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Competition
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Featured
2nd Circ. Rejects 'New Standard' Of Patent Monopolies
A Second Circuit panel on Monday revived antitrust allegations accusing Novartis of concealing the true history of an eye syringe treatment's development from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office to edge Regeneron out of the market, faulting a district court for holding that antitrust markets can't be "coextensive" with the patent.
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April 22, 2024
DOJ Antitrust Concerns Topple $960M Insulation Biz Merger
Insulation and building material provider TopBuild Corp. said Monday it has terminated its $960 million agreement to buy mechanical insulation provider Specialty Products & Insulation from private equity firm Incline Equity Partners, saying it was unable to reach a deal with the U.S. Department of Justice over antitrust concerns.
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April 22, 2024
FCC Fines AT&T, Internet Co. For Discussing Auction Bids
AT&T Services Inc. and AMG Technology Investment Group LLC have not been able to convince the Federal Communications Commission to kibosh a combined $175,000 in fines for talking to each other during the bidding process for an auction of funds to subsidize infrastructure build-out.
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April 22, 2024
FCC Eyes Rule Changes For Independent Video Programmers
The Federal Communications Commission plans to explore how federal rules can better help independent video programmers thrive in a competitive media landscape and may prohibit a pair of provisions that affect their contracts with distributors.
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April 22, 2024
Construction Supplier's Threats Cost Rival $30M, Jury Told
A construction supplier told a Colorado federal jury Monday that a Berkshire Hathaway-owned rival tried to smother its entry into the calcium silicate industrial insulation market, alleging the larger company warned customers to stay away from the newcomer so that it could maintain its monopoly.
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April 22, 2024
Kroger, Albertsons Expand Divestiture Plan
Supermarket giants Kroger and Albertsons are willing to let go of an extra 166 stores in the hopes of swaying federal and state regulators to drop their opposition to the $25 billion grocer union, they said Monday.
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April 22, 2024
Gambling Co., Casinos Battle Over Shuffler Antitrust Claims
Scientific Games successor Light & Wonder has urged an Illinois federal judge not to certify a class of automatic card shuffler buyers, even as the riverboat casinos accusing it of tricking the patent office into shoring up its shuffler monopoly argued that their claims should go to trial.
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April 22, 2024
Robinhood 'Meme Stock' Investors Lose New Class Cert. Bid
A Florida federal judge has denied a bid from Robinhood investors to file a new motion for class certification in a suit over the trading platform's suspension of so-called meme stock purchases, saying the deadline for class certification has passed and the investors have not shown a good reason to extend it.
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April 22, 2024
Court Tosses Shipbuilders No-Poach Case As Untimely
A Virginia federal court found that a pair of warship designers haven't shown that major shipbuilders for the U.S. military, including General Dynamics and Huntington Ingalls Industries, concealed a "gentlemen's agreement" to not poach workers from one another.
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April 22, 2024
Chamber Planning Prompt Challenge Of FTC Noncompete Ban
U.S. Chamber of Commerce officials vowed Monday to immediately challenge an impending Federal Trade Commission rule that would ban essentially all noncompete agreements that employers impose on their workers, raising concerns focused principally on opening a "Pandora's box" of rulemaking they say is beyond FTC authority.
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April 22, 2024
FTC Moves To Block $8.5B Designer Fashion Deal
The Federal Trade Commission moved on Monday to block a planned $8.5 billion deal for the parent company of Coach and Kate Spade to purchase the owner of designer brands Michael Kors and Jimmy Choo.
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April 22, 2024
What We've Learned From Biden-Era Merger Remedies
Amid the Biden administration's uniquely aggressive merger regime, companies making deals face much higher hurdles convincing competition enforcers to accept divestitures, licensing deals or other remedies designed to address antitrust concerns. However, officials have provided a few clues about what settlements they'll accept and when.
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April 22, 2024
Vista Outdoors Nudges MNC Capital To Bolster $3B Bid
Vista Outdoor Inc. on Monday urged investment firm MNC Capital to increase its prior $3 billion buyout offer, as Vista weighs MNC's proposals against an already inked merger agreement to sell its ammunition brands off to Czechoslovak Group.
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April 22, 2024
EU Threatens To Suspend 'Addictive' TikTok App Features
The European Commission warned TikTok on Monday that it may suspend a key feature of the video sharing platform's new app that rewards users for watching videos unless it addresses the watchdog's concerns about addictive elements of the new app and its risk to mental health.
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April 22, 2024
Thermo Fisher Says Rival Is Raiding Its Workforce
Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. is seeking to block Repligen Corp. from hiring one of its top executives, according to a suit in Massachusetts state court accusing the rival of a "systematic raiding" of its workforce.
