Big Data : Is EU Competition Law Ripe Enough to Meet the Challenge?

The paper aims to contribute to the reflection on both the role that personal data has acquired in the mostly dominant business models of the digital economy and how this is likely to pose substantive challenges to EU competition law. After sixty years since its foundation, getting an exhaustive mirrored in its enforcement, is likely to be among the most complicated matters that EU Competition Law has to face ahead. As personal data is a key asset for companies, it should come to the fore when performing any competition assessment in data-driven markets. An overview of the possible data-based anticompetitive behaviours is then provided, alongside an insight into possible future competitive paradigms. The paper concludes on the opportunity of an integrated approach in enforcing data protection and competition law in the markets where data is the main input, so as to effectively tackle upcoming challenges in competition enforcement