by moderator James Kanter were panellists Daniele Calisti, Kati Cseres and Annika Stöhr.

The event was hosted by MEP Rasmus Andresen, Rebalance Now and the Open Markets Institute.

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Vienna Competition Law Days 2026

ComplawAdmin — Wed, 23 Sep 2026 07:57:25 +0000

On 24 and 25 September 2026, The Competition Law Hub once again hosts the Vienna Competition Law Days at the Vienna University of Economics and Business. Bringing together leading academics, competition enforcers and practitioners, the workshop aims to foster discussions on current issues in competition law and economics. In addition to a book talk on democratic antitrust, four panels discuss the state of play in the DMA, FDI & merger control, innovation, and antitrust sanctions. You can find the programme as follows:

VCLD 2026_Programme Download

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ASCOLA 2026

ComplawAdmin — Wed, 08 Jul 2026 08:10:46 +0000

At the annual conference of the Academic Society for Competition Law (ASCOLA), which took place in London from 1 to 3 July 2026, The Competition Law Hub was represented by Franziska Guggi, Klaudia Majcher and Vicky Robertson. Franziska presented a chapter of her PhD in computational antitrust – stay tuned! Klaudia presented her working paper on epistemic welfare in competition law. Vicky presented a chapter of her forthcoming book, dealing with multi-stakeholder engagement in digital competition law. She also chaired a session on antitrust foundations, and discussed Richard Bunworth’s paper on the impact of Irish merger control.

ASCOLA 2026 was also a great opportunity to catch up with former visiting fellows of The Hub, including Belle Beems, Thomas Cheng, Helena Drewes, Eva Fischer and Wendy Ng.

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AI & Competition

ComplawAdmin — Wed, 08 Jul 2026 08:07:43 +0000

On 30 June 2026, Vicky Robertson participated in a Roundtable on AI and Competition, hosted by Ariel Ezrachi at Pembroke College, Oxford. It was an excellent opportunity to push the current boundaries for engagement with the many ongoing developments in AI and ecosystem envelopment. In particular, it was highlighted how various forms of AI-driven misinformation need to be countered, including through competition law. Remedies, it was emphasised, need to be carefully drafted and addressed in order to be successful – and should not only come as an afterthought.

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Computational Antitrust in Action?

ComplawAdmin — Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:22:48 +0000

At The Hub’s Jour fixe, Fanni Tuominen (Graz University of Technology) presented her research into the use of data-driven tools in the enforcement of EU competition law by the European Commission, the General Court and the Court of Justice. She created an interconnected dataset that allows for navigating instances in which the authority and the courts relied on keywords associated with computational antitrust, and also looked into ways in which topic modelling could be applied to legal documents. She carried out her interdisciplinary research with Jürgen Fleiß, Vicky Robertson and Dominik Kowald.

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Merger Guidance on Democracy

ComplawAdmin — Tue, 09 Jun 2026 09:57:38 +0000

Although the European Union’s draft Merger Guidelines acknowledge that consolidation in digital platforms can harm the democratic process, they need to up their efforts to protect media competition and a quality public sphere. In a new blogpost on ProMarket, Vicky Robertson discusses three steps that could help EU merger control support liberal democracy: (i) The European Commission should assume its role as a central actor when it comes to merger control of digital media platforms; (ii) non-price parameters relevant for media pluralism should be made actionable in theories of harm; and (iii) synergies between the European Media Freedom Act and EU merger control should be identified and leveraged. The blogpost can be found here. It is part of a symposium on the draft EU Merger Guidelines.

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Steering and User Choice in the DMA

ComplawAdmin — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 07:49:18 +0000

Vicky Robertson and David Führer just published a working paper version of their analysis of Articles 5(4) and 5(5) Digital Markets Act (DMA) on SSRN. These two provisions enshrine business users’ right to steer their customers away from gatekeepers’ app stores, as well as users’ right to access content they acquired off a core platform service. Articles 5(4) and 5(5) DMA need to be seen against the background of the anti-steering provisions typically included in various application stores. These have already been subject to antitrust enforcement and have now also come under DMA scrutiny in the Apple App Store (non-compliance) decision of 2025.

The contribution is forthcoming in a comprehensive commentary on the Digital Markets Act, edited by Ioannis Kokkoris.

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Book Award for Klaudia Majcher

ComplawAdmin — Tue, 28 Apr 2026 10:12:50 +0000

Klaudia Majcher’s book on ‘Coherence between Data Protection and Competition Law in Digital Markets’ was awarded the Irena & Jerzy Wiszniewski Foundation Award for the best scholarly work in the field of trademarks, patents and competition law. Published by Oxford University Press in 2023, when Klaudia was Assistant Professor at WU Vienna, the book argues for a more integrated approach to enforcing competition law and data protection in digital markets.

The award was presented on 19 March 2026 during the conference ‘The Regulation of Markets in Defence of Democratic Principles’ at the University of Warsaw, co-organised by the Centre for Antitrust and Regulatory Studies, the Irena & Jerzy Wiszniewski Foundation, and the Polish Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Law Studies.

Many congratulations, Klaudia!

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ICN Unilateral Conduct Workshop 2026

ComplawAdmin — Tue, 21 Apr 2026 09:40:39 +0000

At the 2026 ICN Unilateral Conduct Workshop in Prague (15 to 17 April 2026), Vicky Robertson joined the delegation of the European Commission as a Non-Governmental Advisor to DG COMP. The delegation was comprised of Vera Pozzato, Cristina Sjödin, Ligia Dorobantu (all DG COMP),and the NGAs Anne C Witt (EDHEC), Miguel Odriozola (Clifford Chance) and Vicky Robertson (WU Vienna & CLH). The Workshop was hosted by the Czech Competition Authority UOHS.

Vicky contributed to the panel on remedies and commitments in unilateral conduct cases and shared her research on data-driven tools for competition enforcement, focusing on data-driven monitoring of remedies, its opportunities and challenges. The panel was moderated by Rita Leandro Vasconcelos (Pérez-Llorca) and included fellow panelists Alexandre Barreto (Brazilian Competition Authority CADE), Marjorie Holmes (Reed Smith) and Friso Bostoen (University of Tilburg). Her contribution was based on her research on algorithmic remedies (with Jana Lasser; see here) as well as her research on data-driven tools in antitrust enforcement (with Jürgen Fleiß, Jan Amthauer, Franziska Guggi, Dominik Kowald and Valentin Forster; see here, here, here and here).

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