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April 22, 2024
CMA Wins Battle Over Home Search Warrants In Cartel Probe
The competition watchdog won a legal battle at a London court on Monday after a tribunal refused to grant it a domestic search warrant as it carried out a cartel investigation.
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April 22, 2024
High Court Denies US Soccer Petition In Antitrust Challenge
The U.S. Supreme Court denied a petition by the U.S. Soccer Federation asking it to dismiss for good a suit by a sports promoter accusing it of violating antitrust law by refusing to sanction international pro soccer games on American soil.
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April 19, 2024
Colo. Won't 'Defer' To Feds In Kroger-Albertsons Merger Suit
Colorado's attorney general has defended his decision to file a case seeking to block a $24.6 billion merger between the supermarket chains Kroger and Albertsons, telling a state court judge that nothing requires him to "defer to federal enforcers."
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April 19, 2024
Judge Mulls Axing Biomedical Cos.' $25M Punitive Damages
Not enough evidence supports Skye Orthobiologics' $25.5 million punitive damages award against an ex-employee found to have breached his fiduciary duties by leveraging Skye's proprietary information, a California federal judge has ruled, asking for briefing on whether the proper remedy is to cut the damages or grant a new trial.
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April 19, 2024
Yardi Ordered To Provide Info On Apartment Pricing Algorithm
Real estate management software company Yardi Systems Inc. is going to have to turn over information about who has been using its rent maximizer algorithm to renters who claim that at least 11 property management companies have been using the service to fix rental costs, a federal judge has said.
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April 19, 2024
Vegas Paper Wants Antitrust Suit Paused For Appeal
The Las Vegas Review-Journal asked a Nevada federal judge to pause the Las Vegas Sun's antitrust suit against it, pending an appeal to the Ninth Circuit over the core agreement between the papers that the Review-Journal says the judge wrongly cleared.
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April 19, 2024
DOJ Can't Coordinate Google Ad Tech Discovery With Texas
A Virginia magistrate judge on Friday denied a request from the U.S. Department of Justice to coordinate discovery in its suit accusing Google of monopolizing key digital advertising technology with a similar case from state enforcers pending in Texas.
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April 19, 2024
AI Image Cos. Say Artists Offer Little Proof In Copyright Case
Four companies that make or distribute artificial intelligence software that creates art through prompts have told a California federal court that a proposed class action from artists must end, arguing the plaintiffs still have not shown proof that any of the businesses infringed or induced infringement of copyrighted works.
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April 19, 2024
NY Scraps Proposal Impacting Local Broadband Networks
Public broadband advocates are applauding a budget bill approved by New York's state Legislature that lacks previously proposed language they say would have weakened the state's rollout of locally owned wireless networks.
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April 19, 2024
French Train Biz Alstom Selling Signaling Biz For $671M
French train manufacturer Alstom said Friday it has agreed to sell its North American conventional signaling business to German brake-maker Knorr-Bremse AG for about €630 million ($671 million).
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April 19, 2024
Sidley, Perkins Coie Guiding Nordstrom On Strategic Review
Sidley Austin LLP and Perkins Coie LLP are representing a special committee of Nordstrom Inc.'s board of directors that is looking into taking the Seattle-based luxury department store private after an earlier 2017 go-private plan fell apart.
Editor's Picks
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Antitrust Cases And Issues To Watch In 2024
A string of cases testing the limits of antitrust law when it comes to Big Tech are among the developments practitioners are watching in 2024, as well as cases targeting information-sharing schemes and private equity investments and investigations of the real estate and alcoholic beverage industries.
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FTC, DOJ End 2023 With New Guidance, Lingering Challenges
Federal Trade Commission and U.S. Department of Justice competition enforcers are ending 2023 with a mixed track record full of failed criminal prosecutions and contentious civil enforcement, but capped by a crucial win for vertical enforcement and the issuance of new merger guidelines.
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New Merger Guidelines 'Want To Turn Back The Clock'
The Justice Department and the Federal Trade Commission put two-plus years of Biden-era merger theories on paper Wednesday in draft guidelines they hope will help shape a fundamental transformation of U.S. antitrust enforcement, but experts say the guidance may run into the same limitations those theories already have encountered in court.
Expert Analysis
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Behind Indiana's Broad New Healthcare Transactions Law
The high materiality threshold in Indiana's recently passed healthcare transaction law, coupled with the inclusion of private equity in its definition of healthcare entities, makes it one of the broadest state review regulations to date, say attorneys at DLA Piper.
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Highlights From The 2024 ABA Antitrust Spring Meeting
U.S. merger enforcement and cartels figured heavily in this year's American Bar Association spring antitrust meeting, where one key takeaway included news that the Federal Trade Commission's anticipated changes to the Hart-Scott-Rodino form may be less dramatic than many originally feared, say attorneys at Freshfields.
