Anti-trust office wants access to location data
The Office for the Protection of Competition is proposing several changes to competition law that would significantly strengthen its powers in detecting and punishing cartel agreements. Access to telephone location data, random and preventive investigations, and the possibility to prohibit even the mergers of competitors not meeting the turnover criteria are only some of them.
Access to location
The Office for the Protection of Competition, or the anti-trust office, proposes to be able to request traffic and location data from mobile operators, thereby, like the police, gaining access to the location of telephones of the managers and employees of competitors. This, so the office argues, would make it easier to prove cartel agreements (e.g. secret meetings between competitors). In addition, the office demands access to other data collected by various state authorities and institutions, including data on public contracts.
More sectoral and on-site investigations
Currently, the office can intervene in markets where competition is distorted by cartel agreements, abuse of dominance, or mergers of competitors. However, it would also like to have the power to intervene in markets where competition is distorted otherwise. This includes oligopoly markets (e.g., food markets) and markets with a strong network effect (e.g., digital markets). The proposed new rules should allow the office to carry out sectoral investigations in these markets, and to impose remedial measures, e.g., to review the heightened incidence of mergers in a given market, to impose the obligation to provide access to networks, infrastructure or data, or to disclose certain information. As a last resort, the office could even order the sale of part of a business.
Moreover, to facilitate the investigation of cartel agreements, the office wants to be able to carry out random or preventive on-site investigations. It is to be expected that such power would lead to a significant increase in the number of raids of individual competitors, and thus the necessity to always be prepared for such situations (e.g., to have internal regulations on how to respond to such situations, or to have a lawyer specialising in competition law readily available).
Further powers
The office would also like to be able to make the life of competitors difficult in mergers and acquisitions. At the moment, the office must be notified of mergers of competitors that exceed set turnover criteria. Following the EU example, the office is demanding a ‘call-in model’, allowing them to also request notification from competitors who do not meet the turnover threshold. The office would thus be able to prevent the implementation of mergers where turnover criteria have not been reached.
Finally, the office proposes financial rewards for whistleblowers (individuals/natural persons) who report anti-competitive conduct and, the other way round, penalties for individuals/natural persons who have been involved in violations of competition law.
To date, no bill to introduce the above changes has been published. So far, the office has only made their intentions known on their website. We will continue to monitor the changes and inform you in more detail in a future issue of Tax and Legal Update.