EU and competition

Head of department | Elizabeth McKnight

Main areas covered | general competition (antitrust) | behavioural investigations | competition litigation | merger clearance | regulatory matters | state aid | public procurement | EU | WTO and international trade

Key clients include | Coca-Cola | Pearson | Pilkington | Virgin Atlantic Airways | Vodafone

Sector expertise includes | energy and natural resources | financial institutions | food and beverages | infrastructure | transport | manufacturing and industrials | retail

  • BAA on the Competition Commission’s market investigation into the UK airports market
  • Bank of Ireland on substantial matters including the “super-complaint” about personal current accounts in Northern Ireland, the OFT’s ongoing investigation into payment cards London and Continental Railways on a variety of regulatory issues relating to the development and operation of the High Speed Rail Link used by the Eurostar services
  • Pilkington on the European Commission’s investigation into the alleged cartel conduct in the European flat and automotive glass sectors
  • Virgin Atlantic Airways on the investigation into long-haul passenger fuel surcharges
  • Vodafone on its participation in appeal proceedings before the Competition Appeal Tribunal, in respect of mobile network operators’ call termination charges

Client case study
We assisted travel industry client First Choice to gain competition clearance from the European Commission to merge its operations with the tourism division of TUI AG (including Thomson Holidays in the UK). Competition clearance was a significant hurdle for the high profile merger, and the result helped pave the way for the creation of one of the world’s largest travel groups, TUI Travel, with revenues in excess of £12 billion.

The merger between First Choice and TUI came hot on the heels of another merger between competitors Thomas Cook and MyTravel. Business analysts were all in agreement that consolidation in the leisure travel industry was vital for these traditional “package holiday” tour operators to survive, but the travel industry had been the subject of detailed scrutiny in the past, in particular in 1999 when the proposed merger of First Choice/Airtours (the predecessor to MyTravel) was blocked.

Despite the relatively high market shares of the parties, the competition team gathered a range of compelling evidence to show that the growth in travel websites and the success of low-cost airlines had significantly altered the dynamics in the industry. The Commission cleared the deal after a Phase 1 investigation, subject to TUI agreeing to sell its Irish business.

Competition aspects of the transaction were handled by a London-Brussels team: Jonathan Scott, Veronica Roberts, Jenny Coombes and Ingrid Bukovics. They worked closely with Alliance firm Gleiss Lutz and teams from our corporate, employee share schemes, employment, finance, IP, pensions, tax and TMT practices to secure a successful conclusion to this notable deal.