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What FERC's Disclosure Demands Mean For Cos., Investors
Two recent Federal Energy Regulatory Commission orders reflect the commission's increasingly meticulous approach to reviewing corporate structures in applications for approval of proposed consolidations, acquisitions or changes in control — putting the onus on the regulated community to track and comply with ever-more-burdensome disclosure requirements, say attorneys at Willkie.
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Clemson's ACC Exit Fee Suit May Have Major Consequences
Clemson University's recent suit in South Carolina state court against the Atlantic Coast Conference, which challenges the ACC's $140 million exit fee and its ownership of member schools' media rights, would likely have enormous ramifications for ACC members in the event of a definitive court ruling, say William Sullivan and Alex Anderson at Pillsbury.
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FDIC Bank Merger Reviews Could Get More Burdensome
Recently proposed changes to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. bank merger review process would expand the agency's administrative processes, impose new evidentiary burdens on parties around competitive effects and other statutory approval factors, and continue the trend of long and unpredictable processing periods, say attorneys at Simpson Thacher.
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Series
Whitewater Kayaking Makes Me A Better Lawyer
Whether it's seeing clients and their issues from a new perspective, or staying nimble in a moment of intense challenge, the lessons learned from whitewater kayaking transcend the rapids of a river and prepare attorneys for the courtroom and beyond, says Matthew Kent at Alston & Bird.
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Apple Ruling Offers Morsel Of Certainty On Litigation Funding
An English court's recent decision in Gutmann v. Apple, finding that a litigation funder could be paid via a damages award, offers a piece of guidance on the permissibility of such agreement terms amid the ongoing uncertainty around funded group litigation in the U.K., says Mohsin Patel at Factor Risk Management.
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This Earth Day, Consider How Your Firm Can Go Greener
As Earth Day approaches, law firms and attorneys should consider adopting more sustainable practices to reduce their carbon footprint — from minimizing single-use plastics to purchasing carbon offsets for air travel — which ultimately can also reduce costs for clients, say M’Lynn Phillips and Lisa Walters at IMS Legal Strategies.
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4 Ways AI Tools Can Improve Traditional Merger Analyses
Government officials at the American Bar Association's annual antitrust spring meeting last week reinforced the view that competition cases will increasingly rely on sophisticated data analysis, so companies will likewise need to use Big Tech quantitative techniques to improve traditional merger analyses, say Patrick Bajari, Gianmarco Calanchi and Tega Akati-Udi at Keystone.
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Blocked JetBlue-Spirit Deal Illustrates New Antitrust Approach
The U.S. Department of Justice’s recent successful block of a merger between JetBlue Airways and Spirit Airlines demonstrates antitrust enforcers’ updated and disparate approach to out-of-market benefits versus out-of-market harms, say Lisa Rumin and Anthony Ferrara at McDermott.
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The Pros And Cons Of NIST's Proposed March-In Framework
Recent comments for and against the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s proposed guidance on march-in rights — which permit the government to seize federally funded patents — highlight how the framework may promote competition, but could also pose a risk to contractors and universities, say Nick Lee and Paul Ragusa at Baker Botts.
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Opinion
Federal MDL Rule Benefits From Public Comments
The new Federal Rule of Civil Procedure concerning multidistrict litigation that was approved this week by the Advisory Committee on Civil Rules incorporates ideas from public comments that will aid both plaintiffs and defense attorneys — and if ultimately adopted, the rule should promote efficient, merits-driven MDL case management, say Robert Johnston and Gary Feldon at Hollingsworth.
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Practicing Law With Parkinson's Disease
This Parkinson’s Awareness Month, Adam Siegler at Greenberg Traurig discusses his experience working as a lawyer with Parkinson’s disease, sharing both lessons on how to cope with a diagnosis and advice for supporting colleagues who live with the disease.
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EU Ruling Exposes Sovereignty Fissures In Int'l Arbitration
The European Court of Justice's recent ruling that the U.K. had breached EU law by allowing an arbitral award to proceed underscores the diminished influence of EU jurisprudence in the U.K., hinting at the EU courts' increasingly nominal sway in international arbitration within jurisdictions that prize legal autonomy, says Josep Galvez at 4-5 Gray’s Inn.
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Opinion
Aviation Watch: Not All Airline Mergers Hurt The Public
The U.S. Department of Justice's actions to block recent attempted airline mergers have been touted as serving the interests of the consumers — but given the realities of the deregulated air travel market, a tie-up like the one proposed between JetBlue and Spirit might have been a win for the public, says Alan Hoffman, a retired attorney and aviation expert.