Marcin is a senior associate in Bird & Bird’s international Competition and Tech & Communications teams in Warsaw. He specialises in competition law and telecommunications law. He has assisted clients from many innovative sectors including media and internet, telecoms, food & beverage, IT, automotive and energy. He has advised on numerous projects, including commercial practices compliance with competition and consumer protection law, merger control (including coordination of multi-jurisdictional merger control notifications), and various proceedings before the Polish Competition Authority and the European Commission (including representing a leniency applicant in the capacitors cartel proceedings, defending a client against its competitor’s complaint to the European Commission, representing a client in an alleged bid-rigging case, and representing clients in matters of consumer protection). In addition, he has also advised companies on telecommunications regulatory issues, such as establishing mobile virtual network operator’s presence in Poland and providing new types of communications services (VoIP services, e-SIM services, services interfering with net neutrality, geo-localisation services based on GPS). Before joining Bird & Bird, he completed a clerkship by assisting the judge at the Polish Court of Competition and Consumer Protection, and also worked at international law firms.
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In July, the Polish Competition Authority (UOKiK) announced the initiation of a preliminary investigation and the fact that they conducted an inspection at the premises of Kärcher. The UOKiK suspects that Kärcher imposed minimum resale prices on distributors selling its professional line of (...)
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At the end of June, the Polish Competition Authority (UOKiK) published its annual activity report for 2020 (the Report). The Report shows that last year was particularly notable for UOKiK’s enforcement. Highest fine in UOKiK’s history UOKiK imposed the highest fine in its history on (...)
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In mid-May, the Polish Competition Authority (“UOKiK”) issued a decision imposing a fine on an individual for obstructing a dawn raid conducted by UOKiK officials. During the 2017 dawn raid, the CEO of Platinium Wellness sp. z o.o. - a gym operator (“the Company”), changed the email password (...)
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Earlier this year the Polish Competition Authority (“UOKiK”) published its guidelines on the rules of imposing and calculating fines for companies breaching competition law (the “New Guidelines”) replacing guidelines issued in 2015. According to the New Guidelines, to determine the amount of (...)
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Following more than a one-year phase II investigation, in January 2021, the Polish Competition Authority (“UOKiK”) announced that it blocked the acquisition of Eurozet by Agora. Parties to the blocked acquisition Both Eurozet and Agora are present in the radio broadcasting and related (...)
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Online platforms and e-commerce have significantly changed the business environment since the current Vertical Block Exemption Regulation (“VBER”) was adopted. They have had a huge impact on the way business is conducted and on the behaviours of consumers who can switch within different online (...)
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The President of the Polish Office of Competition and Consumer Protection ("UOKiK") has imposed the biggest fine for gun-jumping ever by a national competition authority. The UOKiK imposed a fine of over PLN 29 billion (approx. EUR 6.5 billion) on Gazprom, and a total of over PLN 294 million (...)
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In early July, the Polish competition authority (UOKiK) has opened preliminary investigations into the rebate practices of 19 retail chains. In particular, the authority will focus on whether retrospective rebates are used to exploit retail chains’ contractual advantage towards small and (...)
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The Polish Competition and Consumer Protection Act foresees that sanctions for implementing anticompetitive agreements may be imposed on companies and their managers. In fact, managers who have intentionally permitted their company to engage in such practices can face a fine of up to PLN 2 (...)
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Due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the looming economic crisis, Poland is currently adopting legislation, under which transactions involving certain Polish companies and non-EEA investors would be subject to a new clearance obligation. This legislation also temporarily adopts the FDI Screening (...)
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In March 2020, the Polish Competition Authority ("UOKiK") announced that in late February 2020 it cleared Sarantis’ takeover of assets belonging to PZ Cussons International and PZ Cussons Polska ("Cussons"). All parties involved produce and distribute personal care products. In fact, the (...)
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In February 2020, the Polish Competition Authority (“UOKiK”) announced that in December 2019 it imposed a PLN 1.4 million fine on Brother Central & Eastern Europe (“Brother”), a manufacturer of office equipment, which set minimum online sale prices for printers. Between 2010 and 2017, (...)
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In August 2018, Vectra notified UOKiK about its planned acquisition of Multimedia Polska (Multimedia), a competing provider of cable television and Internet access. Following its initial assessment of the planned transaction, UOKiK initiated the second stage of its proceedings in September (...)
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Following four years of proceedings, the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (’’UOKiK’’) fined Volkswagen Group Poland (a Polish importer of Volkswagen Group cars) for misleading customers about the level of exhaust gas emissions and affecting how consumers’ legitimate complaints (...)
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Following the inspection conducted by the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection ("UOKiK") in Allegro in July 2017, UOKiK has opened an antimonopoly investigation into Allegro’s practices that may violate both Polish and EU competition law. In its press release, UOKiK notes that (...)
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On 7 November 2019, the Polish Office of Competition and Consumer Protection ("UOKiK") imposed a PLN 172 million (EUR 40 million) fine on Engie Energy Management Holding Switzerland AG ("Company") for not providing requested information. The fine was imposed due to the lack of response to (...)
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The Polish Act on Counteracting the Unfair Use of Contractual Advantage in the Trade in Agricultural and Food Products (the “Act”) applies to all contracts for supply of agricultural and food products (i.e. between supermarkets or retail chains and food producers, as well as food producers and (...)
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On 10 September 2019, the Polish Supreme Court issued a landmark judgement in which it clarified the applicable rules during a company inspection by the Polish Competition and Consumer Protection Office (UOKiK). As the UOKiK regularly conducts (unannounced) company inspections (or ’dawn (...)
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Earlier this year the Polish Supreme Court rendered two judgments, in which it addressed the way in which the Polish Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (’’UOKiK’’) handles cases concerning anti-competitive vertical agreements. The judgments confirmed UOKiK’s decision, in which PHU (...)
