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Christian Ahlborn

For more than 20 years Christian Ahlborn has been advising multinational corporates, banks and other institutions on all aspects of global competition law, combining an in-depth understanding of the subject with a pragmatic approach.

Christian is qualified in England & Wales and in Germany and is widely recognized as a market-leading competition lawyer. He is also a trained economist. Christian belongs to a small group of antitrust practitioners who can bring both a legal and economic perspective to a case.

Christian advises major corporates, banks and institutions on all areas of global competition law. He has a broad range of experience in EU competition law, particularly in relation to complex M&A, behavioral antitrust work, control of dominance issues and State aid control. He is well-known for extensive work on high-profile matters.

Christian’s experience spans many industry sectors, with particular experience in financial services, IT, fast-moving consumer goods and mining.

During his career Christian has been seconded to the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Competition and to the Bundeskartellamt. He is also well known on the Brussels market.

Contact:Read more about Christian AhlbornEmail

The European Court of Justice released its long-awaited judgment1 in the Google Shopping saga last week, finally putting to bed close to fifteen years’ of scrutiny into Google’s practices of favouring its own comparison shopping service (Google Shopping) over rival shopping services.

In its ruling, the ECJ upheld the General Court’s earlier judgment2 which had rejected Google’s appeal over the European Commission’s decision3 to fine it €2.42 billion for abusing its market dominance as a search engine by systematically favouring Google Shopping in its general search results.

The overall outcome of the ECJ’s reasoning in Google Shopping is perhaps unsurprising to competition law practitioners – given the unwavering direction of travel of the case. The ECJ judgment nevertheless raises a number of interesting points and leaves a number of questions unanswered.

Key takeaways

  • Refusal to supply. The judgment confirmed that not every issue of access necessarily requires the application of the Bronner test of refusal to supply. The ECJ found the Bronner doctrine applies in circumstances where a dominant firm refuses to grant a competitor access to infrastructure which it has developed for its own business needs. However, the ECJ ruled that the Bronner test is not applicable in cases where there is no outright refusal of access to infrastructure – but rather access granted on discriminatory terms (such discrimination being assessed under separate forms of potential abuse).
  • Competition not on the merits. The ECJ accepted Google’s arguments that, to establish an abuse of dominance under Article 102, a two-pronged test applies: (i) that actual or potential anticompetitive effects arise from the abusive conduct; and (ii) that the conduct falls outside of “competition on the merits”. However, in assessing the latter requirement, the ECJ rejected Google’s arguments that only circumstances relating specifically to Google’s conduct are relevant to the assessment. Instead, the ECJ held that, in assessing “competition on the merits”, relevant circumstances regarding the characteristics of the market or the nature of competition are capable of characterising the conduct as falling outside of the scope of competition on the merits.
  • Causality and counterfactual. The ECJ maintained that the causal link is one of the essential elements of a competition law infringement and that, as a result, the burden of proof for such causal link (and hence the counterfactual analysis) lies with the Commission. However, the ECJ found that the counterfactual analysis is just one way to establish causality. Where establishing a credible counterfactual may be “arbitrary or even impossible” (para 231), the Commission cannot be required to systematically establish a counterfactual and can rely on other evidence to establish causality.
  • “As-efficient competitors”. The ECJ reiterated earlier case law that it is not the objective of Article 102 to ensure that less efficient competitors remain on the market but also remarked that this statement did not imply that an abuse of dominance finding does not always require a showing that the conduct was capable of excluding an as-efficient competitor. With respect to the AEC test, the Court held that this is just one way to establish an abuse of dominance.

Continue Reading ECJ’s Google Shopping Judgment: The End of a Long Saga

On 18 July 2024, the current President of the European Commission (“Commission”), Ursula von der Leyen, was reconfirmed by the European Parliament for a second 5-year term. As part of her reconfirmation, President von der Leyen delivered a speech before the European Parliament, complemented by a 30-page program, which lays down the Commission’s political program for the next five years.

