Big Tech remedies - recent developments and trends

Our Monitoring Trustee Services team reviewed recent case law and legislative developments relating to the choice of competition and merger remedies for Big Tech companies in the EU and UK.  The resulting article (which can be downloaded in full below):

• identifies a close relationship between relevant case law and the new/proposed legislation
• concludes that the adoption of clearly defined ex ante remedies can be expected to continue, even though the two jurisdictions have taken different approaches
• discusses the scope for an increased use of structural remedies.  While the groundwork for this shift has been laid, we believe that the break-up of Big Tech companies is likely to remain an exception. However, other more structural remedies short of full ownership separation will become more prominent. This would involve the operational separation of businesses and commercial activities of dominant platforms in competition with platform-dependent third parties as well as data separation and ring-fencing measures
• considers the institutional changes and resource implications of increased ex ante regulation and antitrust law enforcement in the digital economy.  The complexity of the subject matter and the dynamic nature of digital technology markets mean that the costs of both compliance and monitoring will be significant.

This material was first published by Thomson Reuters, trading as Sweet & Maxwell, 5 Canada Square, Canary Wharf, London, E14 5AQ, in European Competition Law Review as ‘Big Tech remedies - recent antitrust case law and legislative developments’ in Issue 2 (2023) and is reproduced by Mazars in agreement with the publishers.