PresentationsConference summary
The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), the Hong Kong Competition Association (HCA) and Concurrences hosted the 2017 edition of the conference “Antitrust in Asia: One Size Fits All?” at the Graduate Law Centre of CUHK Faculty of Law on Friday, April 7, 2017. Sandra Marco Colino (Assistant Professor, CUHK) and Carter Chim (Professional Consultant, CUHK) welcomed the participants by sharing their excitement at hosting the event at their Faculty and their city, where the first cross-sector antitrust legislation, the Hong Kong Competition Ordinance, entered into force in December 2015. The event brought together practitioners, academics, industry representatives and other leading experts to discuss the developments and challenges currently affecting Asian competition law systems such as China, India, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Taiwan or Korea.
Keynote speech
Justice Godfrey Lam Wan Ho (President, Hong Kong Competition Tribunal) delivered the opening keynote speech, in which he discussed the feasibility of the conference’s “one-size-fits-all” theme in Asia—that is, harmonization of the competition law regimes developed in this continent within the last few decades. The different systems do share some common ground, in addition to being subject to common inter- national and regional policies. There is further an increasing need for more uni ed regulations regarding corporations’ multi-national development. Yet full harmonization could fail to recognize the region’s legitimate differences. These include differences between: 1) legal and constitutional systems, 2) market sizes, 3) political considerations, 4) socioeconomic and cultural characteristics, and 5) stages of development in competition policy.