Shylah R. Alfonso Partner

The Federal Trade Commission issued a policy statement on June 15, 2023, sternly criticizing the use of confidentiality and nondisclosure agreements that “impede” the FTC’s ability to conduct voluntary interviews with market participants.

Across every industry, companies are leveraging machine learning to derive valuable insights without extensive employee involvement. These groundbreaking capabilities are creating an upheaval in how companies engage with competitors and consumers.

Antitrust is the engine of free enterprise: it shapes countless lines of commerce, from tech to toilets, beer to baseball and healthcare to hardware.

On April 29, 2023, the U.S. Department of Justice, Antitrust Division, suffered another defeat in its ongoing efforts to criminally prosecute conduct affecting workers’ compensation and job mobility.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in two related cases that federal district courts have jurisdiction to hear structural constitutional challenges to the adjudicative authority of the Federal Trade Commission and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and that litigants need not wait until the appeal of an adverse agency decision in the adjudication to raise such arguments in court.

Federal and state enforcers highlighted an ambitious agenda at the 2023 ABA Antitrust Spring Meeting. From criminal no-solicitation, no-poach, wage-fixing, and monopolization cases to a more aggressive merger strategy, this Update discusses 10 takeaways that companies should have on their radars.

Top federal agency leaders previewed plans for broader antitrust enforcement at the 2023 ABA Antitrust Spring Meeting.

The American Bar Association's 2023 Antitrust Spring Meeting, held in Washington, D.C., placed heavy emphasis on employees, contractors, and talent. Government officials, judges, academics, and the private bar debated cutting-edge competition issues affecting workers and labor markets, including criminal enforcement, amicus efforts, public engagement, and rulemaking. Prosecutors sent a clear message that they view no-solicitation, no-poach, and wage-fixing agreements as criminal violations, even in the face of several jury trial setbacks.

The American Bar Association's 2023 antitrust spring meeting, held in Washington, D.C. in March, had a heavy emphasis on upstream markets affecting employees and talent.

This Update analyzes three trends that make customized compliance programs more crucial than ever and provides guidance on how companies can begin to craft catered policies to fit their business needs.

The Federal Trade Commission and 10 U.S. states recently filed an antitrust complaint against Syngenta AG and Corteva Inc. in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina.

In a rapid shake-up of the antitrust lawsuit filed against the PGA Tour Inc., professional golfers Carlos Ortiz, Abraham Ancer, Pat Perez, and Jason Kokrak have withdrawn from the case.

In a rapid shake-up of the antitrust lawsuit filed against the PGA Tour Inc., professional golfers Carlos Ortiz, Abraham Ancer, Pat Perez and Jason Kokrak have withdrawn from the case.

The U.S. Department of Justice Procurement Collusion Strike Force secured a guilty plea on July 13, 2022, from a Texas military contractor for conspiring to rig bids on $17.5 million in government contracts.

A federal judge in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois has held that an antitrust challenge to a “hiring restriction [that] prevented” plaintiff employees “from taking a better-paying position with a rival McDonald’s outlet” must be evaluated under the full rule of reason.

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission voted 5-0 to issue a complaint and accept a proposed order for public comment regarding private equity fund JAB Consumer Partners SCA SICAR’s $1.1 billion acquisition of SAGE Veterinary Partners, LLC on June 13, 2022.

The Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology announced the withdrawal of a 2019 Policy Statement on Remedies for Standards-Essential Patents Subject to Voluntary F/RAND Commitments.

There's a clear message out of the American Bar Association's Antitrust Law Spring Meeting, held April 5-8 in Washington: Practitioners should know that we are in a new era of antitrust enforcement and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice will be taking on tough cases such as those addressing criminal Section 2 enforcement and labor market practices.

Though there has been ample discussion and debate over how Executive Order 14036 will affect Big Tech, other key aspects of the executive order have received far less attention.

U.S. antitrust enforcers highlighted their past efforts and future priorities at the American Bar Association's Antitrust Law Spring Meeting, held virtually on March 23-26.

Hundreds of COVID-19-related class action claims have been filed in state and federal courts throughout the country.

Over the last two weeks, the American Bar Association offered a virtual version of what would have been its 68th Antitrust Law Spring Meeting, presenting a select number of panels online. Several of the virtual sessions addressed the efforts of federal and state antitrust enforcement agencies.

Over the last two weeks, the American Bar Association offered a virtual version of what would have been its 68th Antitrust Law Spring Meeting, presenting a select number of panels online.

 When the DOJ is deciding whether to charge a company with a criminal antitrust violation, or agreeing to a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA), the effectiveness of a company’s antitrust compliance program is only one factor.

The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced a new policy on July 11, 2019, designed to incentivize the development and implementation of corporate antitrust compliance programs. 

Judge Lucy Koh of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California ruled for the FTC last week in its antitrust enforcement action against Qualcomm. 

The American Bar Association’s 67th Antitrust Law spring meeting held earlier this month featured several sessions addressing the efforts of federal and state antitrust enforcement agencies, including a number of discussions with representatives from those agencies.

In this update, we consider the decision and suggest that parties may face greater scrutiny when relying on the foreign compulsion defense or the international comity defense, which may make mounting such defenses more challenging.

