Timothy Hester is a Partner at Covington & Burling, based in its Washington, D.C. office. For more than 30 years, Tim Hester has led complex litigation including high-profile civil and criminal antitrust matters involving conspiracy claims and monopolization theories across a range of industries as well as antitrust suits raising claims of unlawful patent settlements, sham litigation, and wrongful patent acquisitions. He has an active antitrust counseling practice that focuses on patent litigation settlements and other matters at the intersection of antitrust and patent law. Mr. Hester has also represented clients in merger reviews and investigatory matters before both the Justice Department and FTC and has also handled litigation and merger matters before regulatory agencies, including the Surface Transportation Board, the Department of Transportation, and the Copyright Office. Mr. Hester was elected to the firm’s Management Committee in 1998 and served as Chair of the Management Committee from 2008-2019. As Chair, he was responsible for the overall direction of Covington’s strategy and operations. During his tenure as Chair, the firm more than doubled in size, developed new offices and capabilities to meet evolving client needs, strengthened its corporate, litigation and investigations practices, and maintained market-leading regulatory practices and a deeply collaborative culture. One of the hallmarks of Mr. Hester’s tenure as Chair included his dedication to building durable client relationships. He now serves as Chair Emeritus, a role focused on supporting the firm’s client relationships and international practice.
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On July 19, 2023, the Federal Trade Commission and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice (collectively, “the Agencies”) issued a new set of merger guidelines in draft form for public comment (the “Draft Guidelines”). The Draft Guidelines, if adopted, will replace the (...)
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The Federal Trade Commission has brought its first suit alleging anticompetitive conduct in connection with the prosecution and settlement of pharmaceutical patent litigation since the Supreme Court’s June 2013 decision in FTC v. Actavis. Although two commissioners dissented from the decision (...)
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On November 6, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) amended the implementation rules of the Hart Scott Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act (the “HSR Act”) to specify when parties to pharmaceutical patent license agreements must observe the HSR Act’s notification and pre-closing waiting period (...)
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Last week, the U.S. Justice Department (“DOJ”) and Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) (together, the “Agencies”) issued revised Horizontal Merger Guidelines (the “Guidelines”) describing how the Agencies seek to determine whether a merger of competing companies will substantially lessen (...)
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In the latest development in the Federal Trade Commission’s efforts to challenge Hatch-Waxman patent litigation settlements, earlier this week a federal district court in Pennsylvania denied in part defendants’ motions to dismiss antitrust complaints challenging a series of such settlements. (...)
