Christof Swaak speaks at IBA’s 20th Annual Competition Conference in Florence

Articles - The European Commission recently issued guidance on the participation of third country bidders in public procurement. It clarified bids may be excluded, but remains silent on whether they may be accepted and under which conditions. The Commission is of the opinion that contracting authorities or entities can exclude bids if no access is secured. However, it does not discuss if and under which conditions contracting authorities or entities can allow foreign bids if no access is secured.

Short Reads - The European Court of Justice recently ruled that the European Commission does not have to take additional precautionary measures to respect the right of legal professional privilege when conducting a new dawn raid at the same company. Companies are well-advised to mark clearly all communications covered by legal privilege as 'privileged and confidential' and to keep all privileged communication separate from other communication.

Seminar - Stibbe is organising a seminar in Amsterdam on 29 November 2019 concerning recent developments in the software market, potential new opportunities offering the right to respond to powerful suppliers, and the question of how these developing resources can be used effectively. 

Short Reads - Benelux competition authorities have published a joint memorandum on how best to keep up with challenges in fast-moving digital markets. As well as calling on the European Commission to issue an economic study on digital mergers, the memorandum calls for an ex ante intervention tool to fill the gap between interim measures and ex post enforcement. This tool would pre-emptively impose behavioural remedies on digital gatekeepers without first having to establish an actual competition law infringement.