To protect your position in the market while minimising risk, it's vital that you are armed with creative and pragmatic solutions to address competition law problems – whether it be defending regulatory investigations and enforcement actions, getting your deal through the ACCC or following advice to avoid complex competition issues.

Our competition team is ranked as one of the leading teams in Australia. We regularly act for blue chip clients on “bet the firm” competition litigation, mergers and acquisitions and cartel investigations. We have extensive experience dealing with the ACCC and the Australian Competition Tribunal, and advise on all aspects of the Australian Consumer Law and access and pricing regulation.

We advise major Australian public companies, multi-national corporations and private enterprises on:

  • criminal and civil cartel investigations including immunity applications
  • complex mergers, acquisitions; joint ventures and alliances including ACCC informal merger clearance
  • anti-competitive agreements, understandings and concerted practices
  • misuse of market power issues
  • exclusionary provisions (boycotts)
  • authorisations, exemptions and notifications
  • third party infrastructure access rights
  • pricing reviews
  • dawn raids and other investigative and regulatory processes;
  • all aspects of the Australian Consumer Law
  • industry codes of conduct and market inquiries and studies; and
  • compliance systems and training

We also act for and have very strong relationships with the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission. This provides our team with unparalleled insights into the workings of the regulator.

Our industry experience spans agricultural commodities, aviation, building products, energy, food manufacturing, information technology, insurance, manufacturing, media, transport and wines & beverages.

Key publications

ACCC Merger Report 2023

7th edition of our report on recent trends in complex informal merger clearance decisions made by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC).

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ACCC Merger Report 2022

6th edition of our report on recent trends in complex informal merger clearance decisions made by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC).

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ACCC Merger Report 2021

Fifth edition of our report on recent trends in complex merger review cases by the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission.

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Experience

Mergers & acquisitions

PepsiCo

Obtaining ACCC informal clearance for PepsiCo’s US$3.2 billion acquisition of SodaStream.

Qantas Airways

Advising on the ACCC’s investigation into the 19.9% acquisition of Alliance Airlines.

Ruralco

Obtaining ACCC informal clearance for acquisition by Nutrien.

Bauer Media

Obtaining ACCC informal clearance for acquisition of Pacific Magazines from Seven West Media.

Unilever

Obtaining ACCC informal clearance for acquisition of Weis.

Jetstar Airways

Obtaining authorisation for Jetstar Pan Asian Strategy and approvals in multiple overseas jurisdictions.

Yahoo! Inc

Obtaining informal clearance for Bing search engine deal with Microsoft.

Cartels

Unilever

Acted for immunity applicant in ACCC prosecution of Colgate Palmolive, PZ Cussons and Woolworths (laundry detergent cartel).

Global multi-national

Advising in relation to global cartel investigation and proceedings.

Domestic cartels

Advising and acting in a number of domestic criminal cartel investigations and proceedings including for immunity applicants.

Prysmian Cavi E Sistemi S.R.L

Acted for Prysmian concerning cartel conduct in relation to the supply of high voltage land cables in Australia.

Investigation and Litigation

Ramsay Health Care

Successfully defending an ACCC prosecution for misuse of market power and exclusive dealing.

Jetstar Airways

Advising in relation to the ACCC's Airlines Terms and Conditions project.

RateSetter

Acting in the Australian Competition Tribunal in respect of the authorisation of New Energy Tech Consumer Code.

Access Regulation

Airlines for Australia Group

Submissions on access arrangements to airports (on behalf of all major Australian airlines).

State and Federal regulators

Advising on an declaration applications under Part IIIA and access undertakings under state based regimes.

Port Authorities

Advising on access regimes and their application to Australian ports including re-certification of effective access regimes.

Recognition

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