Rein Wesseling speaks at Fordham University's 42nd Annual Conference on International Antitrust Law and Policy in New York

Short Reads - As it stands, the UK will exit the European Union at midnight on 29 March 2019. Therefore, businesses within the UK, or with trade relations with the UK, would be best advised to assume that a no-deal Brexit is inevitable. The exchange of personal data  within the EU is governed by the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). In a no-deal Brexit, the GDPR will cease to be applicable in the UK upon its EU exit.

Short Reads - On 16 January 2019, the European Court of Justice clarified the procedural guarantees the European Commission needs to provide to merging parties during merger reviews. According to the Court of Justice, the General Court (GC) had rightly annulled the Commission's decision to prohibit the merger of UPS and TNT. UPS's right of defence had been infringed because the Commission had failed to share the final version of the econometric model with UPS before adopting its prohibition decision.

Short Reads - The Dutch Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) recently reviewed its first merger between two pharmaceutical companies. In its conditional clearance of Aurobindo's acquisition of certain European Apotex assets, the ACM followed the European Commission's approach in assessing the merger's impact on competition. Companies will welcome the news that pharma mergers will be reviewed in a similar fashion, irrespective of whether the ACM or the European Commission conducts the review.

Short Reads - It is nearly time for the European Commission to reveal its course of action in digitisation and competition law. Feedback from a public consultation and the recent conference on 'Shaping competition policy in the era of digitisation' together with the upcoming expert panel's report on the future challenges of digitisation for competition policy are likely to shape the Commission's course of action.