Changing competition regimes and the growing contribution of corporate in-house counsels

The contribution of in-house legal departments to corporate strategy continues to evolve in response to market pressures, growing regulatory complexity and increased political interventionism. As national and supranational competition authorities become more active, corporate decision makers face increased layers of uncertainty, delayed plans and unforeseen risks. A report compiled by Lex Mundi, address the internal challenges of in-house counsels to the increasingly activist and intrusive Competition Law regimes around the world, and how they have succeeded in managing those issues.

At the 2014 Lex Mundi Summit in Amsterdam, corporate counsel and Lex Mundi firms’ representatives discussed five main trends in international competition law: the globalization of competition law and the resulting fragmentation of enforcement action as well as the diversification of enforcement agencies’ mandates, increasing cooperation between enforcement agencies and the increase in antitrust litigation. In the course of the Lex Mundi Summit, participants identified three major challenges arising from these trends:

• first, corporate counsel need to keep up with the constantly changing political and economic conditions as well as the regulatory framework driving the decisions and attitude of national competition authorities;
• second, more efficient coordination of competition law matters is required in order to avoid delays or spillover effects between jurisdictions and
• third, in-house competition counsel need to be involved in corporate strategy planning at an earlier stage so that competition law challenges can be identified early on and managed more efficiently.

The discussions of the 2014 Lex Mundi Summit have been summarized in a report which can be requested here.