Luis Campos

Most mergers do not raise competition concerns and therefore can be completed without further commitments to competition authorities. By contrast, mergers raising material competition concerns will not be authorised by competition authorities without adequate commitments by the parties aimed at addressing those concerns. Understanding which type of remedies a competition authority is willing to accept to address these concerns is therefore key to the success of a merger, and an important element in the merger strategy devised by the parties. The articles in this edition provide numerous examples on the use of a specific type of remedies – behavioural remedies – to address competition concerns arising from mergers.

In recent years, damages litigation in Europe has been marked by the implementation of the Damages Directive across most EU countries. Reflecting this, a number of recent articles in this edition report on the details of the implementation of the Directive across the EU.