We offer some key takeaways from ABA's Antitrust Law Spring Meeting, including the impact of leadership changes at the federal agencies, recent enforcement activities and signals regarding future priorities.

The American Bar Association’s 66th Antitrust Law Spring Meeting, held last week, included a number of sessions with representatives from federal and state antitrust enforcement agencies.

Earlier this month, the Electronic Transactions Association (ETA) hosted its annual TRANSACT conference to connect and educate the various branches of the payments industry.

The American Bar Association’s 65th Antitrust Law Spring Meeting held at the end of March included a number of sessions with representatives from federal and state antitrust enforcement agencies.

An article in Law360, “Takeaways From The ABA Antitrust Spring Meeting: Part 1,” discusses key points from the annual ABA Antitrust Law 2017 Spring Meeting, including leadership changes, past activities, and expected priorities under the new administration.

In 1995, the U.S. Department of Justice and the Federal Trade Commission published guidelines that delineated how and when the Agencies would evaluate intellectual property licensing and other activities under the antitrust laws.

The Federal Trade Commission filed suit last week in federal court against Qualcomm, Inc., following its investigation launched in September 2014.

As President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take the helm of the executive branch of the federal government, many are asking how he will approach antitrust regulation. Conventional wisdom holds that Republicans are more amenable to mergers, even large ones, than Democrats.

The U.S. Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division and the Federal Trade Commission jointly issued their Antitrust Guidance for Human Resources Professionals on October 20, 2016.

In a precedent-setting opinion, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Aerotec International, Inc. v. Honeywell International, Inc., affirmed the summary dismissal of a garden variety of antitrust claims brought by Aerotec.

The Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice is vigorously pursuing civil and criminal actions against individuals—and not simply the companies they run. 

This update was also published in China Business Review on 03.17.2017, "Antitrust Division Focuses Enforcement Efforts on Individuals Behind International Cartels."

Patent settlement agreements were traditionally deemed outside the purview of antitrust scrutiny unless the patent holder’s conduct fell outside the legitimate scope of the patent’s exclusionary power.

The American Bar Association held its 64th annual Antitrust Law Spring Meeting April 5–8, 2016, in Washington, D.C.  Over 3,000 practitioners, enforcers, economists and academics from around the world came together to discuss and share views on the hottest antitrust topics of the day.

Qualcomm sells chipsets and licenses its related standard-essential patents for use in 3G- and 4G-enabled smartphones and tablets.  In late 2013, China’s National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) began investigating Qualcomm’s patent licensing practices under China’s Anti-Monopoly Law (AML).

United States antitrust law seeks to encourage free and open competition by preventing exclusionary conduct that threatens the competitive process. Intellectual property rights (IPR) laws, by contrast, are designed to encourage innovation by granting IPR holders a limited statutory right to exclude competition. Compared to many jurisdictions, United States law balances this tension more frequently in favour of the IPR holder. An extract from The Antitrust Review of the Americas 2015 - www.GlobalCompetitionReview.com.

The Antitrust Review of the Americas 2014 - 2015

In the most significant patent antitrust decision in decades, Federal Trade Commission v. Actavis, Inc., No. 12-416, 2013 WL 2922122 (June 17, 2013), the Supreme Court has held, by a 5-3 vote with Justice Alito recused, that reverse payment patent settlements are subject to antitrust scrutiny.  Although the Court rejected the Federal Trade Commission’s request that it go further and deem such settlements presumptively anticompetitive, the Court’s decision resolves a circuit split under which most courts had held that a settlement was not subject to antitrust review so long as it fell within the legitimate scope of the patent’s exclusionary power.  Monday’s decision expressly rejects that “scope of the patent” rule.

With two deft strokes, Vermont simultaneously increased the tools in its enforcement toolbox and dealt a significant blow to a well-known patent assertion entity (PAE).  First, Vermont filed suit against MPHJ Technology Investments, LLC, a PAE, alleging that the company violated the Vermont Consumer Protection Act, 9 V.S.A. §§ 2451 et seq.

On March 26, 2013, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) issued a rare negative business review letter declining to approve a plan by Intellectual Property Exchange International Inc. (IPXI) to offer a financial exchange for licensing and trading intellectual property rights.

On March 27, 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Comcast Corp. v. Behrend, 569 U.S. ___, No. 11-864, 2013 WL 1222646 (Mar. 27, 2013).

On November 20, 2012, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued a decision in Ritz Camera & Image, LLC v. SanDisk Corp., No. 2012-1183, 2012 WL 5862779 (Fed. Cir. Nov. 20, 2012). They affirmed that direct purchasers of patented products have standing to pursue a Walker Process antitrust claim against the patent holder, even where the direct purchaser cannot be sued for patent infringement and otherwise lacks the ability to bring an action for declaratory judgment.

Recently the Federal Trade Commission and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice jointly released their new Horizontal Merger Guidelines (the 2010 guidelines).

On April 20, 2010, the Federal Trade Commission and the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice jointly released their proposed revisions to the Horizontal Merger Guidelines for public comment.

Shylah Alfonso co-chaired the Seminar and moderated a panel discussion regarding criminal cartel enforcement.