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Competition law and platforms: New German act in force, DMA in preparation

The new German antitrust law has been in force since 19 January 2021. This means that the deliberations on the 10th amendment to the Act against Restraints of Competition (GWB10) have been completed. Prof. Dr. Rupprecht Podszun and his team of Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf had intensively accompanied the legislative process. Among other things, Mr Podszun was invited as an expert to the Economic Committee of the German Bundestag. The Düsseldorf lawyers had accompanied the topic on panels, in numerous discussions, in journals and in the blog www.d-kart.de. The focus of the new law is on stricter rules for digital platforms (so-called gatekeepers). According to Rupprecht Podszun, the new Section 19a GWB, which grants the Federal Cartel Office (Bundeskartellamt) extended powers against companies such as Google or Facebook, is a groundbreaking innovation: “The whole world is following how the German legislator is trying to tame the tech titans.” In addition, important reforms were also enacted in abuse of dominance, merger control and procedural law. Philipp Bongartz, research assistant at the Chair of Civil Law and Competition Law, reports on the latest changes in the antitrust law blog D'Kart.

It was at the University of Düsseldorf where Dr Daniel Fülling and Annett Arlt, members in the competition department of the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology, presented the new law on 27 January 2021. They reported that this was the first such presentation of the new act by the "authors" after it came into force. The very informative talk was hosted by the DEaL group (Düsseldorf Economics and Law), an association of young academics from the fields of competition economics and antitrust law at HHU. Sarah Langenstein hosted the evening.

The European Commission is also following the German activities. Commissioners Margrethe Vestager and Thierry Breton presented their own draft for a European platform regulation in December 2020, which goes even further than Section 19a GWB. This Digital Markets Act (DMA) is to make clear prohibitions and specifications for digital gatekeepers. Discussions between the Commission, the EU Parliament and the European Council are now beginning. Rupprecht Podszun and Sarah Langenstein have reported on the project in the Legal Tribune Online (in German). In preparation for the DMA, Professor Podszun had written a study on competition in the digital world with British competition expert Philip Marsden in preparation for the DMA rules.

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