A key pillar of the program – “A new plan for Europe’s sustainable prosperity and competitiveness” – has the objective of combining competitiveness and prosperity with the achievement of the European Green Deal goals.

Specifically on competition policy, according to President von der Leyen, a new approach is needed to achieve this objective. This blog post projects where competition policy is likely headed in the 2024-2029 period by commenting on the most relevant paragraphs of the program.

Von der Leyen: “I believe we need a new approach to competition policy, better geared to our common goals and more supportive of companies scaling up in global markets – while always ensuring a level playing field. This should be reflected in the way we assess mergers so that innovation and resilience are fully taken into account. We will ensure competition policy keeps pace with evolving global markets and prevents market concentration from raising prices or lowering the quality of goods or services for consumers. We will look at all of our policies through a security lens.”

  • This statement reaffirms the classic principles underlying competition law, i.e., the focus on ensuring a level playing field, preventing market concentration, and ultimately avoiding a negative impact on prices/quality of goods or services.
  • However, the President’s comments recognize the impact of global dynamics and the need for EU companies to be able to respond to global pressures. In the context of Siemens/Alstom and Lufthansa/ITA, there is growing pressure from EU Member States to allow European champions and this program could signal an openness to that effect.
  • The President also calls for an increased focus on innovation and resilience in the substantive assessment of mergers. This could mean (i) that the Commission will expand its assessment of the impact of ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) standards and security, (ii) that the Commission would be open to a greater role of wider efficiency justifications/public interest considerations in merger control and competition law assessments, and/or (iii) that the impact on the overall economic competitiveness of the EU, and the aim of geopolitical de-risking for critical supply chains and technologies, may play an increasingly important role in the assessment of mergers.

Continue Reading The 2024-2029 Commission Political Guidelines: Where Is Competition Policy Likely Headed?

On 10 July 2023, the European Commission (the “Commission”) adopted the Implementing Regulation (“IR”) for the European Union (“EU”) Foreign Subsidies Regulation (“FSR”). The FSR, which starts to apply today, 12 July 2023, creates a new instrument designed to prevent foreign subsidies from distorting the EU internal market (see our blog). The objective is to level the playing field within EU markets between companies subject to scrutiny under the EU State aid rules and companies receiving subsidies from non-EU Member States.

To attain this objective, the FSR empowers the Commission to assess foreign subsidies either on its own motion or after the notification of concentrations or public procurement tenders in the EU where certain thresholds are exceeded. Foreign subsidies are financial contributions (i.e. any value transfer) granted by non-EU countries, or entities whose action can be attributed to a non-EU country (i.e. foreign financial contributions or “FFC”) that confer a benefit that is not available on the market, specifically to one or to several companies or industries. Where foreign subsidies are problematic, this assessment may lead to remedies and even to the prohibition of the concentration or of the award of a public contract. Although the FSR starts to apply on 12 July 2023, allowing the Commission to investigate foreign subsidies on its own motion, the notification obligations only kick in on 12 October 2023. That means that notification may be requested for transactions signed after 12 July but not closed by 12 October and for public procurement procedures initiated after 12 July.

The purpose of the IR is to set out the rules applicable to proceedings conducted by the Commission under the FSR, including the submission of notifications.

Key things you need to know about the IR and the notification obligations:

  • The IR enacts the forms that notifying parties will have to complete and submit to the Commission in the context of concentrations and public procurement tenders.
  • The Commission must review foreign subsidies within statutory time limits that start to run as soon as the notification is complete and that may be suspended to obtain further information.
  • Detailed information must be submitted for FFCs that are considered to fall into the most distortive categories of foreign subsidies, whereas aggregate information must be provided for most other FFCs.
  • Information must be provided for FFCs provided to all group entities of the party or parties involved.
  • Companies that are likely to be involved in large concentrations or public procurements would be well advised to prepare sufficiently well in advance to avoid delays in their clearance timeline.

