Category: Extraterritorial Conduct

On Monday, just a few days after the Justices of the Supreme Court conferred on the cert petition in the Vitamin C price fixing antitrust case, the Court asked the Acting Solicitor General to file a brief “expressing the views of the United States.”  The cert petition comes after a Second Circuit decision reversing a $147 million jury award to vitamin C importers who successfully argued in the court below that two Chinese companies fixed the prices of vitamin C exported to the United States in violation of the Sherman Act.

On June 21, 2016, the United Kingdom Competition Appeal Tribunal (the “Tribunal”) published notice of an application to commence collective proceedings under Section 47B of the UK’s competition act.  If this action continues, it will be the first opt-out collective (class action) competition claims to be heard by the Competition Appeal Tribunal.

In yet another high-profile enforcement action, last week EU Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager announced charges against Qualcomm Inc., a world leader in 3G, 4G, and next-generation wireless technologies and the world’s largest supplier of baseband chipsets, for allegedly abusing its dominant position in the baseband chipset market.  The Commission preliminarily concluded that Qualcomm illegally paid a major customer to exclusively use Qualcomm chipsets, and also engaged in predatory pricing by selling chipsets below cost with the aim of forcing a competitor out of the market.  

Our Antitrust practice group recently co-authored a series of articles in Inside Counsel discussing major antitrust issues facing in-house counsel today.  Our articles expand on topics that we have covered in this blog, including the Actavis litigation, the change in the competition landscape across the globe and antitrust reforms in Europe and Asia, antitrust enforcement in e-commerce, the implications of the Supreme Court’s decision in North Carolina State Board of Dental Examiners on antitrust liability for professional boards, and the Department of Justice’s recent guidance on antitrust compliance programs.

Today the United States Supreme Court denied certiorari in two cases, Motorola Mobility LLC v. AU Optronics et al. and Hsiung and AU Optronics Corp. America Inc. v. United States, declining to resolve a closely watched circuit split on the applicability of the Foreign Trade Antitrust Improvements Act (“FTAIA”) in regulating foreign conduct.  

AU Optronics Corp. (“AUO”) filed a petition for a writ of certiori in Hui Hsiung, et al. v. United States of America on March 16, 2015, seeking Supreme Court review of the Ninth Circuit’s 2014 decision that upheld the convictions of AUO and its former executives for their participation in a global cartel to fix the price of liquid crystal display (“LCD”) panels.  The United States Department of Justice, Antitrust Division, which had tried AUO and its former executives in the district court in San Francisco, filed its brief in opposition to the petition on May 15, 2015, and petitioners filed a reply on May 22, 2015.  

Last month, the French Competition Authority (“the Authority”) updated the “Procedural Notice” for its leniency program. As in the U.S., the French leniency program allows enterprises that report cartel activity and cooperate in investigations to avoid fines and other penalties.  

On December 1, 2014, we wrote about the Seventh Circuit’s decision in Motorola Mobility LLC v. AU Optronics Corp., which affirmed dismissal of the vast majority of Motorola’s claims regarding LCD panels.

On December 19, trade officials from the United States and China wrapped up a three-day trade conference in Chicago.  As attendee and U.S. Trade Representative Michael Froman stated, the 25th annual Joint Commission on Commerce and Trade (“JCCT”) produced “concrete results.”  

On the day before Thanksgiving—less than two weeks after oral argument—the Seventh Circuit issued its ruling on Motorola’s interlocutory appeal in Motorola Mobility LLC v. AU Optronics Corp., affirming dismissal of the vast majority of Motorola’s claims regarding LCD panels. 

In July, we wrote about two putative class action lawsuits alleging that Panasonic, Samsung, and other electronics manufacturers had formed a cartel to boost prices of certain electronic capacitors. Since then, the cases have been consolidated, interim lead co-counsel have been appointed, the Antitrust Division has confirmed its own investigation, and the court has set a preliminary case schedule.

We have written extensively about the scope of the Foreign Trade Antitrust Improvement Acts and the extraterritorial reach of U.S. antitrust laws.  Now, the scope of the U.S. antitrust laws has arisen in a different context: the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (“FSIA”).

China’s antitrust regulators have been on a tear lately.  Last year the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (“SAIC”) began its investigation of Qualcomm for allegedly violating China’s 2008 Anti-Monopoly Law.  SAIC recently released a statement indicating that this investigation is coming to an end, but Qualcomm may be facing a fine of over $1 billion.  Then, in July of this year, SAIC raided offices of Microsoft and its partner Accenture PLC throughout China in connection with an investigation into Microsoft’s alleged anti-competitive bundling of software. And during the last month alone, the National Development and Reform Commission (“NDRC”) accused Chrysler, Mercedes Benz, Volkswagen, and a dozen Japanese auto parts makers of various violations of the Anti-Monopoly law in connection with their pricing of auto parts. 

Many of you will recall that on March 27, 2014, the Seventh Circuit issued a long-awaited decision concerning the scope of the Foreign Trade Antitrust Improvements Act (“FTAIA”) in Motorola Mobility v. AU Optronics.  The Seventh Circuit held that the higher prices for mobile phones Motorola sold in the United States did not “give rise to” its foreign subsidiaries’ antitrust claims, and that Motorola could not show a “direct” effect on U.S. commerce sufficient to satisfy the FTAIA.  Just days after this opinion, Motorola asked for a rehearing.  After multiple letters back and forth between the Court, the parties, and the Solicitor General’s Office, on July 1, 2014 the Seventh Circuit vacated its prior opinion.  Additional briefing is now underway, and is expected to be completed in October.

Perhaps best known worldwide for its Trappist breweries, Belgium is increasingly hospitable to business regulation. It is among the many countries that have recently introduced new laws and created new agencies to regulate business practices that have undermined economic competition. In April 2013, Belgium revised its Code of Economic Law (“Code”) to implement a simplified competition enforcement regime.

As we noted earlier this month, one factor that may contribute to the increase in criminal antitrust fines over the past ten years is the Antitrust Division’s focus on anticompetitive conduct that is international in scope.  Indeed, the Antitrust Division’s chart listing Sherman Act violations yielding a corporate fine of $10 million or more shows that nearly all of the investigations resulting in fines greater than $10 million are international.

We are pleased to announce the launch of Antitrust Update, Patterson Belknap’s new resource for the latest news and happenings in the antitrust and competition law arena. 

On May 19, 2014, I participated on a panel entitled “Cross-Border Investigations Involving Multiple Agencies” at the New York City Bar Association’s Third Annual White Collar Crime Institute. The moderator of the panel was Bruce Yannett from Debevoise & Plimpton and my co-panelists were Denis J. McInerney, the former chief of the Fraud Section at DOJ; David Meister, the former Director of Enforcement at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission; and Aaron R. Marcu of Freshfields.