In ten years, digital has become one of the main focuses, if not THE main one, of antitrust enforcers in Europe and worldwide. As a result, a very large number of competition law cases touch upon the question of digitalization. Over the past two years alone, hundreds of decisions and initiatives have been issued by competition enforcers worldwide, which aim to address some aspect(s) of the digital economy. This issue of e-Competitions devoted to “Antitrust in the Digital Sector” includes more than a hundred articles written on the subject in 2020-2021, and many more could have been added. It is obviously impossible, in this Foreword, to cover it all. We will therefore try to concentrate on the more significant developments of the past two years, starting with the paradigm-changing initiatives that have been proposed and, in some cases, already implemented for the ex ante regulation of platforms. The past two years have also seen numerous decisions and ongoing cases against the GAFAM, targeting both “classic” issues, including interoperability, foreclosure or exchanges of information, and evolving concerns, such as the boundary between privacy and competition law. Finally, digitalization has even impacted merger control. On this side of the Atlantic, the evolution of the European Commission’s doctrine regarding the application of Article 22 of Regulation No 139/2004 (the “European Merger Control Regulation” or “EUMR”) is meant to allow the Commission to look at acquisitions made by the largest platforms – with limited results so far. In the United States, agencies are proactively looking back to acquisitions made by the GAFAM in the past, entertaining the possibility of actually unwinding some of them.
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