Antitrust and Competition Investigations

They can lead to heavy fines, brand damage, and sometimes, criminal liability.

If you find yourself under investigation, you need a legal team you can trust to guide you through this complex area. We have extensive experience defending clients under investigation by authorities around the world, including the European Commission, individual EU member states, the UK, the US Department of Justice, the US Federal Trade Commission, US state antitrust enforcement agencies, and Asia competition agencies.

This experience enables us to give you the best possible service. With teams on the ground across our global network, we can provide support throughout the entire life cycle of an investigation, from dawn raids through key strategic decision making and resolution. This includes applications for immunity, coordinating internal investigations, responding to authority requests, and advising on key strategic decision all the way to case closure and beyond. We will deal with the investigating authorities and design an effective strategy to protect your rights and minimize your liability. We understand when to take a robust approach and when to focus on building a constructive relationship with the authorities.

Working quickly can be particularly crucial in this kind of investigation. To help you respond promptly, we deploy our in-house forensic data review platform to support a rapid and cost effective data review process in multiple languages, without the need to engage an external provider. Our global reach and years of experience allow us to guide you through the challenges of a competition investigation, wherever it arises, and to provide a seamless, coordinated approach across the relevant markets.

Our sole aim is to achieve the best possible outcome for your business.

Our Antitrust and Competition Investigations capability in Ireland

It is a top priority of Ireland’s competition regulator, the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (CCPC), that competition law breaches are investigated and prosecuted. The CCPC has a number of investigative tools at its disposal which enables it to carry out the enforcement of competition rules. We regularly handle the most complex merger control (M&A) cases, as well as advising on a wide range of behavioural and investigatory work. Our approach is practical and commercial. We will work alongside you day-to-day to ensure that your commercial strategies, requirements and agreements meet competition law and so we can steer you through investigations if and when they arise.