Competition

What is involved?

Compliance with competition and antitrust laws is absolutely vital for all businesses. Antitrust risk should never be ignored – ultimate responsibility rest with the Board and senior management.

Global and UK competition authorities and specialist sector regulators wield significant investigatory powers. They scrutinise and challenge M&A deals and joint ventures, punish cartels, resale price maintenance and other anti-competitive arrangements, fine dominant companies for abusive conduct, and reform failing markets.

On top of that, the UK laws on foreign direct investment, public procurement subsidy control (state aid) and trade remedies impose substantial regulatory burdens on global and UK businesses alike. The additional legislative challenges following the UK’s departure from the EU alongside its continued membership of the WTO are novel, significant and tricky to navigate.

It is crucial that your business and staff fully understand and follow competition law to avoid severe penalties, including huge fines, punitive director disqualification, lengthy prison sentences and vast exposure to damages claims. The reputational damage and time devoted to defence are substantial and the agreements themselves may be void and unenforceable.

Competition law can also be used as a sword to keep your competitors ‘clean’ and allow your business to compete on a level playing field.

Illegal anti-competitive behaviour may not be obvious to everyone. It is a thorny area of law and is is crucial to avoid the traps. It can include restricting resellers’ activities, amicably agreeing with competitors not to undercut each other’s prices, making deals to share markets or customers, discussing your strategies and intentions, and sharing other sensitive information with each other.

Freeths’ Competition department regularly helps clients – including many household names – comply with all aspects of competition law and use competition law to their advantage. We offer considerable expertise in delivering bespoke competition compliance policies and training programmes, as well as ongoing support if competition concerns do arise. Where breaches have occurred, we advise on leniency applications, investigations and overall defence/claims strategy.

Our team includes ex-City competition lawyers who together have amassed considerable practical experience helping businesses navigate the complexities of competition law. We can deliver in-person or virtual training sessions tailored to our client’s business needs, as well as carry out competition law audits to identify the overall level of antitrust risk within an organisation.

Click here to read our recent publications about competition law.

Why choose Freeths?

• We have first-hand experience of working with the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) in competition and merger investigations and market studies/investigations
• Our competition lawyers include former CMA practitioners, with leading in-house regulatory experience, offering clients invaluable regulatory insights
• As “business people first and lawyers second”, we will see problems from your point of view and help you alight on a solution that works for your business
• You can rely on our competition lawyers to be commercially-minded and easy to work with
• Our specialist team offers up-to-date advice on key legal principles, helping you avoid pitfalls
• We will regularly update you – in person, in writing, online and by email – on the latest commercial activity and legislative changes
• We integrate cross-disciplinary expertise across the range of competition disciplines
• We offer innovative cost structures and bespoke billing solutions for our clients

We can help you minimise antitrust risk under UK competition laws, as well as steering you through any antitrust, merger or market investigation you face. We can also help you successfully bring claims or defend disputes involving UK competition law, including competition litigation, cartel damages actions and class actions.

Led by Head of Competition, Andrew Maxwell, Freeths have a dedicated and expert Competition department advising, representing and trusted by clients on all aspects of UK competition law, antitrust, merger control, dispute management and regulation.

We also have a wide variety of sector experts who can help you with Corporate Defence & Regulatory, Energy and Waste, Financial Services, Food, Healthcare, Hospitality & Leisure, Insurance, Pharmaceuticals, Procurement or Retail concerns.

Call any member of our expert department now to find out how we can help you.