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Official Blog of the European Competition and Regulatory Law Review (CoRe)

Der CoRe Blog bietet ein Austauschformat für aktuelle Analysen der Entwicklungen im EU-Wettbewerbsrecht. offizieller Blog der vierteljährlich erscheinenden, mit einem doppelten Peer-Review-Verfahren versehenen Zeitschrift European Competition and Regulatory Law Review (CoRe), füllt der CoRe-Blog die Lücken, die eine viermal jährlich erscheinende Zeitschrift nicht schließen kann: Neuigkeiten und Analysen der Entwicklungen im EU-Wettbewerbs- und Regulierungsrecht.

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Case Digests ×

The draft notice on market definition and multisided (digital) platforms – avoiding rather than resolving some of the main challenges

Approximately a month ago the Commission published its draft notice on the definition of the relevant market. The new notice is supposed to replace the old one that dates back to 1997 and thereby bring the entire process up to date with today’s new challenges, particularly in the context of digital markets. A first read of this long awaited document […]

Re-imagining the Abuse of Economic Dependence in a Digital World

As proven by the recent consultation on the Digital Services Act, the European Union is actively pursuing new solutions to cope with the challenges posed by digitalization. This post proposes a new approach to conducts taking place in the context of online commercial relationships, such as refusals to access platforms or datasets. Namely, it suggests that the European legislator should […]

Amazon cases on the move: Bundeskartellamt closes proceedings while European Commission opens formal investigation

The 17th of July has been quite the day for Amazon, at least when it comes to antitrust. Firstly, the German Competition Authority (Bundeskartellamt) has closed its abuse of dominance proceedings against Amazon in return for concessions from the online marketplace. Secondly, the European Commission announced that it was opening a formal investigation into possible anti-competitive conduct by Amazon. This blog post takes a closer […]

Abuse of relative dominance in the platform economy: a French court finds Amazon’s contracts with third-party sellers significantly imbalanced

Two years ago (before Amazon became entangled in a patchwork of investigations by competition authorities), Reuters reported: ‘France files complaint against Amazon for abuse of dominant position’. The news report did not garner a lot of attention. More surprisingly, neither did the recent judgment of the Paris Commercial Court on the complaint. As the judgment offers insight into several pressing questions presented by platform competition […]

It’s raining Amazon probes: the Bundeskartellamt joins the Commission in investigating the tech giant’s marketplace practices

The investigation On 29 November 2018, the German competition authority (Bundeskartellamt) announced an investigation into Amazon’s business terms and practices on its German marketplace. The Bundeskartellamt’s president commented: Amazon is the largest online retailer and operates by far the largest online marketplace in Germany. Many retailers and manufacturers depend on the reach of Amazon’s marketplace for their online sales. Amazon functions as […]

The Karstadt – Kaufhof merger decided

The Bundeskartellamt started investigations into the merger between big retail store chains Karstadt and Kaufhof just in October and announced the investigations were expected to be complicated and long. Given the parties’ arguments in favour of the merger as counter-measure to pressures from online retail, we suspected here that this merger might turn out the perfect opportunity for the authority to position […]

The Karstadt – Kaufhof merger

The two big department store chains’ plans to merge have gone through quite a bit of up-and-down over the summer. The potential merger had been criticised for several reasons, such as job losses or pay cuts for employees. While it first seemed that the merger would fall through, mainly because of financial issues the Kaufhof owner, Hudson’s Bay Company, experienced, the banks and companies gave […]

New momentum for abandoning the 50+1 rule of the German Bundesliga?

Have you recovered from the World Cup yet? Whether or not, it is now time to focus on the national football leagues again and support the football club of your choice (for better or worse). With regard to the German Bundesliga, the old issue of club-ownership has come back into focus over the summer when the Deutsche Fußball Liga (‘DFL’ […]

The German cement cartel – a landmark decision for private damages actions

The German cement cartel has been occupying German courts of all levels for some time. From the feasibility of the assignment of claims to a third party (see here), or a reduction of fines by nearly 50% by the Higher Regional Court Düsseldorf (OLG Düsseldorf; in German see here) to the recent decision of the Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof […]

Online platforms and abuse of dominance – the case of Funda Real Estate

The application of EU competition law to online platforms has been subject to much debate in the course of the past two years. The EU Commission and several national competition law authorities have launched multiple studies in order to identify the possible challenges in this context and establish an action plan. The distinguishing characteristics of online platforms including: the reliance […]
Anja Naumann

Blog Editor

LL.M., PhD, currently legal trainee at the Higher Regional Court of Berlin.