Continue Reading The EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation starts to apply – what you need to know about the notification obligations

The Digital Markets Act (“DMA”) will apply from 2 May 2023. In anticipation of this, the European Commission (“Commission”) has sought feedback via a public consultation on the draft DMA Implementing Regulation (“IR”) between early December and 9 January 2023.

The draft IR addresses a range of procedural aspects concerning the DMA, including gatekeeper designation and core platform service notifications, opening of proceedings, the right to be heard, and access to the file. By contrast, the draft IR so far is silent on the Commission’s investigative powers during the gatekeeper designation process and the process of further specifying the obligations set out in Article 6 DMA (both of which gatekeepers will undoubtedly be eager to learn more about).

The Commission is aiming to publish the final IR before Spring, and it will apply from the same date as the DMA. Whilst the draft IR may still be subject to changes before the final version is adopted, it already provides valuable insights into the Commission’s thinking.  How stakeholder feedback might affect these issues in the final IR remains to be seen.

Two themes in the draft IR – each further outlined below – are particularly noteworthy:

  • First, it touches upon the potential delineations of core platform service under the DMA, an issue which can have important ramifications for future enforcement: delineating one core platform service from other services in the context of digital ecosystems which are often designed to be seamless could prove rather complex.
  • Second, the draft IR displays a certain tension between achieving a “rapid and effective investigatory and enforcement process” (Recital 3 IR) while also ensuring that rights of the defence of the parties to the proceedings are effectively protected. The Commission’s emphasis on speed in DMA enforcement may require some notable departures from the traditional procedural framework for antitrust.

Continue Reading Countdown to Compliance: the DMA Implementing Regulation

European Union (“EU”) Foreign Subsidies Regulation (“FSR”), a new state aid instrument adopted at the end of 2022, will have a significant impact on transactions in the EU. The FSR impacts any company that is present in or wants the enter the EU, and has received financial support in any form from non-EU governments. 

The FSR is game-changing — it imposes notification obligations on companies on subsidies received from non-EU countries and, when those subsidies are considered to distort the internal market in the EU, the European Commission (“EC”) can impose remedies.

Companies will now have notification obligations if they have received foreign financial contributions above a certain amount and are:

(1)    acquiring a company that has a turnover of at least EUR 500 million in the EU, or

(2)    participating in a public tender with a value of EUR 250 million.

These notification obligations will start to apply on 12 October 2023.Continue Reading EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation – Key Takeaways

Regulation (EU) 2022/2560 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 December 2022 on foreign subsidies distorting the internal market (FSR) entered into force on 12 January 2023 and will start to apply as of 12 July 2023.

The FSR creates a brand new instrument to fill a regulatory gap, by preventing foreign subsidies from distorting the European Union (EU) internal market. Whereas companies receiving public support in the EU are subject to strict State aid rules, companies obtaining public support outside the EU are generally not. This was perceived as putting companies in the EU at a disadvantage compared to companies that obtained subsidies outside the EU, but that also engaged in economic activity in the Union.

The FSR’s scope extends far beyond the obvious State support, to cover common types of benefits that are granted all over the world, including in countries driven by a market economy. Its obligations will inevitably place an additional administrative burden on companies engaging in an economic activity in the EU. Acceptance of a foreign subsidy distorting the EU internal market may have far-reaching consequences for the company. The FSR places additional compliance obligations on companies, and for many will entail a thorough assessment to identify and justify foreign subsidies received. For companies considering transactions in the EU, the FSR effectively creates a third layer of deal conditionality, besides merger control and Foreign Direct Investment laws. This is adding a further unique set of thresholds, timings and factual considerations, to be included in companies’ strategies to invest in the EU. This will require expertise in EU antitrust and State aid law, and a good understanding of the details of the FSR.

Key things you need to know:Continue Reading The EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation enters into force