I often feel a certain deflation after the Supreme Court decides an antitrust case. After watching a case for months, prognosticating about it with other antitrusters, reading umpteen blog posts, reading the briefs if you’re into it and even some amici briefs if you’re really into it, the Court then rules one way or the…
In Consolidation in Health Care Markets: A Review of the Literature, authors David Balto and James Kovacs in a study funded by and submitted to the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation discuss the recent literature concerning consolidation across various health care markets. The paper focuses on consolidation of hospital, provider, and health insurance markets with the goal of understanding the…
My partner Lee Van Voorhis in Washington drafted some thoughts on this transaction, which I thought would be of interest to the Kluwer readership. DOJ Sues to Block Further Anheuser-Busch InBev/Grupo Modelo Linkage On January 31, 2013, the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice (“DOJ”) announced that it filed a complaint in federal district…
The Federal Trade Commission’s investigation of the now-abandoned merger between Integrated Device Technologies and PLX Technology was the topic of remarks delivered by FTC Commissioner Julie Brill at Skadden’s and Compass/Lexecon’s annual “Antitrust in the Technology Sector” program in Palo Alto, California, on January 28. “The issues raised by IDT/PLX spanned the Merger Guidelines,” Brill said….
My U.S. colleagues Lee van Voorhis and Brian Rafkin wrote an excellent client alert on the Bosch case and I asked them to prepare the following short summary for the Kluwer readership: On November 26, 2012, the FTC and Robert Bosch GmbH entered into a Consent Agreement that resolved the FTC’s inquiry into Bosch’s $1…
What would likely be the last major acquisition in the car rental industry may soon be completed, with the blessing of the Federal Trade Commission. The pending acquisition of Dollar Thrifty Automotive Group, Inc. by Hertz Global Holdings, Inc., currently under review by the FTC, would cement the positions of the three major car rental companies…
On Friday morning the FTC announced that it had closed its investigation of Universal Music Group’s acquisition of EMI’s recorded music division. The Commission will not seek any concessions or take other action. Elsewhere I’ve written and said that I think the merger is probably awfully anticompetitive and that it should be blocked completely. A few thoughts….
More than four years after Polypore International Inc. acquired rival battery separator manufacturer Microporous Products L.P., the U.S. Court of Appeals in Atlanta has determined that the transaction was anticompetitive. The appellate court yesterday upheld a December 2010 opinion of the Federal Trade Commission, which held that the that the merger of the two producers…
Merger challenges are rare in Canada. The last contested merger case in Canada was in 2005. Typically, concerns about a prospective merger are resolved in negotiations between the Commissioner of Competition (the “Commissioner”) and the acquiring party, with some form of partial divestiture the usual remedy required. As such, it was a major development when…
This morning the Court granted certiorari in Federal Trade Commission v. Phoebe Putney Health, No. 11-1160, on appeal from an execrable pair of opinions in the Eleventh Circuit and the Middle District of Georgia. At issue is a local hospital merger that would give the acquiror 100% in its county and upwards of 90% in…
