Emmanuel Combe

Mr Emmanuel Combe, Vice-President of the Competition Authority, explains in this interview the challenges of the new economic realities for competition policy. Interview conducted by Didier ThéophileDarrois Villey Maillot Brochier, Paris. Can you remind us of your professional and academic (...)

During the Nasse Seminar organized the 9th of November of 2017, David Taylar (lawyer ar Clifford Chance) and Laurent Flochel (economist, vice-president du cabinet Charles River Associate) talked about intellectual property and competitive behaviours in the pharmaceutical industry. This seminar (...)

In this article, we combine the classic approach to cartels in terms of economics of crime approach with a corporate governance approach applied to collusion. It leads us to study in particular the motivations of a manager implicated in a price-fixing arrangement and to conduct a cost-benefit (...)

Interview conducted by Emmanuel Combe, French Competition Authority and Nicolas Charbit, Editor in chief Concurrences. Several times, you’ve stated that competition can form part of a progressive vision of society, placing economic freedom and equal opportunities at the centre of debates. Can (...)

During the Nasse Seminar organized the 9th of January of 2014, Anne Perrot and Jérôme Philippe talked about airports competition. The seminar was animed by Emmanuel Combe, vice president of the Competition authority. Created at the end of the 1980s within the Forecasting Department, the (...)

This set of three papers is derived from the Philippe Nasse’s seminar on the new practices in the e-commerce that was held on July 2, 2013 in Paris. The e-commerce has grown very rapidly these past few years and contributes to the competitive animation of the distribution sector by showing new (...)

This set of three papers is derived from the conference organized by the Concurrences Journal and the Chambre de commerce internationale of Paris that was held on 17th October 2012 in Paris. In the first article, Emmanuel Combe and Constance Monnier discuss their works of 2007 on the level of (...)

Interview conducted by Patrick Hubert and Marie de Drouas, Clifford Chance. 1. Can you remind us of your professional and academic background? While studying history at the Ecole Normale Supérieure (Saint Cloud), I discovered the works of great economists, first and foremost Smith, Hayek, (...)

This set of three papers are derived from the training session on the “Passing on defence” organized by Concurrences Review that has held on 5th July 2011 in Paris. The first contribution written by the economist Emmanuel Combe is dedicated to the definition of the fundamental notions. The second (...)

Prosecuting Cartels in France and in Germany, Introductory papers : The Bundeskartellamt’s New Organization and Policies Andreas MUNDT President of the Bundeskartellamt 1. In an increasingly international environment where it is standard practice for businesses to operate not in several (...)

When determining a pecuniary sanction, the French Competition Authority will take into account several criteria including the « damage to the economy » caused by the illicit practice. Evaluating this damage involves several variables and the task remains inherently complex due to the lack of (...)

This article draws an exhaustive panorama of all the cartels convicted by the European Commission (111 cartels convicted from 1959 to 2009) and depicts the cartel profile in Europe. We analyze our sample comparing our results with those obtained from international and U.S. data. We study (...)

Despite its economic success, the low cost model is often considered as detrimental to consumers because it may reduce the quality level of products and services. Contrary to this view, we argue the low cost model is beneficial for consumers, by allowing them to choose an adequate quality level (...)

Based on a sample of 64 cartels convicted by the European Commission from 1975 to 2009, we estimate from easily computable microeconomic variables a range of restitution fines, which amount to the illicit gain, and a range of dissuasive fines, which take into account the probability of (...)

Introducing antitrust and consumers class action has been debatted since more than 20 years in France. This set of 6 articles from various authors suggest that 2008 may well be the right time. The State Secretary in charge of Industry and Consumers takes side in favour of such a reform. (...)

La publication du rapport Beigbeder sur le low cost a retenu l’attention en proposant de faire de ce modèle économique un levier de baisse des prix, au service du pouvoir d’achat. Mais pour le spécialiste de la concurrence, le rapport présente également un autre intérêt, sans doute moins matérialiste. (...)

This paper provides an empirical methodology to determine fines to be imposed on a cartel which is based on easily computable economic variables. Our approach allows to compare, on a case by case basis, the amount of monetary penalties inflicted by antitrust authorities to the illegal profit (...)

Cet article présente la première étude systématique de tous les cartels condamnés par la Commission européenne depuis 1969. Il fournit une analyse de leurs caractéristiques permettant de tracer leur portrait robot - secteurs concernés, nombre de parties à l’accord, évaluation du rôle des associations (...)

Since the beginning of 2006, the economic and legal war between laboratories and generics companies has seen new developments, which lead us to update our study published in issue 1-2006 of this journal. We will focus our attention on two types of behavior that have recently come to the (...)

Presentation At a time when the Commission is publishing new guidelines on the calculation of fines in antitrust matters, it seems appropriate to question the purpose and effectiveness of the penalties imposed on undertakings that have infringed the competition rules, particularly in the case (...)

Facing patent expiry and competition from generic drugs, pharmaceutical companies rely on a wide array of defensive strategies, building on the innovator’s brand image, the extension of the legal market exclusivity period, or the launch of second generation products. While all of these (...)