>> Anja’s CoRe Blog posts >>

Daniel Mandrescu
Blog editor Assistant Professor EU competition law, Europa Institute, Leiden University >> Daniel's CoRe blog posts >>
Friso Bostoen

Blog Editor

Assistant Professor of Competition Law and Digital Regulation, Tilburg University

Friso Bostoen is an assistant professor of competition law and digital regulation at Tilburg University. Previously, he was a Max Weber Fellow at the European University Institute. He holds degrees from KU Leuven (PhD, LLM) and Harvard University (LLM). Friso’s research focuses on antitrust enforcement in digital markets. His work has resulted in numerous international publications, presentations, and awards (including the AdC Competition Policy Award 2019 and the Concurrences PhD Award 2022). In addition, Friso edits the CoRe Blog and hosts the Monopoly Attack podcast.

>> Friso’s CoRe Blog posts >>

Nelly Stratieva

Head of Editorial Department and Data Protection Officer

Responsible for EStAL (European State Aid Law Quarterly), EPPPL (European Public Private Partnership Law Review) and CoRe (European Competition and Regulatory Law Review). Overseeing Lexxion Publisher’s privacy and data protection compliance.

Parsa Tonkaboni
Picture Rita Paukste
Rita Paukste

Former Blog Editor

Senior Associate, Motieka & Audzevicius PLP, Vilnius

>> Rita’s CoRe Blog posts >>

Case Digests ×

The draft notice on market definition and multisided (digital) platforms – avoiding rather than resolving some of the main challenges

Approximately a month ago the Commission published its draft notice on the definition of the relevant market. The new notice is supposed to replace the old one that dates back to 1997 and thereby bring the entire process up to date with today’s new challenges, particularly in the context of digital markets. A first read of this long awaited document […]

Re-imagining the Abuse of Economic Dependence in a Digital World

As proven by the recent consultation on the Digital Services Act, the European Union is actively pursuing new solutions to cope with the challenges posed by digitalization. This post proposes a new approach to conducts taking place in the context of online commercial relationships, such as refusals to access platforms or datasets. Namely, it suggests that the European legislator should […]

Amazon cases on the move: Bundeskartellamt closes proceedings while European Commission opens formal investigation

The 17th of July has been quite the day for Amazon, at least when it comes to antitrust. Firstly, the German Competition Authority (Bundeskartellamt) has closed its abuse of dominance proceedings against Amazon in return for concessions from the online marketplace. Secondly, the European Commission announced that it was opening a formal investigation into possible anti-competitive conduct by Amazon. This blog post takes a closer […]

Abuse of relative dominance in the platform economy: a French court finds Amazon’s contracts with third-party sellers significantly imbalanced

Two years ago (before Amazon became entangled in a patchwork of investigations by competition authorities), Reuters reported: ‘France files complaint against Amazon for abuse of dominant position’. The news report did not garner a lot of attention. More surprisingly, neither did the recent judgment of the Paris Commercial Court on the complaint. As the judgment offers insight into several pressing questions presented by platform competition […]

It’s raining Amazon probes: the Bundeskartellamt joins the Commission in investigating the tech giant’s marketplace practices

The investigation On 29 November 2018, the German competition authority (Bundeskartellamt) announced an investigation into Amazon’s business terms and practices on its German marketplace. The Bundeskartellamt’s president commented: Amazon is the largest online retailer and operates by far the largest online marketplace in Germany. Many retailers and manufacturers depend on the reach of Amazon’s marketplace for their online sales. Amazon functions as […]

The Karstadt – Kaufhof merger decided

The Bundeskartellamt started investigations into the merger between big retail store chains Karstadt and Kaufhof just in October and announced the investigations were expected to be complicated and long. Given the parties’ arguments in favour of the merger as counter-measure to pressures from online retail, we suspected here that this merger might turn out the perfect opportunity for the authority to position […]

The Karstadt – Kaufhof merger

The two big department store chains’ plans to merge have gone through quite a bit of up-and-down over the summer. The potential merger had been criticised for several reasons, such as job losses or pay cuts for employees. While it first seemed that the merger would fall through, mainly because of financial issues the Kaufhof owner, Hudson’s Bay Company, experienced, the banks and companies gave […]

New momentum for abandoning the 50+1 rule of the German Bundesliga?

