Canadian COMPETITION & ANTITRUST LAW

COMPETITION POLICY SERVICES

We provide a full range of competition law and Canadian foreign investment law services including in relation to the merger, conspiracy, bid-rigging, misleading advertising and Canadian foreign investment provisions of the federal Competition Act and Investment Canada Act.  Our competition policy services for international clients and enforcement agencies include:

Agency enforcement guidelines and policy documents. Research, drafting and consultation for antitrust agency enforcement guidelines and policy documents in relation to merger control, monopoly/abuse of dominance, conspiracy/cartels, pricing and distribution and consumer protection rules.

Research and policy papers. Research and preparation of legal, economic and industry/sectoral studies, policy and position papers and reports.

Competition policy and reform. Competition policy and law modernization and reform consultation services.  Our experience includes the development and revision of merger enforcement guidelines in several competition law jurisdictions including Canada, the United States, European Union, India, China, Russia and Malaysia.

Competition policy advocacy programs.  Our experience includes the design and delivery of competition advocacy programs prepared and implemented by competition agencies and their government partners, which emphasize the role and importance of a well articulated and strongly advocated competition policy in supporting enforcement of and compliance with a modern competition law.  Possible audiences include other government departments, trade and industry associations, major companies, and civil society.

Research, policy development and advocacy services on the links between competition policy and law and broader economic and social development objectives of government.  Competition policy and law reform and advocacy requires a sound understanding of the role and importance of competition policy and law and other competition related economic reforms in promoting the achievement of the broader economic development objectives of developing countries in such areas as inclusive growth, poverty alleviation, entrepreneurship and small business development, agricultural and rural development, innovation, and the emergence of a more diversified knowledge based economy.

Research and advocacy services on the interactions of competition policy and law with other marketplace laws and regulatory frameworks.  Competition policy and law reform, enforcement and advocacy also requires a solid understanding of the positive and negative interactions between competition policy and law and trade, industrial, innovation, financial market, consumer and small business development policies, intellectual property rights, corporate, bankruptcy and consumer protection laws, and sectoral regulators. Our experience on competition policy contributions, linkages and interactions includes assignments for competition agencies, other government departments and international organizations such as the OECD and UNDP.

Training, education and voluntary compliance programs. Advisory services on and the preparation and implementation of training, education, voluntary compliance programs, and networking initiatives, to be implemented within and outside government in order to promote competition policy objectives and successful competition law enforcement.

Coordinating governmental policies with competition policies. Research and advisory services that would allow competition agencies and other government ministries with competition policy responsibilities to better tailor industrial organization theory and competition law practice to better meet the merger review and other competition law enforcement and competition policy needs and constraints of developing country competition authorities and to the socioeconomic and political economy realities of developing and transition economies.  For example, our research, experience and expertise provide us with a sound understanding of how privately and state owned enterprise and business groups that are prominent in many developing countries can influence competition policy and law enforcement, corporate governance and the administration of other marketplace policies, laws, and regulations in a manner that can either promote or hurt competition.

Competition policy for the introduction of competition laws. Advisory services, research, policy analysis and competition policy advocacy programs to facilitate the introduction of competition, commercialization, public-private partnerships and private investment, ownership and management into previously regulated state-owned industries in developing countries.

Economic research programs. Advisory services on the establishment and operation of economic research programs on competition policy and law, consumer policy and consumer protection policy, intellectual property rights and other marketplace framework laws – including on the interactions between different policies, laws and regulatory regimes.

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We provide federal competition and foreign investment law services to clients across Canada and internationally.