In January 2016, the Commission cleared the acquisition of the global #2 beverage can manufacturer Rexam by the global #1 Ball, subject to the divestiture of nearly the whole overlap in Europe. A key feature of the phase 2 investigation is the adoption of customer-centric catch-ment areas as the...

In recent years the Commission examined many telecommunication mergers in Europe and gained significant experience in assessing the different issues raised by consolidations involving mobile-only operators or mobile and fixed operators. While mobileonly mergers often result in horizontal...

In a two-country international trade model with oligopolistic competition, we study the conditions on market structure and trade costs under which a merger policy designed to benefit domestic consumers is too tough or too lenient from the viewpoint of the foreign country. Calibrating the model...

This papers analyses how horizontal mergers affect innovation activities of the merged entity and its non-merging competitors. We develop an oligopoly model with heterogeneous firms to derive empirically testable implications. Our model predicts that a merger is more likely to be profitable in...

Kann eine Wettbewerbsbeschränkung Effizienzziele verfolgen? Diese Frage beantwortet der Autor mit einem deutlichen "Nein!". Ob eine Wettbewerbsbeschränkung vorliegt, eine marktbeherrschende Stellung missbraucht wird oder der Wettbewerb im Gemeinsamen Markt im Sinne der...

Standard analysis of mergers in oligopolies along the lines of the popular Farrell-Shapiro Framework (FSF) relies, regarding its policy conclusions, on the assumption that rational agents will only propose privately profitable mergers. If this assumption were held, a positive external effect of...

In diesem Jahr steht in Deutschland die Novellierung des Gesetzes gegen Wettbewerbsbeschränkungen (GWB) an. Das Reformvorhaben hat eine intensive Debatte um die Neuorientierung der Wettbewerbspolitik in digitalen Märkten entfacht. Während es einen Konsens gibt, dass der existierende...