merger

Written by Simon Harms | Stephen C. Tupper

As many businesses will be acutely aware, the preparation of merger control notifications to the European Commission (the “Commission“) under the EU Merger Regulation (the “EUMR“) in respect of M&A transactions requires a considerable amount of effort by in-house teams and external legal and economic advisers and results in significant costs in terms of professional fees and management time.

As detailed below, the Commission is currently proposing small but significant changes to its notification rules to ensure that these financial and administrative burdens are only imposed when absolutely necessary.

By way of background, the EUMR uses monetary turnover thresholds to determine whether a notification must be made in respect of an M&A transaction. While this provides parties with a great deal of certainty regarding the need to make a filing, it also means that the rules catch transactions which could not, by any stretch of the imagination, have a real impact on competition (e.g. acquisitions by parties which have no, or minimal, overlapping operations with their targets).
Continue Reading EU merger control: reform with a small ‘r’ (but do not underestimate its value)

Written by Simon Harms and Stephen C. Tupper

1. Background

A significant number of countries worldwide now operate mandatory merger control regimes. Cross-border M&A activity, as a result, increasingly involves notifications in several jurisdictions. Most regimes are national in scope, however, important supranational merger control regimes exist – such as European Union (“EU”) merger control.

Whilst EU merger control operates as a “one-stop shop” for the entire EU1for transactions meeting certain thresholds, 26 of the 27 EU Member States2 operate national merger control regimes for transactions that do not. As a result, many transactions require notification to multiple merger control authorities within the EU, each subject to its own procedural and substantive rules which vary significantly from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.3
Continue Reading Streamlining multi-jurisdictional merger control in a globalised world – best practices