Have you recovered from the World Cup yet? Whether or not, it is now time to focus on the national football leagues again and support the football club of your choice (for better or worse). With regard to the German Bundesliga, the old issue of club-ownership has come back into focus over the summer when the Deutsche Fußball Liga (‘DFL’ […]

The German cement cartel – a landmark decision for private damages actions

The German cement cartel has been occupying German courts of all levels for some time. From the feasibility of the assignment of claims to a third party (see here), or a reduction of fines by nearly 50% by the Higher Regional Court Düsseldorf (OLG Düsseldorf; in German see here) to the recent decision of the Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof […]

Online platforms and abuse of dominance – the case of Funda Real Estate

The application of EU competition law to online platforms has been subject to much debate in the course of the past two years. The EU Commission and several national competition law authorities have launched multiple studies in order to identify the possible challenges in this context and establish an action plan. The distinguishing characteristics of online platforms including: the reliance […]

Case Digests ×

The draft notice on market definition and multisided (digital) platforms – avoiding rather than resolving some of the main challenges

Approximately a month ago the Commission published its draft notice on the definition of the relevant market. The new notice is supposed to replace the old one that dates back to 1997 and thereby bring the entire process up to date with today’s new challenges, particularly in the context of digital markets. A first read of this long awaited document […]

Re-imagining the Abuse of Economic Dependence in a Digital World

As proven by the recent consultation on the Digital Services Act, the European Union is actively pursuing new solutions to cope with the challenges posed by digitalization. This post proposes a new approach to conducts taking place in the context of online commercial relationships, such as refusals to access platforms or datasets. Namely, it suggests that the European legislator should […]

Amazon cases on the move: Bundeskartellamt closes proceedings while European Commission opens formal investigation

The 17th of July has been quite the day for Amazon, at least when it comes to antitrust. Firstly, the German Competition Authority (Bundeskartellamt) has closed its abuse of dominance proceedings against Amazon in return for concessions from the online marketplace. Secondly, the European Commission announced that it was opening a formal investigation into possible anti-competitive conduct by Amazon. This blog post takes a closer […]

Abuse of relative dominance in the platform economy: a French court finds Amazon’s contracts with third-party sellers significantly imbalanced

Two years ago (before Amazon became entangled in a patchwork of investigations by competition authorities), Reuters reported: ‘France files complaint against Amazon for abuse of dominant position’. The news report did not garner a lot of attention. More surprisingly, neither did the recent judgment of the Paris Commercial Court on the complaint. As the judgment offers insight into several pressing questions presented by platform competition […]

It’s raining Amazon probes: the Bundeskartellamt joins the Commission in investigating the tech giant’s marketplace practices

The investigation On 29 November 2018, the German competition authority (Bundeskartellamt) announced an investigation into Amazon’s business terms and practices on its German marketplace. The Bundeskartellamt’s president commented: Amazon is the largest online retailer and operates by far the largest online marketplace in Germany. Many retailers and manufacturers depend on the reach of Amazon’s marketplace for their online sales. Amazon functions as […]

The Karstadt – Kaufhof merger decided

The Bundeskartellamt started investigations into the merger between big retail store chains Karstadt and Kaufhof just in October and announced the investigations were expected to be complicated and long. Given the parties’ arguments in favour of the merger as counter-measure to pressures from online retail, we suspected here that this merger might turn out the perfect opportunity for the authority to position […]

The Karstadt – Kaufhof merger

The two big department store chains’ plans to merge have gone through quite a bit of up-and-down over the summer. The potential merger had been criticised for several reasons, such as job losses or pay cuts for employees. While it first seemed that the merger would fall through, mainly because of financial issues the Kaufhof owner, Hudson’s Bay Company, experienced, the banks and companies gave […]

New momentum for abandoning the 50+1 rule of the German Bundesliga?

Have you recovered from the World Cup yet? Whether or not, it is now time to focus on the national football leagues again and support the football club of your choice (for better or worse). With regard to the German Bundesliga, the old issue of club-ownership has come back into focus over the summer when the Deutsche Fußball Liga (‘DFL’ […]

The German cement cartel – a landmark decision for private damages actions

The German cement cartel has been occupying German courts of all levels for some time. From the feasibility of the assignment of claims to a third party (see here), or a reduction of fines by nearly 50% by the Higher Regional Court Düsseldorf (OLG Düsseldorf; in German see here) to the recent decision of the Federal Court of Justice (Bundesgerichtshof […]

Online platforms and abuse of dominance – the case of Funda Real Estate

The application of EU competition law to online platforms has been subject to much debate in the course of the past two years. The EU Commission and several national competition law authorities have launched multiple studies in order to identify the possible challenges in this context and establish an action plan. The distinguishing characteristics of online platforms including: the reliance […]

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