Benoît Durand
RBB Economics (Brussels)
Partner
Benoît Durand is a partner at RBB Economics, which he joined in 2008. He has over 20 years of experience in competition economics, particularly in applying quantitative techniques in the context of competition law investigations. Prior to joining RBB, he was director of economic analysis at the UK’s Competition Commission, and a member of the Chief Economist Office at the Directorate General for Competition at the European Commission. He was previously based in Washington DC, USA, where he worked in private practice. He speaks regularly at competition policy conferences and has published numerous articles on competition economics issues. He teaches competition economics at the Brussels School of Competition and at the Barcelona Graduate School of Economics, as well as a course on quantitative techniques. Benoît Durand received his Ph.D. in economics from Boston College, USA.
Distinctions
Linked authors
Simon Bishop
RBB Economics (Brussels)
Miguel de la Mano
RBB Economics (Brussels)
Joan de Solà-Morales
RBB Economics (Brussels)
Michael Dietrich
RBB Economics (Düsseldorf)
Christian Ehmer
RBB Economics (Düsseldorf)
18434 | Events
Articles
2293 Bulletin
1240
In 2001, the Bundeskartellamt conducted a series of dawn raids and discovered the existence of a cartel in the cement industry in Germany. Cement producers had divided the market, reaching agreements on sales quotas. This cartel had been operating at least since the beginning of the 1990s. (...)
556
"The role of quantitative analysis to delineate antitrust markets: An example. Blackstone / Acetex"* Introduction On 20 January 2005, the Commission received a notification for the proposed acquisition of Acetex, an active producer in the acetyls and plastic business, by Blackstone, a U.S. (...)
497
"GE/Instrumentarium: a practical example of the use of quantitative analyses in merger control"* On 2 September 2003, the European Commission approved, subject to conditions, the acquisition by General Electric Medical Systems (‘GE’) of the Finnish firm Instrumentarium. The Commission was (...)
15804 Review
2892
Interview conducted by Benoît Durand, Partner, RBB Economics, Brussels/Paris The most important merger decisions Between 2014 and 2019, you were deputy director-general for mergers, but your experience with merger control starts well before that, notably when you were a member of the Merger (...)
1147
Tommaso Valletti, Chief Competition Economist at the DG COMP since september 2016, assesses the role of the chief competition economist (CEE) and the necessary interaction between economics and competition law in this interview conducted by Benoît Durand, RBB Economics, Brussels. The chief (...)
549
In recent decisions involving fast-moving consumer goods, the European Commission has relied on merger simulation models to predict the likely effect of horizontal mergers. Is this the beginning of a new trend? The merger simulation label contains a variety of models, and if all merger (...)
3747
There is no alternative to the hypothetical monopolist test to define the relevant market. Even though the test is difficult to apply, adopting other alternatives such as that advocated by the French competition authority in its merger guidelines is a risky venture. However, the hypothetical (...)
2263
1 The CCLA has a strong interest in mass distribution. Recently, it has recently carried out a self-investigation to investigate the practice of "category management" between food retail operators and some of their suppliers. In the past, other competition authorities have also taken an (...)
5206
Economic literature is warning us that applying a one-sided market logic in two sided markets is bound to generate some errors when assessing the extent of competition between firms. This article reviews some recent UK merger decisions in two-sided market industries and found that in all (...)
